Page 1488 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 6 June 2007
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
Personal explanation
MRS BURKE (Molonglo) (3.59): Mr Speaker, I seek leave under standing order 46 to make a personal explanation.
MR SPEAKER: The member may proceed.
MRS BURKE: Mr Hargreaves in question time today alluded to the fact that I had misled people. I want to read out a couple of things from my press release and then from Mr Hargreaves’s press release. I will go with Mr Hargreaves’s first, as his was the first out. In Mr Hargreaves’s release—I quote the last two paragraphs—he says:
We have a situation where families with three or more children are waiting for public housing, while single tenants are residing in three and four bedroom homes.
Housing ACT estimates that under-utilisation has resulted in the equivalent of 500 three-bedroom homes sitting empty.
I say in my media release:
It is absolutely astounding that the Minister for Housing has only just now been informed of an apparent under-utilisation of properties managed under the Housing portfolio. How could the Minister have discovered now that there is an equivalent of 500 three-bedroom properties lying idle—
Mr Hargreaves: No, you didn’t say that in the Canberra Times, did you?
MRS BURKE: Hang on; I am coming to that—
while Canberra families continue to sit on waiting lists to access housing assistance.
A Canberra Times article of 6 June by Marika Dobbin stated:
Opposition housing spokeswoman Jacqui Burke said the minister’s mismanagement of his housing portfolio was a disgrace.
“What poor management that we now have an estimated—
MR SPEAKER: Order! My leave for you to make a statement pursuant to standing order 46 goes to the issue of being misrepresented in this place.
MRS BURKE: Yes, I am getting to the heart of that, Mr Speaker. I will move along very quickly. I note your ruling on the matter.
MR SPEAKER: Well, come to it, please.
MRS BURKE: What I wanted to move on to was the second point of Mr Hargreaves’s point. I had said that there were thousands on the waiting lists, and I
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .