Page 2719 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 26 September 2007
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as losses or damages. This is Stanhope and Corbell social engineering at its worst. They should show us that that is not true and support this bill.
In no way, Mr Speaker, does this bill serve to negate the high duty of care that all doctors owe their patients. This bill very carefully steps around any possibility of cutting across damages action. That is the way that Mrs Dunne has designed this bill, so that fundamental is underscored. That fundamental is not opposed in any way.
Labor should support Mrs Dunne’s legislation. This is sensible legislation; it goes to the heart of defending the family, the family value, the dignity of the child and all the things that we cherish as a society. That is all this legislation does. Well, that is not all it does—it is a powerful piece of work—but that is fundamentally what it is aimed at and nothing else: supporting the family, supporting our children, and supporting the dignity of our children so that our children know that they do not have to blame their parents for what they have become or for what their parents might think of them. That is very, very important if we are going to make our society successfully regenerate and continue our traditions.
Therefore, Mr Speaker, I commend Mrs Dunne’s bill to this place. I stress to the government that it is a sensible piece of work. I call upon the government to support Mrs Dunne’s bill.
MR SMYTH (Brindabella) (4.48): Much has been said this afternoon, and there are several points that need to be cleared up before we go any further. Mr Corbell is the expert at spin, interjecting across the chamber, latching on to a small thread and pulling at it so that it will unravel the carpet. He twists and he turns at every stage. He suggests that Mrs Dunne’s bill, the Civil Law (Wrongs) Amendment Bill 2005, allows you to sue for a disabled child but not for a normal child. It is not true. Mr Corbell knows it, and if he does not know it then he should resign his portfolio as Attorney-General because he is not up to reading plain English. It is as simple as that.
The bill ensures that damages are still able to be sought for damage to a disabled child. It is for their disability, not for their existence. The damage is the disability, not the existence of the child itself. If you want to throw barbs and jibes across the chamber, Mr Corbell, you should go right ahead, but you are wrong, and expressing your ignorance in this way does not bring anything to your position as Attorney-General. I suggest you should read the bill.
As for Dr Foskey, I have never heard such a load of codswallop cobbled together in my entire life. If you want to take a serious issue and have a general spray at women’s fertility and sexual health issues then go for your life. But all that you do, Dr Foskey, is to demean yourself and the Greens movement. You show that, yet again, you cannot read the bill. You should go back and do some remedial English courses if you think that what you have portrayed here is consistent with what Mrs Dunne has put in her bill.
I am probably the only person in this place who can speak from the experience of having twins. I have got twins. The Canberra Times editorial on Sunday was really interesting. Its description of the case was as follows:
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