Page 546 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 5 March 2008
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
I believe that that has been the strategy today. Consequently, I eschew the amendment. It makes me wonder why we bother to have private members business day, which I believe in and support, if it is turned into a circus like this. That is what seems to me to be happening.
I am going to try to take an approach to this motion and, to some extent, the amendment as though it was put forward seriously. I would like to think that we are actually here saying what we think and believe is for the betterment of Canberra, not for the one-upmanship of “my party is better than yours; my government is better than yours was”, which is basically what this debate has boiled down to.
Before I go anywhere, let us consider: when cuts are made to Canberra’s institutions and to the NCA, who is affected? Not just Canberra but the whole of Australia! And I do not hear anybody here making that point today. Whose national institutions are they? They are not just Canberra’s. They are not just here for our tourist industry, believe it or not, though they certainly help our tourist industry. I believe they are pretty well what our tourist industry is based around. And I do not know that people would come here if we were just a provincial country town, which we would be if we were not the national capital. So let us remember that, when we argue for proper funding of these institutions, we are arguing on behalf of all Australians.
What kind of job does the National Library do? Without that, our national history would not be safeguarded. If all those documents of those people who become more and more important to us—the Judith Wrights of this world, all the other forgotten poets, all the writers, all the people whose documents are there—cannot be looked after, where is our history? It makes it very much easier for a future government to tell the history as they want it, to talk about black-armband versions and to outlaw anything which they do not like and which does not suit their political agenda.
I think that we are finding here today that efficiency dividends have always been made at Canberra’s expense. It is true. The previous government did it, and the one before that and the one before that. But currently we are talking about the Rudd government. Why do they do it? For a start, they do it because the media enhances this idea that Canberra is just a place full of politicians. They do not think about the people who live here, nor do they appreciate that their national capital is their national capital. And that may be something that needs to be talked up, not just by this government but by the Rudd Government. It is theirs; it is not ours in that sense.
The second reason why governments do that depends pretty much on how the voting works in this territory. We have a very predictable outcome: we will always elect two Labor Party members to the House of Reps, while there are two seats. We know that, when there was a third, it was marginal. We will elect one Liberal and one Labor Party senator. The Greens are making inroads into that. Mr Smyth was in the lower house. I believe there was a third seat at that time.
Mr Smyth: No, two seats.
DR FOSKEY: I apologise to Mr Smyth. I would like to see those seats become marginal again because I think that is what makes government sit up and listen. It is the way it goes; that is politics.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .