Page 2609 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 2 July 2008
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There is a letter which Mr Seselja has in his possession because he flashed it around yesterday, which he didn’t mention to you, a letter from me dated 19th July to John Mackay … Vicki Dunne held the letter up in Estimates yesterday.
That was what the Chief Minister said on 2CC radio on the morning of 17 June 2008. Wrong! When he was challenged the next day by the Leader of the Opposition during an interview on 2CC on whether the document had been released, Mr Stanhope lied again. The transcript states:
Mr Seselja: “His department specifically denied me access to this very document, so the Chief Minister now needs to clarify what he meant.”
Jon Stanhope: You’re not telling the truth again.”
That was on 2CC on 18 June 2008. Wrong again! The indexes to the documents released by the Chief Minister’s Department under FOI law very clearly show that the Chief Minister’s letter signed on 19 July 2007 was suppressed under section 27 (1) of the FOI act. The Chief Minister’s Department is still consulting with ActewAGL on whether to release this document in whole or in part. The relevant folios are 174 and 175 of file 07/7920.
What you held up, Madam Assistant Speaker, was not a copy of the letter of 19 July 2007. What was held up was a copy of a related document that had been heavily censored by the government. I quote Mrs Dunne from the transcript of the estimates committee of 16 June 2008, page 1,239:
Can I just point out, for instance, Chief Minister, in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act, the Leader of the Opposition requested a document which is folios 10 to 15 of the FOI request, which looks rather like this—I am sorry, but for the Hansard record there are big black squares on the page. I just need to show you this, Chief Minister, and I will be happy to table it when I am finished it.
This, Chief Minister, is a draft of the submission—
not the letter—
that you received on 17 July and signed off on on 18 July. The opposition did not receive the final version of this.
This is the government that promised to be open and accountable. This is the government that promised it would not hide behind cabinet in confidence. This is the government that promised its public servants would not become entrepreneurs. This is the government that has breached its promises.
This government has released documents to the media that it would not release to members of the Legislative Assembly under FOI. This contemptuous behaviour of Mr Stanhope in providing a select group of documents to the media without providing them to the opposition is yet another nail in the coffin of his government. He said his government would respect Westminster convention, yet majority has gone to its head.
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