Page 1388 - Week 04 - Thursday, 26 March 2009
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This will be the fundamental philosophical question for the minister to answer, but it is a fundamental economic question. It is this: you cannot stand up and make the argument that on the one hand this needs to go through—we agree with that; we agree that it should go through—but say that any other moves to assist other types of developments or the same types of developments in a different context, funded from a different source, should not be in any way assisted.
This is the challenge for the Labor Party. If they do oppose it, they will have to say to industry, “No, we don’t support those jobs; we do support these jobs. We don’t support that economic activity; we do support this economic activity.” The only difference appears to be that it is because it is Kevin Rudd’s money and it is being funded as a result of the stimulus package coming from the federal government. That is not a reasonable argument. That does not make any economic sense.
We need to be encouraging private sector investment. At a time of a slowing economy, we should be encouraging investment in our territory. We should be encouraging both public sector and private sector investment in our territory. We should be encouraging this economic activity. We should be encouraging jobs. This will be the question.
There will be a lot more said about this. We will, no doubt, be having further debates on this very issue in coming days and weeks in the Assembly. That is the fundamental question that Andrew Barr will have to answer. Is this only good for Kevin Rudd’s money? Is it only good to open up the system when Kevin Rudd funds it and it is done because he is told to by the Prime Minister? Or, if the principle is reasonable that relatively minor developments should not be unreasonably delayed—because, clearly, this planning minister does not have a lot of confidence in the system that has been set up; he does not have confidence that this will be able to get through without it being exempted—is it not also good for private sector development? That is the fundamental question.
Just to summarise, Mr Speaker, I think it is odd. I do repeat that I do not think there is any reason for this, but we are very happy to vote against the minister’s motion. We are always happy to vote against the minister’s motion if we think it is a dud one. And this is a dud motion, particularly because he tells us that he does not want it to be supported, for a start. He knows the Greens are not going to support it and he knows we are not going to support it.
We will make it clear: we will not be voting for this disallowance motion. But let us have the further debate. If it is reasonable here, where else is it reasonable to extend it? Where else can we underpin the productive capacity of the ACT economy? Where else can we help confidence in the sector? Where else can we encourage further private sector development to underpin jobs and underpin our economy? We will not be supporting this disallowance motion.
MS LE COUTEUR (Molonglo) (10.46): I would like to start by agreeing with quite a few of the sentiments of Mr Seselja. The Greens also find this a very interesting methodology, particularly given the advice that Mr Seselja has repeated from the Clerk—that, even if this motion is not passed today, the Assembly still has six days in
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