Page 1954 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 6 May 2009
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MR HARGREAVES: All you’ve got to do, Mr Precious, is just cop it. You know, cop it. What you have got to do is suck it up. Just suck it up and grow up. Madam Deputy Speaker, I find it absolutely amazing that I did not have to utter one word before the whole of the intellectual mob over here went clunk. They absolutely amaze me sometimes. You absolutely amaze me, you blokes.
I looked at this motion from Mr Smyth and I thought the temerity of it was absolutely mind-boggling. Let me just go back in history a tad. How many members opposite, I ask rhetorically, were members of the Carnell government ministry? One. Which of the people over there had anything to do with the Bruce Stadium fiasco? One. How many of those people over there had something to do with the “Feel the Power” numberplates? Do you remember that? We do. How many of those people over there were in the ministry that was responsible for Katie painting the fuselage of an aeroplane to send it off? How many of those opposite had something to do with the introduction of the futsal slab or the Hall-Kinlyside debacle? How many people? Just one.
Opposition members interjecting—
MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Resume your seat, Mr Hargreaves. Stop the clock, please. Members, be quiet and listen to Mr Hargreaves. Mr Hargreaves, will you stop provoking those opposite—
MR HARGREAVES: I would never provoke anybody.
MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: and address the amendment to the motion.
MR HARGREAVES: Well, I can provoke them merely by breathing, Madam Deputy Speaker. All I did was stand up and utter a breath and they went berserk. But I do take your advice, Madam Deputy Speaker. Thank you very much.
The single difference between what the Labor Party has done over the last couple of terms of government and what we witnessed when I came here in 1998 is that we have actually moved forward. We have moved forward on quite a number of issues, and they are social justice issues. Mr Smyth sits there and carps away and does not actually do anything. I agree with my colleague. One of the things I tried to do when I was in opposition—I do not know if I was successful or not, but I did try—was to be critical where it was needed but actually to say that something was well done when it was. An examination of the Hansard will reveal that. But I do not see that coming out of Mr Smyth. I do not see it at all.
Mr Hanson: Maybe they did some good stuff and you don’t, John. That is the conclusion I draw.
MR HARGREAVES: Well, have a look at some of the gigantic leaps that we have made over the last few years to support people in the disability sector. They are significant. Mega dollars have gone into the disability sector. The whole housing sector has been reformed. When I inherited the housing portfolio 4½ years ago, Mr Smyth had sold off a thousand units. We got them back. It took us a while, but we got them back. I took over from Mr Wood, who had spent three years trying to repair the damage that Mr Smyth did. When we took office in 2001, the waiting list was 3,500 people.
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