Page 2905 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 24 June 2009
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I do not know whether the quote in the Canberra Times today is based on what he said again yesterday, but Mr Stanhope said, “Genworth withdrew because it was hit by the financial crisis.” He is calling into question the truthfulness of what they told him and what is in the letter. It goes to how he has treated this issue over a period of time. He was getting concerns right through. There is a reason it has taken two years to get one lender actually on board after two years. There is a reason for that. There were serious concerns expressed from day one. In fact, going right back to 2004, we saw concerns expressed about the scheme.
Yet what did Mr Stanhope have to say on it? On 25 June last year he said, “It is supported everywhere, across the board.” That is not true. That is simply not true. It was not supported across the board, as evidenced by the fact that after two years they had managed to scrape one lender. If it was supported across the board, you would have 20 lenders or 50 lenders. You would have lenders everywhere offering finance for this scheme, but they do not.
Then he said on 26 June, “At no stage has any financial institution indicated the nature of the land rent scheme would provide an impediment to lending.” That is not true. Once again, that is not true. We see this pattern on this issue. We see this pattern on this issue from Jon Stanhope.
Then, in the lead-up to the election, having had all these concerns expressed to government—and they were desperately seeking a lender—he was asked about it. On 28 August 2008, before the election, six weeks out, he said, “We have no reason to believe that the relationships we have with them and the undertakings we have from financial institutions are other than they will support land rent.” We know that is, again, not true. He could have said: “We are still hopeful that we might get one but we are struggling. We are struggling to get one on board.” But he said, “No, there are no problems with this scheme, no problems at all.”
Then, “In relation to the interest of banks and lending institutions, the interest has been strong.” We have seen the pattern of behaviour and he still continues to avoid this particular issue. Recommendation 39 of the estimates committee says:
The Committee recommends the Chief Minister prepare and table a full briefing for the Assembly, in the next sitting, on the progress of the Land Rent scheme, a timeline of what advice his office and department received, and a cross reference to information provided to the public, and to reveal the identity of lending institutions, if any, who have officially offered support for the scheme.
He noted the response and then said he has got a land rent paper. That does not cover most of the things in this. It covers maybe one or two. It covers not much—“a briefing”, I suppose. It is very brief. There is not much detail in it. If you go through it, it does not cover a time line of what advice his office and department received and a cross-reference to information provided to the public. Why not? What is he hiding on this issue? What did he know prior to the election and how does that accord with his public statements? We are entitled to know.
The other thing is that Mr Smyth will be moving an amendment, which I think has been circulated, actually calling on him to give details of this partnership arrangement.
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