Page 3613 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 25 August 2009
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The issue of school closures is a very simple one. This is a government that had a lot of meetings about school closures. It had a lot of meetings about school closures but only after it had made the decision that it was going to close a lot of schools. It did not actually consult—say, at the election—honestly and openly about whether or not it would be reasonable to close a lot of schools. They said they would not close before the election and then after the election they went and consulted on exactly which schools should be closed. Then they said they would not be selling the sites and, of course, then they went and consulted on which sites should be sold.
People do look very sceptically at their community consultation. Simply saying it is community consultation, simply having a newsletter, does not make it genuine community consultation. We see that again more recently with the issue of the fringe festival. We saw the fascinating exchange on this issue on Alex Sloan’s program where the Chief Minister was being forced to defend Minister Hargreaves for his lack of consultation with Jorian Gardner. That would have been a fairly simple thing. It is one thing to spend thousands of dollars on newsletters, but making a phone call to the person running the festival would have been a fairly simple form of community consultation.
The Chief Minister certainly looked and sounded very uncomfortable when he was being asked about this. Alex Sloan says to him, “This goes to the relevant minister, which is John Hargreaves.” He says, “Well, I am not going to that point.” I think there is a reason why, Madam Assistant Speaker. And Alex Sloan goes on, “I am just wondering if it has got to that, and when we get the blow-out in TAMS, and again that has happened on John Hargreaves’s watch when he was minister. Of course, you took over that portfolio after you were re-elected, but again it goes to John Hargreaves. I mean, why is he still in this job?” The Chief Minister said, “Well, I support—” and then Alex Sloan says, “And I bring up the Al Grassby statue.” The response was, “Well, Alex, I think that is being a little bit—” and Sloan says, “Well, I think it might be expressing how the community feels about it. We wonder why he is still in such an important role.”
The Chief Minister’s response was overwhelming. He says, “Well, Alex,” pause, “Um,” pause, “You know,” pause, “I have no hesitation in defending John Hargreaves, no hesitation in defending John Hargreaves. He is a valued minister within my cabinet.” And didn’t we all believe him; didn’t we all believe him with his lack of hesitation in endorsing his ministerial colleague?
We all believed him with his three pauses prior to not hesitating in defending John Hargreaves. He goes on. He does then criticise him for his consultation with Jorian Gardner. He says, “In the context of this issue you raised, there are aspects in relation to consultation with Jorian Gardner, but the fundamental issue, the overspend in relation to which I have expectation that John Hargreaves would respond, it’s just not acceptable for that level of overspend, to that degree of management or the lack of management.”
So what is he going to do about this? Alex put this to him: “So you are acknowledging that he has not handled these things well. Is it because he controls the
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