Page 3747 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 26 August 2009
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
These concerns were aired by a member of the Labor Party—not a member of the Liberal Party—and a very important member: the president of the Labor club. We have heard about the politics of envy. The concerns were raised by the president of the Canberra Labor Club Group. I am not sure what he is envious of. It certainly was not raised by the Liberal Party.
Do we take an interest in these issues when they are raised? Yes, we do. Yes, we should. Yes, we have an obligation to because that is the role of the opposition: to scrutinise in this case what the government is doing, in this case the minister in her administration of the act, and—
Ms Gallagher: And you have not been able to find any fault, have you Brendan, unfortunately?
MR SMYTH: No. That is just it. The minister said we have not been able to find any faults. We have not raised any faults. We want the murkiness cleared. That is what we are asking for here. With respect to Ms Hunter, we acknowledge the motion of last week, but since then we have asked further questions of the Chief Minister and he has not answered those questions to our satisfaction.
Four ministers gave unequivocal answers—not me, not my staff and not my representative. The Chief Minister does not do the same, and it is the shame the Chief Minister is not here to talk about the issue. Indeed, it is instructive that for most of her speech the minister did not address the motion. She spoke about process. That is fine. She spoke about the act and the commission. That is fine as well.
But the point here is: what is the Chief Minister’s role in this? We have seen the back-flip. As I have pointed out, the Chief Minister is on the administrative committee. They directed the board not to do it. He voted for it, apparently. It was a unanimous vote—I think he told the Canberra Times—a unanimous vote. But then today he says he is in favour of the sale. What is his position on this? We do not know. We do not know what influence he has brought to bear because he has not told us.
The minister said that I had said that only the Assembly can investigate corporations law or possible tax implications. The minister needs to listen more closely. I will read the paragraph again. I said, “The commission can only”—she agreed with me; she said I got this bit right—“investigate the gaming issues. The commission cannot examine the application of corporations law or any possible tax implication.” I then said, “Indeed, the commission cannot determine policies relating to gambling: that is for the Assembly alone.”
That is what I said. I did not say the Assembly was the only body that could investigate the Corporations Law or possible tax implications. But it can, and it could reasonably do it through an inquiry, potentially through the public accounts committee. We may talk about that later.
The issue here is the continuing murkiness of the on-again, off-again sale. We do not know who these people of influence are. In theory, we do not even know who owns
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .