Page 4104 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 16 Sept 2009
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and I hope that it is. The ACT government will take a lead in any debate at the primary industry ministerial council in relation to that in 2010.
MS LE COUTEUR (Molonglo) (5.24): We would like to keep this clause. I am very pleased that the Chief Minister has said that he will continue to advocate regardless of whether it is part of the bill. By memory, although I am not totally sure, Mrs Dunne also suggested that she thought it was reasonable that the Chief Minister continue to advocate. Given that there is agreement that the Chief Minister should continue to advocate, I cannot really see what the problem is in making it part of the legislation. I understand that there are reporting requirements in legislation covering many things where the government is required to report back on its progress on this, that and the other. This is just one of those. The government is saying it is going to do it; we are saying: “Great. Government, you are going to do it. Let it be part of the legislation. You report back every year about it.” It just makes the whole position a bit stronger if it is actually part of the legislation rather than something which the Chief Minister agrees to do out of the goodness of his heart. I do applaud him for that, and I do seriously thank him for this. I know he is a chicken lover at heart. I would like to have stronger legislative backing in case we have a chief minister in the future who is not so kindly disposed towards chickens.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (5.26): The Liberal opposition will be opposing this clause. We oppose this more vehemently than any other clause in the bill, because it is not appropriate to have this sort of wording in legislation. It is, in fact, completely outside any legislation and it is also unnecessary. As I have said, if we think that the Chief Minister is not doing his job as he has undertaken to do, the Assembly is free to direct him to do so by virtue of a motion in the Assembly. That would be something that we would look at on its merits if the need arose.
Something I was looking for before, Mr Speaker—it is slightly off the mark but it does need to be put on the record—is a piece of correspondence that I received from the President of the Free Range Egg and Poultry Association in relation to the Greens bill:
As a free range producer, I cannot support this …
that is, the Greens bill—
Consumers should have a real choice in what they buy—including lower priced eggs. Free Range egg producers cannot produce eggs in the way the consumer expects for the prices Woolies and Coles are prepared to pay (and Woolworths are now pushing down the price of free range further).
The correspondent goes on to question whether the Greens and Animal Liberation want to stop all use of animals:
They do not especially like free range production. They just think we are the best of a bad lot.
She goes on to say:
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