Page 4452 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 14 October 2009
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MR COE: Treasurer, what discussions have you had with the ACCC on this issue?
MS GALLAGHER: I have not had any discussions with the ACCC on this issue.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Seselja, a supplementary?
MR SESELJA: Yes, thanks, Mr Speaker. Treasurer, has the ACCC approved or looked at the recommendations of the review?
MR STANHOPE: As members of the Assembly know, the ACCC review, the Martin review, was actually initiated by me and was conducted under the auspices of the Chief Minister’s Department. I do not know why the Liberals persist with this childish behaviour of asking questions of the minister who is not the responsible minister—the minister who does not have the background, the minister who did not have the discussions, the minister who did not receive the report and the minister who did not actually arrange for the government’s response to the report.
I am not quite sure what this childish gaggle that passes itself off as an opposition believes is the benefit of continuing to ask ministers who do not have responsibility for an issue to answer questions on that—
Opposition members interjecting—
Mrs Dunne: I raise a point of order on relevance, Mr Speaker.
MR SPEAKER: Order, Chief Minister!
MR STANHOPE: Well, I think that bit of context was reasonable. This puerile childishness from the opposition really is—
Opposition members interjecting—
MR STANHOPE: The government, through the Chief Minister’s Department, commissioned Mr John Martin, a commissioner from the ACCC. The Martin report is not a report of the ACCC. I am surprised that that has not dawned on Mr Seselja yet. It is a report commissioned by the Chief Minister’s Department, through me, of an ex-commissioner of the ACCC in response to recommendations by the ACCC in relation to the role that territory and local governments can play in enhancing competition within the territory.
The ACCC may have a view, but we certainly do not need their approval or their authority; nor will we be seeking their specific intervention or involvement in decisions that we make as a government in relation to competition within the supermarket or retail sector of the ACT.
It is a good report, and it is surprising that the opposition adopt their typical standard opposition for opposition’s sake; that Mr Seselja immediately got into bed with Woolworths and Coles and abandoned the consumer. It is a typical automatic response, the response that we expect. The Liberals are backing Woolworths. The Labor Party are backing the consumer. (Time expired.)
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