Page 5365 - Week 14 - Thursday, 19 November 2009

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At the time of the opening, as the Minister was not appropriately briefed on the delays, the community was not adequately informed about the delays …

So we were not adequately informed before the election. This is a pattern from this government. Before elections, they will just try and get away with it. We have seen it before, haven’t we? “All the plans are on the table except for the secret deal on Calvary. We are not going to close schools—yes we are, after the election. We have got a prison to open—oops it’s not ready.”

This is a pattern, and Mr Corbell has been caught out. The facts are so compelling that even his colleagues cannot defend him. Ordinarily, we would expect some sort of defence. We would expect that, if there was even a slight argument in his favour, we would have seen a Labor dissenting report. We would have seen some words to defend him, but we have not seen them. We can only draw two conclusions from that. One conclusion is that there was no credible defence put up by Mr Corbell. The other one is that there are serious divisions and that, in fact, Mr Corbell is right when he says that there is a political attack coming at him from his own party, that his own party has engaged in a sham, that his own Labor Party colleagues have engaged in a sham in order to stitch him up. That is the extraordinary claim that has been made by Mr Corbell in this place today.

The findings go on. Finding No 15 is:

The Radio Frequency Identification System was not completely operational …

Finding No 20 is:

At the time of the commencement of operation of the AMC Defect 2.6 (involving the hierarchy of the security system and how the master control and subordinate control points relate to each other) was unresolved.

And, of course, finding No 22, which is fascinating to us all, states:

While there were significant delays in installing the AMC security system not all the delays to the commencement of operations of the AMC were due to the security system as the Attorney-General has contended.

Let us just reflect for a moment on what the finding is actually saying. This unanimous report from the JACS committee is saying that he was not being up-front, that he contended something that was simply wrong. He contended something that was wrong, and he has been caught out. That is a serious finding and a serious charge. Let us have it again:

This is what Ms Porter signed off on, this is what Ms Hunter signed off on and this is what Mrs Dunne signed off on in this unanimous report. They are saying that the Attorney-General was not up-front. He made claims that were simply wrong, claims

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