Page 1024 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 17 March 2010
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Madam Assistant Speaker, my fears have proven correct. I explicitly stated that I would work with the government and with the Greens, and I went so far as to write to Mr Stanhope in February to that end, after he put out some baseless criticisms of my bill. I will read into the Hansard what I wrote to Mr Stanhope:
Dear Jon,
In a collegiate fashion I note that your government has recently announced a change in its position in relation to the introduction of random drug testing in the ACT. The opposition welcomes this change in the government’s position and I believe that the broader community will applaud what is a very important road safety initiative.
As you are aware, I currently have tabled before the Assembly a private members’ bill which will introduce a framework for random drug testing based on the Victorian model, the Road Transport (Alcohol and Drugs Random Drug Testing) Bill 2009, which was tabled in December 2009 and which I intend to bring forward to debate in March 2010.
The criticisms that you have levelled at my bill have unfortunately been misleading and without substance and I would welcome the opportunity to provide you with any clarification that you require. If you have genuine amendments to my legislation then I would be very open to discussing these with you.
For example, my legislation specifically lists cannabis and methamphetamine as proscribed illicit drugs, as the evidence shows that they are both prevalent drugs found in drivers. The bill makes provision for additional illicit drugs to be included under regulation and further illicit drugs, such as ecstasy, could easily be included by the minister at any time. If you genuinely consider that other illicit drugs should be proscribed from the onset, then the opposition is willing to adopt an amendment to the bill to that effect.
I look forward to working with you on this important road safety initiative and believe that it is in the community’s interests that we adopt a cooperative approach towards implementing this important legislation.
What response did I get? Absolutely nothing. What a shame. I also met with the Greens. I met with Mr Rattenbury and Ms Bresnan; I met in a collegiate fashion and I think they would have to agree that the meeting was taken in good faith. There was certainly no intent by me to do anything other than engage with them in a very constructive manner. They actually asked during that meeting that I delay the debate until March because they wanted to consider it. Initially, I was going to bring it on on 24 February and I said: “Yes, of course. Have an extra month. This is important legislation. We want to get it right. Take that time to consider and then bring any amendments that you may have back to me and we can move forward on this bill.”
Unfortunately, things have changed with the Greens since that meeting. They have now changed their position on what they want to do. So rather than debate it in March, as we had discussed, now what they are going to do is simply to reject it. The Greens, it is clear, want to delay, they want to postpone and they want to hinder this
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