Page 849 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 16 March 2010
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There are important bills to be debated today. Indeed, there are three very significant pieces of legislation that should be being debated at this very minute in relation most particularly to health. Here we have the entire morning of a day of executive business—the day set aside to debate legislation of the government for the people of Canberra—where the business is essentially put in second place, referred to second place, reduced to a lesser priority by an opposition that thinks this spurious, nonsensical notion that an ACT minister in some way can be held responsible for a federal program is more important than debating health legislation.
That is the opposition’s priority in relation to this. “Let’s talk about some spurious issue that might get us on TV or get us a headline in the paper”—rather than having to do the hard work of trying to assess and understand important legislation that the government was hoping to debate today. That is what we have.
This morning has just been the most ridiculous waste of time. It was quite clear that not a single member of the opposition, led by the Leader of the Opposition, believed for a minute anything they said. That is how confected it is. There was no energy in the place, no atmosphere, no feeling that this was genuine or that there was any substance to the motion. Indeed, it has to be said that the majority of the last two hours has been spent attacking the Greens for daring to have an opinion that did not match theirs. The entire morning has been consumed by each and every one of the Liberal Party members in this place standing up and attacking the Greens for daring, for having the temerity, to come to an independent view on a matter, for daring to disagree with the Liberal Party. We have had a two-hour attack on the Greens because they did not agree. As I said, it could almost have been a censure motion by the Liberal Party against the Greens for daring to think.
I do have a prepared speech here, Madam Assistant Speaker, but this is all so tawdry and boring that I cannot be bothered delivering it.
MR SESELJA (Molonglo—Leader of the Opposition) (11.58), in reply: We see that the Chief Minister again has run out of puff. The best they could put up in defence of this minister was a member of the Greens and a Chief Minister who could not be bothered. It is extraordinary, isn’t it, to see the amount of passion and energy defending this minister?
We did not hear the Chief Minister address the issue once. We did not hear it, because it is indisputable. It is indisputable that he misled. It is as clear as day. Even Mr Rattenbury could not deny it. All he could say was, “Well, you have got to put it into context,” and, “Well, I don’t know if he really meant to say that.” It is crystal clear. Even the defenders of Mr Corbell—such as they are, in the Greens and Mr Stanhope—could not dispute the substance of the issue.
We had a minister who persistently and wilfully misled. He did it on several occasions. He claimed more than once in this place that there were no documents, and there were hundreds of documents. He claimed that there were no documents. He said, “Well, there may have been some emails, some chatter.” But he signed a letter to Minister Garrett. He received a letter. He received a briefing. That pathetic defence is blown out of the water.
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