Page 1342 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 24 March 2010
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
MR HANSON: I want to say up front that the Liberal opposition—
Mr Stanhope interjecting—
MR SPEAKER: Mr Stanhope, please.
Mr Stanhope: I just do need to make a point about—
MR HANSON: Will you stop the clocks, please.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Hanson, continue with your speech, thank you.
MR HANSON: The Liberal opposition are going to scrutinise this latest proposal. Once we get the detail we will go through it vigorously. We will engage with stakeholders. Although we will be putting some words in the Hansard today raising a significant number of concerns about the process and what has been presented to us, or the lack of what has been presented to us, it is very important to state from the outset, as we did last time, that we will look at this in good faith. We will examine the proposal that is put before us when we have the detail and then we will make a decision. But we certainly will not be rushed into making that decision until we have all the information and we have spoken to the relevant stakeholders and those who are engaged. What we will not be doing is accepting any rhetoric from the government. Last time Katy Gallagher said:
… I think, from Mr Hanson’s point of view, that he is out here to spoil … he is trying to create fear and misconceptions …
I am simply trying to find out the truth, because the only way we get the truth out of this minister about what is going on behind closed doors is by demanding answers either in this place or in the media. I will go through the motion and what we are calling for. The first point that I make is that this government has been attempting to purchase Calvary hospital since it started its secret negotiations in August 2008. So this is not new; it began over 18 months ago. We know that the government was trying to do this, in secret, before the last election. It was trying to get a heads of agreement signed in August last year. We know that, whilst the minister was trying, behind closed doors, to get deals signed, she was saying to the electorate, “We have all of our deals on the table; all of our plans are on the table.” That simply was not true. That was a misleading statement. There is no other way to interpret it.
People wonder why the opposition constantly inquire of Katy Gallagher what the truth is, why we probe her so hard in question time and why we demand answers of her. She has form, Madam Deputy Speaker. We know that trusting Katy Gallagher simply on face value is a very dangerous thing to do. If you trust what she says, the smile, the grin—the “Oh trust me, everything will be okay”—then that is a very dangerous thing to do. Behind closed doors, behind the grin and behind the soft face of the Labor Party that they try to put out is the hard, cold reality that they do something very differently when it comes to actions with comparison to the rhetoric that they put out. We saw that very clearly in this place. We saw it with school closures. That was just referred
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video