Page 1656 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 4 May 2010
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problems that face those that are incarcerated in the prison, those that seek to help modify their behaviour, those that provide services and the families of those inmates.
Then we get the issue of the minister who turns up for the good news but will not turn up and face the music when something goes wrong. He is looking more and more like Kevin Rudd every day. He is the minister who will be there when there is something meaningful to announce. He will turn up for the good stories. But he trots out the public servants—he hides behind the public servants—when it is time to be held to account. That is not leadership. Is it any wonder that the corrections staff have no respect for their minister; any wonder that morale is so poor; any wonder there are resignations; any wonder there are protests from the prisoners? It comes back to one thing—it comes back to this minister.
If the Greens had bothered to look at the notice of motion, point (2) details what happened in February 2010. So there we have, in (a) through to (j), the failings of the Labor Party, the government, and in particular this minister. But then, if you go from (iii) through to (x), it details what happened, particularly in (v), that in the three months since the motion was debated, what else has gone wrong? What further serious management, safety and security breaches have occurred at the AMC?
We heard nothing of this from Ms Bresnan because her speech was written somewhere else; she just reads from the script. We saw the wrongful release of a prisoner. We saw allegations of breach of procedure and falsification of documents relating to a death in custody. We have seen the allegations of rape and abuse of a detainee at the prison leading to an ACT Supreme Court justice to warn the ACT government that:
If the community cannot protect someone who is detained then the community cannot expect to retain that detention.
We saw the lockdown of prisoners for 20 hours a day due to staff shortages. We have seen a lengthy protest by 13 prisoners on the roof of the prison building as a result of the lockdowns. We have seen the tacit approval and support of the corrections officers—because they have no respect for their minister—for that protest. We have seen delay and disruption to rehabilitation because of the lockdowns and staff shortages. I know one organisation that did not get in for weeks to deliver rehabilitation programs. It told me it was locked out for at least two weeks. And we have seen, of course, other organisations turned away.
That is what has happened in the last three months. But the Greens blithely ignore that. They say: “Well, we’ve had a secret briefing. We’re in bed with the government. We’re part of the alliance. It’s all okay.” What Ms Bresnan and what the Greens—
Ms Hunter: Ha, ha!
MR SMYTH: Perhaps Ms Hunter will do it. Perhaps Ms Hunter will stand and tell us exactly what the standard of accountability for a minister is. Perhaps the Greens will let us know what is the threshold question when it comes to dealing with ministers taking responsibility for their portfolios and remaining in place in those portfolios to deliver the programs that they are meant to do.
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