Page 6162 - Week 14 - Thursday, 9 December 2010
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taxes, fees and charges that we pay to live in the city. When taxpayers pay the huge sums they do, it is not unreasonable for them to think they will get something in return, that they will get value for money. Instead, Canberrans pay high taxes and get very little in return.
Have our lives improved since last year? Have our lives improved since the government was elected? Have our lives improved since self-government in 1989? We have to look above the trivia and look at the actuality. I am concerned for many Canberrans that this great city is indeed getting worse.
We have a great opportunity in the remaining 20 months or so of this Assembly to return choice, tax dollars and ownership back to the community, and I do hope that it can be achieved.
There are a lot of people to thank for making this place operate and I would like to thank all those here at the Assembly, in Hansard, Chamber Support, the Library, the Committee Office, Corporate Services, the Clerk’s office, Strategy and Parliamentary Education, and special thanks to Peter Litchfield for his tremendous service to this place.
I would like to thank my senior adviser, Kate Davis, for her judgement, for her sense of reasoning, her knowledge of what is going on around town, her loyalty and her commitment to the cause. She really is an invaluable asset both to me and to the opposition, and indirectly to everyone in Canberra.
I would also like to put on the record my thanks to Sandy Tanner, who finished up in the first half of this year and whom I have thanked in this place previously. I also send my thanks to Duncan McDonald and Candice Burch for their ongoing great work and dedication to Liberalism. I also thank those that have undertaken research and work experience in my office over the last 12 months, of which there are quite a few.
I would like to put on the record my thanks to those in the leader’s office whom I deal with multiple times every day, including Maria Violi, Keith Old, Tio Faulkner, Adam Duke, Ian Hagen, Steve Doyle and Nick Chapman.
I thank my colleagues Steve and Brendan in Brindabella, Jeremy and Zed in Molonglo and my colleague in Ginninderra, who is a pleasure to work with, Vicki Dunne. I would like to give thanks to the management committee of the Liberal Party, of which I have been a member for 10 years: to the President, Tio Faulkner, and to the outgoing President, Winifred Rosser OAM; to the Vice President, Henry Pike; to the Finance Director, Peter Collins, and his predecessor, Robert Gunning; to the Treasurer, Jimmy Kiploks; and to the Policy Convenor, John Cziesla. I would also like to commend the Young Liberal President, Duncan McDonald; the northern branch chair, the branch of which I am a member, Brian Medway; and the Director, Sandy Tanner.
I wish you all a merry Christmas, and hope we can all reflect on the significance of the reason for the holiday. I wish that everyone can come back in 2011 more refreshed and ready to do the people of Canberra justice in this place.
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