Page 3143 - Week 07 - Thursday, 30 June 2011
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Yes, it has. Because of that approach, the Kingston arts precinct quickly is becoming a lost opportunity to the Canberra community, to the arts community and to the world. And I challenge Minister Burch and her government to swallow their pride and take a long, hard look at all the options and all the opportunities, develop a vision and a master plan and listen to the experts and the stakeholders so that the whole community end up with an arts precinct of which they can all be proud and one that will put Canberra on the map.
The Community Services Directorate is in trouble. It has an overseeing minister who gives conflicting information, does not care, does not know anything except her own thing, does not listen and cannot swallow her pride. So what exactly is she interested in? She is interested, as we all know, in creating media opportunities. We saw that in the minutes of the team of her department earlier this year. Those minutes said:
There is a push to provide media opportunities for the minister.
But she cannot even get that right. Recently she has failed to show up to events to take advantage of those media opportunities. I gather that as recently as last Friday she failed to turn up to the MBA awards, which I gather was a matter of some mirth for most people, but I suspect Minister Gallagher was mortified by the minister’s failure to turn up and present a prize. So she cannot even get media opportunities right.
MR HARGREAVES (Brindabella) (12.40 am): Madam Assistant Speaker, I thank Ms Bresnan for her forbearance, because I have to go and jump in that seat in a tick. I will be very brief.
I have been listening to quite a bit of this debate upstairs. The reason why I have not been down here and joining in the debate, members, is because my back really hurts a lot. For the sake of Hansard, I note that I am holding up a cushion. It has been really sore. I have to make the observation, however, that I thank those opposite for their concern for my welfare. It is really heartening. I am thinking of how warm and cosy it is to be in the company of such beautiful people.
The one thing that I do notice is the ability of those opposite—it is an incredible ability—to trawl through the Encyclopaedia Britannica and find something wrong with it. They have looked into the glass of the ACT budget and found it to be half empty. They do not know about maybe the glass being half full and maybe they can help to fill it up; no.
Their statement is that the place is “rooned”. “We’re all rooned.” Madam Assistant Speaker, we are totally “rooned”. There is absolutely nothing good going on in the whole of the ACT, according to those opposite. I might suggest to those opposite, in fact, that this parliament is supposed to be about trying to find things which are good for the ACT, and one of the things that is good for the ACT is making them feel good. These guys seem to be dedicated to making people feel bad. I congratulate them because, if I have ever seen absolute academic practitioners in the art of miserabilism, it is that lot.
Mr Hanson: Madam Assistant Speaker, on a point of order.
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