Page 3207 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 16 August 2011
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that the job of members of the Legislative Assembly is first and foremost to uphold the dignity of this place. The code of conduct for members requires us to uphold the law. Let us go back to what was said in that interview on 14 July which caused so much concern. What you said, amongst other things, Mr Speaker, was:
It has become clear that there are mixed views in the community. There is no doubt about that. I don’t think it’s my place to condone or condemn. It is the question of why they did it. I’m not going to condemn their actions. I think they’re people who have strong beliefs and they took the actions they think that it was necessary to take.
So that is a message of support from one of the most senior law-makers in this territory to his colleagues in a political ginger group to say that, “It’s all right; I’m not going to stand in your way.” And by doing that, Mr Speaker, you actually undermine the rule of law which we are all charged with upholding and which you as Speaker are especially charged with upholding.
Let us do the mental exercise here. If a member of this place in the course of a heated debate was so injudicious as to call another member of this place a liar, you would demand, rightly, that that comment be withdrawn. Let us do the mental exercise. Let us transpose this a bit. What if the member refused to withdraw and said: “I’m sorry, Mr Speaker, I have strong beliefs about the correctness of my position. In describing the member as a liar, I took the action that I thought was necessary to take. Mr Speaker, there are mixed views in the community about whether the member is a liar or not, and you aren’t in a position to condemn or condone my actions.” If I said that to you, Mr Speaker, I would be out on my ear before I got those sentences out. And that is exactly, Mr Speaker, what you did when you spoke on this matter on 666 in July.
The issue is that it could have been passed off as an injudicious comment that you did not think about. You have had the opportunity. This matter has been raised in a number of ways. It was raised by me almost immediately. It was raised by Mr Moore and it was raised by Mr Seselja in the pages of the CityNews. You have responded to Mr Moore and I understand that you responded to Mr Seselja by way of letter to the editor, most of which was read out by Ms Hunter this morning. You have not recanted any of those views, Mr Speaker. You try to walk both sides of the track. You say that it is all right to practise civil disobedience when, at the same time, you are trying to maintain that you are upholding the rule of law.
There is a difference between the practice of civil disobedience and breaking and entering and wanton destruction of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of property. I think it is offensive to people in the civil rights movement for you, Mr Speaker, and your leader to equate your actions with the actions of someone as eminent as Dr Martin Luther King. Dr Martin Luther King did not condone breaking and entering—criminal destruction of property. Dr Martin Luther King did not condone violence, and the destruction of property and breaking and entering is essentially a violent action. Dr Martin Luther King condoned a peaceful way.
The problem that you have, Mr Speaker, is that you spoke without engaging your brain, and you have sufficient hubris about your position that, even when it has been
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