Page 161 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 15 February 2012
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were. We were going to take that over.” Well, there is no evidence of that. There is no proof of that, and there has been no statement to that effect.
The reality is that the election promise when made by Katy Gallagher had an $8.9 million hole in it. She might come out with some retrofitting to that, but the reality is the promise had a big black hole. So what we have asked her to do—I do not think we have heard this from Katy Gallagher—is to tell us what the policy is. We still do not know, because she is saying: “Oh, we might close the one at the Canberra Hospital. We might. The ones at Belconnen might be half a centre or a whole centre. It might be in the health centre, or it might be somewhere else. We’ll look at it and we’ll let you know.”
The headline election promise she made in health when announcing the 17 Labor candidates has been bungled. It has been mangled. At the least, it has been misleading. It is also incoherent because we still do not know what the promise is. I have asked Ms Gallagher to explain why she misled the community and the media. There is still no satisfactory explanation. There is still no explanation from Katy Gallagher as to why she omitted it. Sorry, she did say, “Nobody asked.” That is her excuse—nobody asked. That is a hell of an excuse.
I have asked her to assure us in the future that she will provide the costings for a policy. That is pretty reasonable, is it not? “Will you provide those costings?” Well, she said no. So this is a new standard, and it is good to know. The Liberals and the Greens will probably take this into consideration. What she is saying by cutting that out of this motion today is that when you provide an election promise, you do not need to provide the costings with it. No, you can provide a bit of a vibe that it will cost about $10 million. Of course, it is not actually $10 million and it is actually a $20 million policy, of which $1.1 million has already been funded. So you can provide a bit of a vibe—she is only about 50 per cent out. You do not need to provide any detailed costing. By taking that out of this motion today, that is what Katy Gallagher is saying.
I have asked her to assure us that it will be fully funded, and she said, “Don’t worry about it.” Then I asked her to assure us that she will not be misleading. No, she is not going to assure us of that. No, she still wants that up her sleeve. Then I have asked her to assure us she will not omit major aspects of policy. No, she wants that cut out too, because who knows what she is going to announce? Maybe half a hospital at some stage! We just do not know what she is going to be providing in the future because she will not have that in the motion.
She will not sign up to the commitment today that you tell the truth. She does not want that. She does not want that you tell the whole truth. No, you are allowed to omit things. She does not want to provide the costings. No. They are the three things Katy Gallagher does not want. They are the three things the Greens have allowed her to take out, so the Greens support that position. The Greens think that is acceptable as well. So there is a new standard for Katy Gallagher and ACT Labor, and the Greens support that. They think it is a good idea. They do not want to be held to account on any of those sorts of things either.
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