Page 3678 - Week 08 - Friday, 24 August 2012
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shone in your new role. I acknowledge the former Chief Minister and my caucus colleagues one and all, for the great work that you do.
Finally, I thank the people of Canberra, and particularly the electorate of Brindabella, for allowing me the honour of being elected in 2008. I hope that I have served you well and I look forward in many ways to this election when the community does have its chance to have their say. As has been said, it is a privilege to be in this place and I thank the community for that privilege. I know that the Labor team will be doing all it can for the community.
Rather than going back to the Dolly Gray quote that I raised this morning, and given that we have all made reference to the campaign, for those that have been out over the last couple of weeks, I will quote Richard Bach:
May the road rise up to meet you.
May the wind be ever at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields.
Until we meet again, may God hold you in the hollow of his hand.
MR HANSON (Molonglo) (7.43): I would like to start by thanking the people of Molonglo. It has been an honour to represent them for the last four years. I know that all members here feel the same way about their constituents. I would like to make mention of the staff tonight who are working so hard in health, police and corrections, which are my shadow portfolios. It would be difficult to say which is the hardest area to be working in tonight—in a hospital, out on the beat with the police or in the jail. They are all equally difficult. I will spare you the org chart tonight, though.
To the ALP and Greens members, it is interesting, as I hear your speeches tonight, as I have on many other valedictory nights or adjournment speeches at the end of the year, that there is as much that unites us as divides us. I think it is worth reflecting, as I did earlier today with the tabling of the review into self-government, that we all strive for a better Canberra here. It is, at times, a rough-and-tumble place and it is a rough-and-tumble profession. I wish you all well. For those of you that return, I look forward to seeing you again in this place. For those of you that do not, I wish you all the best with your future careers.
To the Legislative Assembly staff—to Tom Duncan and all of the staff—thank you very much for the support that you provide to everybody here. I would also like to share in making a special mention of Lainie.
To the Liberal members of the Assembly, we have become more than just a great team over the last four years; we have become great mates. I think we will look back on this place in the way that Simon Corbell reflected today in John Hargreaves’s valedictory; that it was a special time when they first formed opposition and got the Labor Party back on track. I think you can see that that is what happened to the Liberal Party. I think that whatever happens after October, the six of us will look back on these four years as a very special time. It was a difficult time often, but a time when we lifted and rose to that adversity. We overcame it and we have produced some great results for our party and for the people of Canberra.
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