Page 6 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 6 November 2012
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To Mr Rattenbury, representing the almost 24,000 Canberrans who voted green, Hare-Clark throws up unusual results at times, and despite the ACT Greens losing three seats, the 2012 election campaign actually delivered the second highest green vote in the territory’s history.
Mr Rattenbury, I also thank you for placing your trust in me as Chief Minister. I shall honour the agreement struck last week, our shared policy agenda, and I enter the new cabinet landscape with a positive attitude and a genuine belief that it will provide stable, responsive government to the people of the ACT over the next four years.
I would also like to make a brief mention of Ms Meredith Hunter, Ms Amanda Bresnan and Ms Caroline Le Couteur, who sat on the crossbench during the Seventh Assembly but who were not fortunate enough to retain their seats in the Eighth. Ms Hunter showed great leadership on the crossbench over the course of the last Assembly. I believe all three leave behind a proud legacy in terms of policy and legislation, and I wish them all the best for their future endeavours.
Madam Speaker, the Canberra community have elected a parliament where the numbers are 8, 8, 1. It is over to us now to make that parliament work. It is important, as we begin the Eighth Assembly, that we acknowledge that we all start at the same point. We are all here because each of us individually loves this city, because we are all contributors, because we all want to make the city a better place in which to live, because we are parents who want our children to have the brightest future possible, because we are sons and daughters who want our parents cared for in their elderly years, and because we want to shape our city’s future.
While there are many aspects of our system of governance that are undoubtedly adversarial, there are also many occasions when we come together in a spirit of compromise and collaboration—times when our ideas can combine rather than compete. I believe there should be more of those times.
Whilst precedence and history provide important guidance in politics and parliamentary life, we are as much masters of our own future as any parliamentarian that has gone before us, and we have as much responsibility as anyone to shape modern-day politics to reflect what the community seeks from us.
The community are tired of politicians fighting when they want us to lead. They are tired of finger pointing when they simply want us to represent their views and to get the job done as efficiently and effectively as possible.
Madam Speaker, to many in our community it matters less as to whether you are Labor, Liberal or Green than it does about good schools, good hospitals, good transport systems, footpaths, parks and playgrounds for us all to enjoy. And it is delivering these outcomes over the next four years that should keep us focused and occupy the majority of our time.
With this in mind, I think we should look at every way for all 17 members to work together and for the leaders to collaborate more in the interests of the city, even if that
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