Page 1070 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 6 May 2014
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it and spoke at some length about the minutes, and then said—there was an interjection to say, “Where did you get the minutes from?” The minister says: “They’re online. They’re available online.”
That was not true. He was deliberately trying to make it appear that it was okay—“I’m all right. It’s okay. I can read the minutes. I can make this debate.”—because they were available online. That was not true. And he was caught. He was caught red-handed, Madam Speaker, misleading this place in a deliberate attempt to cover up the fact that he had intimate knowledge of the committee’s minutes and he should not have. That was his motive, and it is pretty clear that he is guilty.
Two hours later, realising what he had done—and those of you who sit on that side of the chamber might have missed it, but for those of us on this side we saw the colour that Minister Corbell went. It was about the colour of—I was going to say Mr Doszpot’s hair, but that would probably be unparliamentary. It was the colour of this piece of paper. He went deathly white, because he knew what he had done. It exposed the fact that he had been given privileged information and he had been caught misleading this place intentionally.
The issue, as I said, is not whether he misled this place or not; the issue is what action this place should now take. That is the consideration before us. I refer you to the Companion to the Standing Orders. There is precedence. I point to 6.45 on page 90:
The Assembly has also considered motions expressing lack of confidence in or censure of Ministers. In April 1994 the Assembly agreed to a resolution expressing lack of confidence in a Minister ‘for reason of his deliberate or reckless misleading of the Assembly’—
that is certainly the case here—
concerning matters related to his portfolio responsibilities. The Chief Minister advised the Assembly of the Minister’s resignation the next day …
That is what should be happening here. This is the same situation. This is the precedent. The minister has deliberately misled this place in an attempt to cover up the fact that there has been some dodgy stuff going on with the committee. When he has been caught out, the action that we should be taking is to move no confidence, want of confidence.
This is a very serious matter and this is the precedent. This is the form of this place. This is what has happened before by chief ministers and ministers who have been accountable. The test today will be whether we have a Chief Minister who has got the leadership and a minister who accepts “Yes; I got it wrong” and takes the appropriate action that others have taken.
There is a ministerial code of conduct, of 2012. It says in there:
Ministers must act according to the highest standards of personal integrity and probity and uphold the ACT’s system of responsible government …
Ministers must act honestly at all times and be truthful in their statements.
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