Page 1601 - Week 05 - Thursday, 5 May 2016
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Mr Barr: Madam Deputy Speaker, under standing order 213 the Assembly can order a member to present a document they have quoted from. The Leader of the Opposition appeared to be quoting extensively from a mobile phone. I am interested, Madam Deputy Speaker, in seeking either you or the Speaker to make a ruling in relation to quoting from electronic devices and whether standing order 213 applies in that context.
Mr Hanson: On the—
MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, Chief Minister. Mr Hanson, on a point of order.
Mr Hanson: Yes, on your ruling on the standing order. I probably recall a dozen or two dozen occasions of ministers quoting from their iPads. Indeed, I recall the Chief Minister regularly quoting from his iPad, and Mr Gentleman. I see them all with their iPads here—and Mr Rattenbury with his computer. I think that the standing order is about documents. If we are in a situation where we are asking people if they have quoted from electronic devices, Mr Barr has regularly—
MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just stop, Mr Hanson.
Mr Hanson: To hand them over—then I would equally say that we are in a position where we will be securing every single minister’s laptop.
MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Hanson, I think you have made your point on that point of order. It does raise the interesting concept of electronic devices and access to other material. I will not be asking Mr Hanson to hand his phone over, but I may have a discussion with the Speaker and raise this matter in admin and procedure for future reference. We will move to the question at hand, which is that the motion be agreed to. Mr Wall.
MR WALL (Brindabella) (12.10), in reply: It is a sad day, Madam Deputy Speaker. It seems that the Greens are there and Mr Rattenbury has transferred from the crossbench well and truly firmly into the Labor Party. He is a beneficiary of the unions’ largesse in its political donations, he toes the union line, and it seems that any independence or any ethical standing that he stood to have any credit left for as a genuine crossbench member has gone. He has walked away from his Latimer House principles. The call for more scrutiny, more open and transparent government; those calls are gone.
Mr Rattenbury stood up before, as did Mr Barr, and said that our claims are unsubstantiated and are incorrect, that this agreement has perverted the honest and integral system of procurement in the ACT. If that is the case, you should not be ashamed or scared of allowing a committee to be established to examine that agreement. If the agreement is what you say it is and is the bastion of good governance, a committee inquiry would show that. A select committee would examine it, and that would be its findings. Instead, you are using the cover of the numbers, the protection racket that is being run by Mr Rattenbury, to hide from that additional scrutiny. That is shameful, Madam Speaker. It is absolutely shameful.
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