Page 2847 - Week 08 - Thursday, 11 August 2016
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On the family side, as all of us would understand, we cannot do this job on our own. As my wife would often attest to, she knows what it is like to be a political widow, spending many nights alone at home with our now almost three-year-old. It has very much been a learning curve for us as to what normal is in our household, being elected as just the two of us and going now into the second election with an additional member of the family, who brings so much delight and so much excitement to our day. Obviously, the support that my parents give me and Christine in helping look after Sophia on the nights that we do need to go out together or when she is tied up at work as well makes it all that much easier.
To those of you on the opposite side, it has been a delight in getting to know some of you as we have worked through the last—
Mr Barr: Others are less delightful?
MR WALL: I will leave that for you to decide. Some of you I probably have not got to know quite as well. Simon, I wish you all the best. You mentioned in your speech earlier today that this is where you started your career. I have spent part of my career staring opposite at you and thinking that you are a really good performer in this place. You have carried out your work very diligently, very professionally, and you are always across your brief. That provides a good role model not just for those on the opposite side but also for those on this side as to what we can all aspire to do in our time in this place. I wish you all the best in your future.
I look forward to seeing all of you out in the trenches between now and October, and hopefully we get to see the reverse image of this room come late October.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (9.24): A lifetime ago—it is burned freshly in my brain—I remember the moment in late October 2012 when the Electoral Commissioner announced that the ACT Assembly had resulted in eight Labor, eight Liberal and one Green. As one of my friends said to me, “Good luck with that.”
I would like to take this opportunity to reflect on what has been an extremely interesting Assembly for me and for the ACT Greens. It has been the first time the ACT has had a two-party government and the first time the Greens have taken on a ministerial role. Whilst we have had an independent in cabinet before, actually making two parties come together and work, each with their own clear platforms, has been something that we have had to work at.
I think we have made history in being the only Labor-Greens government that has actually gone a whole term without breaking up, and that is a good thing. In that context, I would like to particularly offer my thanks to both of the chief ministers that I have worked with: Katy Gallagher, who left for the Senate, and now Andrew Barr. An arrangement like this does require a degree of goodwill and a determination to make it work, to work through the times when the disagreements are there and there are different priorities or the various tensions that arise. I have really appreciated the ability to have that relationship with both of the chief ministers, to be determined to get on and do the things we need to do and put some of those other things aside.
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