Page 1429 - Week 04 - Thursday, 4 April 2019
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One of them has the job of going out to the public to bleat about the fact that the Canberra Liberals would only employ one person to change the light bulb, that they would probably undertake the task in two minutes and that that equates to job cuts and casualisation. The fourth one has the job of responding to questions without notice on why, despite all of the effort and the song and dance and the fanfare, the light bulb still has not been changed.
It takes four Labor backbenchers to attempt to change a light bulb, and for some reason it took four of them to put this motion together this morning. It reminds me of those group projects you would do at primary school. If you cannot remember doing them yourself, I am sure those of us with children can remember their children doing them.
They put four students of varying skills and ability together and it usually transpires that just one of them does all the work. She tends to do the whole thing—I am not prepared to say which one that was. One of them sits on the sidelines carping about how she would have done it and how it is all wrong. One of them insists on drawing pretty flowers on the borders of the page because she was not really listening when the teacher set the assignment and so she felt she had to contribute in some way, so good on her. And one of them gets the dates for their project workshops all wrong, does not even turn up for any of them but he is still happy to take the mark in his assessment.
So four had the job of changing this light globe and we are still in the dark.
Ms Elva Loris McLeod—tribute
MS BERRY (Ginninderra—Deputy Chief Minister, Minister for Education and Early Childhood Development, Minister for Housing and Suburban Development, Minister for the Prevention of Domestic and Family Violence, Minister for Sport and Recreation and Minister for Women) (6.06): I take the chance today to wish my nan, Elva Loris McLeod, born in Bombala on 4 April 1919, a very happy 100th birthday. She grew up in a very challenging time, something none of us today could possibly think about: using fuel stoves and open fires, no bathrooms and just a wash tub, hitching up the horses to the cart to go into town to do her shopping. They had a radio and a gramophone and a piano for entertainment, not iPhones, iPads or Netflix as we do today. Her father died after the First World War, and to supplement her mum’s widow’s pension they used to skin rabbits and peel bark off trees to sell.
My favourite memories of my nan, growing up, were of her most amazing passionfruit cheesecake and the best flower garden I have ever seen. They are great memories. My nan received some cards this week, and we videotaped her receiving them. I cannot show you what they were, but I do not think she was very impressed. I think after a hundred years you can be as grumpy as you like when you receive cards from Scott Morrison and others. She is an amazing woman. A hundred years is a remarkable time on this earth, and I take the chance today to say happy 100th birthday, Nan.
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