Page 1382 - Week 05 - Thursday, 18 June 2020
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
was too hard. They were afraid that if they did not get it right a judicial process would expose the government to significant financial risk.
I note in passing that I was told in a number of briefings that the government had worked on guidelines, that they were in the process of being drafted, but the government decided it was too hard and they threw up their hands. I have asked on a number of occasions, repeatedly, only to be told as late as Sunday that I probably could not have them because they were government working documents and they could not be released publicly. I made the point to the minister that I did not necessarily want them to be released publicly, but I thought that if the minister wanted to convince the opposition that we should agree to their course of action it might be useful to demonstrate to us how this process would be difficult.
But with the strict letter of the law approach that the government like to fall back on when they are in an uncomfortable position, the opposition has been refused access to those documents. I understand that it went as far as cabinet, who have refused the opposition access to those documents. The opposition is none the wiser on what the government’s thinking was on this subject or why it simply became too hard for them to do anything.
But I suppose part of the problem is that—and we touched on this today a number of times—when you have nothing in the bank, and this government has nothing in the bank, then you do become a little afraid about the state of your finances in an emergency. And when you are in the situation, as this government is, that you have a $3 billion deficit, rising to $4 billion, in an annual budget of something approaching $6 billion there is a real problem. I fear the ACT’s financial dilemma is the sole reason why we are in a situation where the government would propose that we take away people’s right to apply—and I emphasise again “apply”, not “receive”—for compensation.
We have been told that this has been done in other jurisdictions, notably Queensland, Tasmania, and South Australia, but I think that is not a sufficient reason for us to do that. As I have said before, where the government takes someone’s property in the ACT, because we are a creature of the commonwealth parliament and not a state, we cannot consume it without paying for it. It would be unlawful. When I raised this in the first briefing, an official said that of course such behaviour would contravene the self-government act. It did cross my mind to ask why the government would consider a blanket removal of rights for compensation in this way and why they did not realise that, having created a specific power to commandeer property, they would have to ensure that people whose property was commandeered were protected.
As a result, we have the bill that is here before us today. The bill as it stands is unacceptable to the Canberra Liberals. As I said, I will be putting forward an amendment that retains the right to apply for compensation—to “apply” for compensation—and when the minister is deciding whether that compensation might be payable my amendment will give the minister some latitude to consider whether the actions taken by the Chief Health Officer in relation to the request for compensation were taken on sufficient grounds. I will elaborate on that more in the detail stage.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video