Page 2661 - Week 12 - Thursday, 16 November 1989
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has received, which to some extent shoots down the figures which have been reported thus far. Mr Humphries said that the Government had taken a different position. When the Government has a decision, it will announce it. It has the responsibility to consider the matter appropriately and responsibly and make a decision, and it will do so.
To return to the political nature of the motion, the Liberals have again demonstrated their preparedness to unscrupulously abuse their position in this place and they have used the board as a political football without any conscience at all. What this motion serves to do is to embarrass the board. I think it has to be stated in this place that the board is honorary in nature and all its members have worked hard to do the job that they were put there for. None of them, I suspect, would want to be used as a political football in this sort of debate. The introduction of this motion has done nothing else but demonstrate the Liberal Party's willingness to use these people who have honourably put their shoulders to the wheel. I am sure that this motion will serve as an embarrassment to some of the members of the board, and I must say that they deserve an apology for this political abuse.
Mr Humphries: From you. It is you who have more to apologise for, Minister.
MR BERRY: You introduced the motion.
Mr Humphries: A motion of firm support in the board.
MR BERRY: You introduced the motion, matey, and not because you particularly like the board either. You are playing your political games. Of course the Government has supported the board.
Mr Humphries: Oh, yes!
MR BERRY: It was not the Government that started the debate publicly, Mr Humphries. It was the Liberal Party and other elements in this society, relying, I might add, on a bunch of documents that have fallen off the back of a truck. There is not much information that is new in them, in any case, but certainly it was headline grabbing and, in my view, behaving irresponsibly, with no regard for the sensitive nature of negotiations which have to proceed in the industrial relations area in the health system. In fact, by their very action, those elements have promoted a difficult environment for negotiations to proceed.
The Government will deal with those difficulties and it would be in the interests of the Liberal Party's political agenda to make it as difficult as possible for the Government by any means possible. But I say again that the introduction of this motion to the Assembly has the potential to embarrass people who have put their shoulders to the wheel and assisted the community of Canberra in "minding" the health system in a difficult period.
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