Page 3047 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 10 September 1991
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PERSONAL EXPLANATION
MR BERRY (Minister for Health and Minister for Sport): I wish to make a statement of a personal nature pursuant to standing order 46.
MR SPEAKER: Do you claim to have been misrepresented?
MR BERRY: Yes. Mr Speaker, the issue of travel to the National Conference of the Australian Labor Party was raised by the Chief Minister in question time.
Mr Humphries: A Freudian slip again.
MR BERRY: It was raised by the Leader of the Opposition, the former Chief Minister, in question time in a question to the Chief Minister. Mr Speaker, as members will know, they have an entitlement to travel as members of the Assembly and that travel can be approved by the Administration and Procedures Committee. Many members, if not all, have taken advantage of that at one point of time or another.
Mr Humphries: For different things, though.
MR BERRY: Mr Humphries says that it is a different thing. Mr Speaker, the travel to the Labor National Conference was undertaken by me pursuant to those entitlements and, in fact, was approved by the Administration and Procedures Committee before the change of government. Mr Speaker, as a result of the change of government I continued to proceed with the previous booking.
Mr Jensen: You are allowed only $2,200, in total.
MR BERRY: Mr Speaker, I would not mind a bit of order. All the interjections - - -
MR SPEAKER: Mr Berry, it is rather quiet compared to normal times, I think. Please proceed.
MR BERRY: That is perhaps why the interjections interfere so much. If we can get the sound level of the chook pen a bit higher, I will be able to cope with it.
Mr Speaker, that was approved by the Administration and Procedures Committee and on the change of government it was taken up by the Government. The Chief Minister's Department undertook a check of this practice in all other States. They found that they all followed the same practice of treating it as government business. Members opposite would know that the Chief Minister and I were attending and, of course, attended on government business. In fact, we represented the Territory in terms of the deliberations of the Labor Party in putting together its policies for the good government of Australia. In opposition the same would have occurred, but by way of a different funding source - no more than that.
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