Page 226 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 23 February 1994
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Mr Moore: Our role is to let you do that and then get it at this stage.
MR BERRY: We will get to your role. I am pleased that the Bill is going to a committee rather than being defeated. At first I suspected that there might be some support for the silly notion that Mrs Carnell put forward in relation to this legislation.
Mrs Carnell: It still might be defeated.
MR BERRY: I doubt it. That argument will be seen through for what it is. There has been a lot of agitation in the community because of the performance of the Independents and the Liberals on this issue. They have been hurt politically on this score - and no wonder. Their behaviour has been abominable. They were all over the place.
Mr Humphries: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. You ruled that Ms Szuty should not stray into the substantive questions of this legislation. We are now debating the referral to a committee. With respect, that is not what Mr Berry is talking about.
MADAM SPEAKER: Mr Berry, please confine the debate to the motion to refer the Bill to the committee.
MR BERRY: I understand what he is saying. I am perfectly clear on the subject. Everybody has to find their little spot in the sun on this issue. At the end of the day, if we come through the committee process with legislation that does something in the Territory, then the introduction of the legislation will have achieved something. We do not know what yet, but it will have achieved something. That is fine. People in this place will be able to take credit for their part in it. Mr Stevenson has a view that there is a glimmer of hope that he might be able to knock the legislation off so that he can satisfy the views expressed in his poll. Mr Stevenson argues for choice.
Mr Stevenson: I do not argue that.
MR BERRY: Mr Stevenson represents the view that there ought to be choice. Of course, 70 per cent of the people said that they wanted a choice of smoke-free areas. We can interpret these things any way we like, can we not?
Mr Stevenson: Not at all. How about doing it truthfully?
MR BERRY: I would say that that is one interpretation. Madam Speaker, at the end of the day the committee will look at the Bill and will come up with something better than is happening now - I trust. Some people here will have recovered their lost ground over their behaviour on this issue, but some never will. I am looking forward to the matter going through the committee process as quickly as it can. In the meantime, as I have said, members will see the Government's code of practice on smoking in workplaces, which will begin to have an immediate effect in all of these areas. The committee will be looking at this legislation, but we are concerned about employees in the workplace. There is already legislation in place to deal with the workplace, and it will be dealt with.
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