Page 303 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 1 March 1994
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Mr Kaine: This was before Mr Colquhoun left?
MR BERRY: Mr Colquhoun, as I said to you, was never a member of the decorporatised board, so I do not have to provide - - -
Mrs Carnell: So you decorporatised it so that you could sign the deal.
MR BERRY: Oh! I will go back over a few historical details. Mr Colquhoun's term ran out when he was a member of the corporatised ACTTAB board. The Government had made a decision that it was going to decorporatise the board. Having done so, it installed a new board. Mr Colquhoun was not on that new board and therefore had nothing to do with the decision. The new board chairman signed the document - that is, he signed the deal with VITAB - after those necessary checks were made by Treasury and the Law Office in the ACT. You people are starting to look like fools on this. You are so embittered about ACTTAB's performance that you have lost your marbles. ACTTAB is doing well and you are going to have to wear it.
MR KAINE: I have a supplementary question, Madam Speaker. The Minister obviously cannot remember whether the board was informed before or after he decorporatised it. When he finds out when the board was advised, could he also tell me on what date the contract with VITAB was signed?
MR BERRY: I do not have those details in front of me, but - - -
Mr Kaine: Of course not, but would you find out and tell me?
MR BERRY: Sure.
Magistrates Court Building
MS ELLIS: My question is directed to the Attorney-General. There have been recent media reports concerning the construction of a new ACT Magistrates Court. Could you inform the Assembly of the current situation on this matter?
MR CONNOLLY: I am pleased to report to the Assembly another example of progress being made by this Government, getting on with governing this Territory in the interests of the community, unlike this lot opposite who spend all their time ferreting around in the lowest rubbish bin, trying to find something with a bit of a smell on it - patently unsuccessfully. While you are focused down there in the muck, trying to find a scandal, we are out there governing in the interests of this Territory.
I was delighted that last week, after a meeting with Brian Howe, the Deputy Prime Minister, we were able to proceed and go ahead and build the Magistrates Court for this Territory on the site that we had identified, which was crucial. If we could not have built it on that site we could not have reaped the social justice benefit of having one court complex where a person who needs to go before the courts can easily be directed to the appropriate court. We could not have reaped the dollar efficiencies in terms of an integrated court administration which we can reap from that complex.
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