Page 3154 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 20 September 1994
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Mr Berry: That is where the committee has misled us.
MR MOORE: Mr Berry now says that that is where the committee has misled the Assembly. Madam Speaker, the committee has presented its report to the Assembly. To suggest that we have misled the Assembly is entirely inappropriate. I will ask you, when I finish speaking, to get Mr Berry to withdraw that.
MADAM SPEAKER: Mr Moore, let me stop you right now. As you know, the standing orders do not allow imputations against a member. I do not see how you can say that a generalised statement like that is actually an imputation against a member. That is why I have allowed it, Mr Moore. Please proceed.
MR MOORE: Finally, to take up a point that was raised earlier, I would refer members to a full chapter in the committee's report on occupational health and safety, which refutes the ridiculous suggestion that Mr Berry made, that we did not consider it to be an issue at all.
Mr Berry: You did not raise it in the speech, Michael.
MR MOORE: Madam Speaker, we get a further interjection from Mr Berry, saying, "You did not raise it in the speech". That is right. There are a number of things being raised in a series of speeches throughout this debate, and Mr Berry suggests that I did not raise it in the speech. Did he go back and see whether I raised it in my speech in the in-principle stage? I must say that I do not remember whether I did or not. But, clearly, it is an important issue. It is one that the committee has dealt with and it is one that we will continue to deal with.
Mr Berry himself provided an answer. Occupational health and safety is a matter that is being taken care of under occupational health and safety legislation. Even so, it was something that we cared about. We cared about it so much that we got the new Minister to provide it. Mr Berry would not provide the occupational health and safety code to the committee while he was Minister, and we had to get the new Minister to provide it. That shows his sense of cooperation with a committee and how genuine is his concern for this issue.
MR CONNOLLY (Attorney-General and Minister for Health) (9.05): Madam Speaker, we have come to the crux of the debate and the fundamental flaw in what Mr Moore is proposing. The whole edifice of his argument is built on the rock of Australian Standard 1668.2 - - -
Mr Moore: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. That misrepresents what I have just said.
MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, Mr Moore and I may disagree; but, if he is going to take foolish points of order every time I make a point, we will be here until 3 o'clock in the morning. Let us be serious about this. His whole argument is premised on there being a safe way of having an air standard; that you can have 25 per cent of people in a restaurant smoking, as long as a certain air-conditioning standard is met. The reality is that that air-conditioning standard was designed for comfort, not for health.
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