Page 3904 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 9 November 1994
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be great concern in the community about that sort of matter. This Assembly would feel great urgency, I believe, in wanting to debate that matter. The fact that it remained on the notice paper, possibly intended by a member to be a live issue without being resolved by the Assembly, would be a matter that, I am confident, most people in this place would find utterly unacceptable. I do not directly compare that sort of legislation with Mr Berry's Bill; but I do think that they have one similar characteristic, and that is that they are of extreme importance to many members of the community, they divide the community acutely, and the community expects the matters to be dealt with by this Assembly.
It is clearly Mr Berry's intention that this matter not be resolved by the Assembly in the life of this Assembly. I will be happy to withdraw this motion before the Assembly today if Mr Berry will give a firm undertaking to the Assembly as to on which of the sitting days between now and the end of the year he would wish his Bill to be debated, or, if he wishes to, to withdraw the Bill. The understanding that he has indicated to members, I believe, is that he does not believe that he has the numbers in this Assembly to pass the Bill. In either circumstance, I am very happy to withdraw my motion; but I believe, Madam Speaker, that Mr Berry has thrown up an issue of great importance, and he reserves unto himself the prerogative of saying, "The issue is important, but I do not wish to see it resolved by the Assembly". I do not think any member of this community expects the Assembly not to resolve this matter one way or the other. We should resolve it, and we should be judged on the way in which we resolve it - whether we support or oppose Mr Berry's Bill. But resolve it we must. It is not sufficient for Mr Berry to say, "This is important. I am putting it up, but I am not going to proceed to deal with it at this time".
MR BERRY (Manager of Government Business) (10.44): This Bill is amongst, I think, 40 or 50 items which are on the notice paper. I suspect that the overwhelming number of those will not be resolved by the time of the end of this Assembly. If we were to take Mr Humphries's view, we could spring a surprise attack on the Liberals one morning about a particular issue which they think is important politically and sweep it in front of this chamber at any time we like, after first making sure that they were not prepared.
The approach which has been taken by the Liberals is a political one. It is raw politics at its worst. Because there is a particular matter on the notice paper which they find discomforting to them, they seek to move to upset the rights which private members in this chamber have had for many years; indeed, the rights that members in this chamber would expect to have for many years in the future. It is possible that those rights may not be absolute in all circumstances, but I do not see any reason to upset those rights in relation to this Bill just because the political content of it is not something with which the Liberals are comfortable. That is the issue.
There are many issues on the notice paper which the Labor Party would oppose, but I know that the Labor Party is not about to spring on particular issues from the notice paper for political purposes or just to annoy the Liberals. In fact, we would not have the support of the Independents in relation to the matter anyway. It is as simple as that. They, as Independents, want to choose the timing to suit their own political purposes, as we all do. They want to choose the timing for the - - -
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