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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 10 Hansard (25 September) . . Page.. 3340 ..

MR KAINE (Minister for Urban Services): Madam Deputy Speaker, I indicated earlier, in response to a request from Mr Corbell, that I would table my letter to the Hon. John Sharp in connection with the Barton Highway. I table the following paper:

Stirling Avenue - Federal Highway - forward planning intention - copy of letter from Trevor T. Kaine, MLA, to the Hon. John Sharp, MP, Minister for Transport and Regional Development, dated 17 September 1997.

Debate resumed from 23 September 1997, on motion by Mr Humphries:

That this Bill be agreed to in principle.

MR WOOD (4.53): Madam Deputy Speaker, the Opposition will not support this Bill at the in-principle stage. We will, however, not oppose it as it moves through the later stage of the debate. Our approach is entirely consistent. We have always maintained that 24-hour trading in the ACT is appropriate. The report that the Government commissioned, at the behest of Mr Osborne, supports that view. The Government has dragged out of that report the best things it can, to try to suggest that other measures are desirable. It seems to me a strange approach when you commission a report and then at the end of the day you decide that you will not have anything to do with it.

The consistency of the Labor Party's approach stands in contrast with that of the Government, which keeps varying its opinion, changing its mind and carrying on in the way we see today. It went from 24-hour trading to a trial of 4.00 am closing, and now it has agreed to a 5.00 am closure. We have a couple more sessions before this parliament finishes its work. I suspect that in October we will move from 5.00 am closing to 6.00 am closing, in November we will go to 7.00 am and in December we will go back to 8.00 am - the full 24 hours. That is the way the Government has been working on liquor licensing hours. It is just reacting to events, adjusting them to suit itself, or in this circumstance, to be fair, following an approach from the Hotels Association to extend it to 5.00 am.

I think the fact that it has now come up with this proposal brings great discredit to the Government in the way it has been carrying out this program over the last year or so. It is, however, a step. It is another hour towards the more appropriate 24-hour trading. So, in that respect, when the Bill is finally put to the house, it will not be resisted by the Opposition. I want to make the point that our consistency requires that in the in-principle stage we do not support this Bill.

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