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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 11 Hansard (5 November) . . Page.. 3632 ..

MR WHITECROSS (continuing):

On the radio yesterday you indicated that the amount involved was $184m. Can you explain which of these numbers is right, and why, and how it works? What does your signing of a gas agreement on Friday have to do with the passage of the water supply and electricity Bills currently before the Assembly? Chief Minister, is it not the case that your conduct over the past 24 hours has simply been a scare campaign to push through your legislation?

MRS CARNELL: I do not know where you start with a supplementary question that, I think, at last count, had five parts, Mr Speaker.

Mr Whitecross: Tell the truth. That would make a change.

MR SPEAKER: Give her a chance and she will, I have no doubt.

Mr Humphries: Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Mr Whitecross was heard to remark, "Start with the truth for a change", or words to that effect. Mr Whitecross knows what the rules are. I would ask him to withdraw that remark.

MR SPEAKER: Yes; withdraw it, Mr Whitecross.

Mr Whitecross: Mr Speaker, I am amazed that the Manager of Government Business thinks that encouraging Ministers to tell the truth is unparliamentary; but I withdraw the suggestion that Mrs Carnell, at any time in the past, may not have told the truth. I will let the facts speak for themselves, Mr Speaker.

MR SPEAKER: Let the Chief Minister get on with her answer.

MRS CARNELL: Mr Speaker, as I just said quite definitely, it is amazing that those opposite, taking into account that they were involved in most of the national competition policy agreements - I think, as I said yesterday, Rosemary Follett signed something like 11 of them, to my three - are not aware of how the competition payments work over the period of time.

Mr Corbell: We are about to see whether you know.

MRS CARNELL: I always do.

MR SPEAKER: I warn Mr Corbell.

Ms McRae: Mr Speaker, on a point of order: You are regularly chiding us for interjections. The reason for the interjections, Mr Speaker, is that you are not upholding the rules of relevance or the rules of answering a question. If the Chief Minister chose to answer a question, you may find that other people would follow other rules.

MR SPEAKER: The Chief Minister is attempting to answer a question under a stream of interjections. Continue, Chief Minister. Mr Corbell, you remain warned.

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