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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 2 Hansard (20 May) . . Page.. 402 ..

Mr Kaine: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Mr Kaine did not endorse it, and I want that recorded in Hansard.

MR SPEAKER: There is no point of order. You will have an opportunity to make a personal explanation later if you wish.

MS CARNELL: He was part of a Cabinet that did, Mr Speaker. J. Walter Thompson did give a number of presentations. J. Walter Thompson did a lot of the work for the Atlanta Olympics and did give us a presentation on the work that they had done to improve the opportunities for cities in the Atlanta region to maximise the benefits of the Olympics in Atlanta. Fairly obviously, Canberra is in a very similar position of needing to, I suppose, change some attitudes to Canberra in the lead-up to the Olympics. I believe that J. Walter Thompson's capacity and experience in this area are the sort of experience that no local company has. No local company has done that sort of work before. I think J. Walter Thompson has done a very good job.

I come back to open tender. Open tender is not the be-all and end-all. Open tender would be the approach that we take under normal circumstances. What is a normal circumstance, Mr Speaker? When there is not a good reason to go down a different path. Certainly, from a Government perspective, open tender is not a holy grail. What is a holy grail is getting the right outcomes, absolutely the right outcomes. From that perspective, I stand by the approach of not going to open tender when we believe we can get the outcomes in a better and different way.

MR OSBORNE: My question is to the Minister for Justice, Mr Humphries. Minister, on 17 September 1996, a 17-year-old youth named ...... ........ hanged himself in the Quamby Youth Detention Centre. The inquest into his death did not begin until November 1997, almost 14 months later. At the time the inquest began ...... ........ family was told that it would run until it was finished. In the event, the inquest ran for three weeks before it was adjourned without a result. The family was told that the inquest would recommence in February this year. As it turns out, it is not listed to resume until October this year, 1998; that is, over two years since ...... died. Minister, I know you are aware of the situation. Can you explain why it is that there has been such an absurd delay in dealing with this matter?

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Speaker, let me say, first of all, that I am not entirely sure that the name of the person who died at Quamby has been released publicly by the court. I do not think I have seen the name referred to in any news reports; so, I do not propose to use the name of the person concerned until I am sure about that. We might ask anybody reporting it not to use that name unless they check, as before, that the name in fact is not suppressed by the court.

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