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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 4 Hansard (24 June) . . Page.. 940 ..

PAKISTANI NUCLEAR TESTS

MR HIRD: Mr Speaker, under standing order 128, I would like to fix the next day of sitting for the moving of private members business Notice No. 6.

CIVIC AND WODEN YOUTH CENTRES - FUNDING

MR CORBELL (8.17): Mr Speaker, I am pleased to be getting to this matter a little earlier this evening. I move:

That this Assembly:

(1) condemns the intervention of the Chief Minister in reducing the funding offer to the Civic and Woden Youth Centres from 3 years to 1 year and the subsequent failure of the Minister for Education to defend the needs of the two centres;

(2) recognises that the Civic and Woden Youth Centres qualify for category 1 support as assessed by the Department of Education; and

(3) requires the government to restore its funding offer to a 3 year period for Civic and Woden Youth Centres effective from 1 July this year.

Mr Speaker, this is an important motion and it says some very significant things about how this Government operates in the Territory. It says some significant things about how political patronage happens in this Territory. It says some significant things about the real credibility of the Minister for Education when it comes to protecting the interests of young people in the Territory. Finally, it says some significant things about what sorts of priorities this Government places on youth services.

This is a simple and straightforward motion. It says, first, that this Assembly does not accept the activities of the Chief Minister in arbitrarily deciding to cut funding to two of the ACT's youth centres. Secondly, it says that these youth centres are significant and important facilities and deserve to be funded on a triennial basis like all of their counterparts in the Territory. Finally, it says that this Assembly requires the Government to make that commitment. It is a simple and straightforward motion.

Mr Speaker, I would like to outline this evening exactly what occurred in this particular instance and what led me to place this motion on the notice paper. I was contacted at the beginning of this week by representatives of the Woden and Civic youth centres who told me that they had been told that their original offer of funding from the Government for

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