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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 7 Hansard (10 July) . . Page.. 2393 ..
MS CARNELL (continuing):
Mr Deputy Speaker, this is about leadership. It's about getting on with the job. It's about not playing silly political games, as those opposite have done. They have been burnt, Mr Deputy Speaker, burnt badly, because none of the positions they put forward, and there were about four in four days, worked. The fact is that a separate appropriation bill was tried by Mr Humphries. It was put forward, but those opposite or those on the crossbenches were not happy to wear that approach.
Mr Berry: It was never put to us.
MS CARNELL: Mr Berry comments that it was never put to them. Mr Deputy Speaker, all the Labor Party have ever done is oppose our budgets, regardless of how good or bad they are; because that's what they do. It has come back to haunt all of you. You have blocked supply for the first time since 1975. That has required an amendment to the SIP Legislation. That amendment is now being debated. Nobody can be blamed except the Labor Party.
MR QUINLAN (11.46): The first observation I want to make is that within this town there are injecting places now. The difference is that none of them are supervised. In fact, Mr Humphries brought forward some regulations, last year, I think, although I am not sure of the date, to make it compulsory for pubs, taverns and nightspots to install sharps containers.
Mr Humphries: And you knocked it off.
MR QUINLAN: Yes, because we did not want unsupervised injecting places. Mr Humphries' idea of an injecting place is a toilet in a pub. I presume that that also goes for the crossbenchers who have brought us to this position today. There are injecting places; they are toilets and back alleys. What this legislation-
Mr Osborne: I raise a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I can understand the embarrassment on the part of Mr Quinlan and his colleagues today, but they need to get their facts right on the issue of-
MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Osborne, you will have an opportunity in the debate. There is no point of order.
Mr Osborne: There is, because Mr Quinlan got it wrong. Not only the Labor Party voted against the issue of syringes in pubs.
MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: That is no point of order, Mr Osborne. Resume your seat, Mr Osborne. Mr Quinlan has the floor.
MR QUINLAN
: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I repeat: we have injecting places in this town. They are unsupervised. They are back alleys and public toilets. A supervised injecting room would have represented at least a trial, and I insist that it be remembered that it was a trial. At least the trial could have given us some insight into whether we could have possibly changed that situation in the long term. As Mr Stanhope has pointed out, that trial has probably been torpedoed, and torpedoed completely. I think it is important that people in the ACT recognise that that is what we are voting for today. We are voting not just to do away with this facility; we are voting for people who are
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