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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 01 Hansard (Tuesday, 10 February 2004) . . Page.. 74 ..

The issue of responsibility in this Assembly on this subject is very interesting. I remember clearly that I wanted to debate the government response immediately after it was tabled because I was so concerned, but no-one on the opposition side of the house said, “Yes, this matters. My God, look at what the government has said; it’s not good enough.” No, that was not said by the opposition or the cross bench and I was not allowed to debate the response. It was the minister who finally said, “My God, we have a problem.” She is the person who took responsibility, not anyone else in this Assembly. Now, in hindsight, we have the opposition baying for blood, even though they were equally culpable in government and now in opposition for failing to take any real notice of the issue. So I think that this whole debate is extremely interesting.

I will say on the general question of ministerial responsibility, whether you look at Kate Carnell on the implosion or Bruce Stadium or at John Howard on the asylum seekers or the children overboard the key difference between how this minister has responded and how they responded is that they were denying it, they were covering up, they were not prepared to acknowledge that there had been a stuff-up. They failed to take responsibility at any point of the process. But Ms Gallagher, whilst she has acknowledged that she failed in her responsibilities, has taken responsibility on her own for what has happened.

When you look at these questions of ministerial responsibility, which are, I agree, extremely important in the Westminster system, you should look at them in context. You should look at them in terms of whether that irresponsibility was a result of recklessness and negligence, whether there was an admission, whether there was an attempt to cover up. All those aspects are extremely important.

I think it is very easy and simplistic to say that there was a breach of ministerial responsibility, that responsibility was not taken and therefore the minister has to fall on his or her sword, that we should forget the rest of the story, should not look at the whole story, and just focus on that issue. I think that it is quite dangerous and does not assist to do that. I am not saying that Ms Gallagher, having taken responsibility in the way that she has, does not deserve to pay for some of the consequences of that; but I would say, as someone who has taken an interest in this issue over a long time, that I am seeing for the first time a minister who is actually taking responsibility in a way that might lead to an improvement in the situation.

MS DUNDAS (4.41): With a little bit of misguided faith, I thought that today we would be having a debate about ministerial responsibility as a matter of public importance. I think that the responsibility of ministers and of members to this Assembly and to the community is one of great public importance. We seem to have gone off track and started to debate a very important issue relating to the Children’s Services portfolio. We have already had a lot of discussion about that today, so I want to look at the broader issue of ministerial responsibility.

Ministerial responsibility is an issue that, obviously, is very important. It is something that the Democrats take very seriously. We have concerns about the relationships of members of parliament, ministers in particular, with their staff—not just in their offices, but within other areas, such as their departments. In the federal arena we are looking at how to codify a very important role staff play in decision making, which is something that the minister touched on in earlier discussions today when she said that she had a

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