Page 669 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 28 March 2006
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MR PRATT: I have a supplementary question, Mr Speaker. Minister, did you have to be pressured by the Chief Minister to release the report because of your lack of ministerial leadership?
MR HARGREAVES: No.
Policing—report on hit-and-run incident
MRS DUNNE: My question is to the minister for police. In the Canberra Times of Saturday, 25 March, regarding the internal report into the hit-and-run incident in Civic, you said that the public did not need to see the report and that it was enough for the public to take your word that the police had acted appropriately. You said:
I don’t believe I need to release—
the findings—
in paper form when we can talk to the community through the electronic media.
Even the Canberra Times is going to be cut out of this conversation. Late yesterday you released a version of the report to the public. Minister, why, in a matter of only days, have you significantly changed your mind regarding the release of this report?
MR HARGREAVES: Firstly, my comment relating to the Canberra Times was because I do not trust the Canberra Times to put the truth out there. I believed the only way in which to get the truth out there was to do things verbatim, which the electronic media did. Secondly, the report, which has been made available, satisfies all of those fears that I had articulated in answer to the previous questions.
MRS DUNNE: Minister, is your turnaround an admission that the community had concerns which would not be placated without the release of the report?
MR HARGREAVES: I thank Mrs Dunne for the question. No.
Industrial relations
MS PORTER: My question is to the Chief Minister. Australian Lawyers for Human Rights is reported to have said that the federal government’s Work Choices act “either expressly impacts on some rights or, by ambiguous terms or an absence of express terms, possibly renders many rights hollow or unenforceable”. Chief Minister, do these changes represent a breach of rights?
MR STANHOPE: I thank Ms Porter for the question, which is an important and very timely question.
Mrs Dunne: I take a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek your ruling. I know that the question is about whether the changes represented a breach of rights, but, as it is about commonwealth law, does the Chief Minister have the capacity to answer a question on it?
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