Page 2340 - Week 07 - Thursday, 17 August 2006
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Mr Corbell: And he wants to be the Treasurer!
MR STANHOPE: That is a good point, but I am in a light-hearted mood and I did not want to be particularly personal about it. Mr Mulcahy, it is a very simple mistake that was made. There is a total figure and there is a new figure and, if you take one away from the other, you will get the difference. I would have thought, Mr Mulcahy—
Ms Gallagher: Maths 101.
Mr Hargreaves: Do we want an Irish calculator coming in?
MR STANHOPE: Actually, an element of doubt has been thrown into the minds of my colleagues in relation to the leadership challenge arranged for December of this year, an Australian record: the only member of any parliament of Australia to come into the parliament at an election and within two years knock off his leader and then, within the next two years, knock off his successor.
MR SPEAKER: Order! Come back to the subject matter of the question.
MR STANHOPE: The only impediment, of course, to that possibility is that when you are launching a leadership challenge you need to be able to count and when you want to be Treasurer you need to be able to count.
Mrs Dunne: I take a point of order, Mr Speaker. Standing order 118 (a) requires the Chief Minister to come to the point and he has not actually answered the point about the utilities land use permit.
MR SPEAKER: Chief Minister, stay with the subject matter of the question.
MR STANHOPE: It is all about numbers, Mr Speaker.
MR SPEAKER: It was not a question about numbers.
MR STANHOPE: I respect your ruling, Mr Speaker, but I do see in the manoeuvrings of Mr Smyth over the last week, and the energy and activity, the prospect of a comeback. I can see Mr Smyth has not ruled it out.
MR SPEAKER: Order!
MR STANHOPE: Do you have a supplementary question, Mr Mulcahy? I can get to the utilities charge on that.
Mr Mulcahy: It depends on whether I will get an answer that is clear.
MR STANHOPE: Okay. In answering questions at the estimates hearing, Mr Costello also referred to the impact of the utilities charge as being $15 per household, while I as Treasurer, in answering a question on notice, referred to an amount of $37 for water, $22 for sewerage, $35 for gas, $15 for telecommunications and $28 for electricity. The values referred to by Mr Costello and me were for two different reasons. The
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