Page 2497 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 22 August 2006
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actually created in the Department of the Territory and Municipal Services, rather than the fragmentation or splitting of responsibilities and the creation of false barriers and efficiencies, a single land manager through the Department of the Territory and Municipal Services that will provide a far more streamlined and far more seamless delivery of services than was being achieved across the previous departmental structure and arrangement.
A number of other issues were raised. There is almost a fetish with the communications unit within the Chief Minister’s Department and the delivery of events. I recall members of the opposition reviling the government from time to time over the last number of years in relation to a lack of governmental support for events such as New Year’s Eve and Australia Day. We now provide significant resourcing and funding for New Year’s Eve, Australia Day and Canberra Day, and these events are delivered through the communications unit, or the events unit, within the Chief Minister’s Department. Today, for the first time, I heard a suggestion from the opposition that these events should not be supported, that we should leave it to the community, generally speaking.
Mr Mulcahy: I have said it before.
MR STANHOPE: That is not the position of your predecessors or of your party, Mr Mulcahy. Once again, we have this delineation, this differentiation. The Liberal Party’s position now is that the government should not support New Year’s Eve fireworks or a New Year’s Eve celebration. The Liberal Party’s position, as expressed by the shadow Treasurer, is that we should not be supporting, to the extent we are, Australia Day. The shadow Treasurer’s position, as expressed on behalf of the Liberal Party today, is that we should not be supporting Canberra Day.
Mr Pratt: This is a verbal.
MR STANHOPE: No, it is not. The position was put in this debate less than an hour ago by the shadow Treasurer that an area of objection which the Liberal Party has with the government’s budget is that we are supporting the funding of events on New Year’s Eve, Australia Day and Canberra Day and of other events which celebrate our community and which, as you all know and which is the issue, are very successful programs and projects that are wildly supported by the people of Canberra. Of course, in the line of all scrooges forever, you have killjoys such as Mr Mulcahy threatens to become that would have no support and would use that as a device for attacking the communications unit and attacking the fact that the government wishes to communicate with the constituency. How often, and I hear it particularly from the Greens, are we criticised and condemned for not taking the community into our trust, not consulting with the community? Here we have the Greens today condemning a unit designed to facilitate and enhance communication and consultation.
At 6.00 pm, in accordance with standing order 34, the debate was interrupted and the resumption of the debate made an order of the day for the next sitting. The motion for the adjournment of the Assembly was put.
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