Page 1759 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 21 August 2007
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Mrs Dunne: That is not true.
MR BARR: You just gave up going to the meetings then, did you?
Mrs Dunne: I went to every one of those meetings, and you know it.
MR BARR: No, you did not. You were not at every meeting. I was at every meeting; I was the last person to leave the hall on every night.
Mrs Dunne: You can check my diary; I went to every one of them.
MR BARR: No, you did not. You certainly did not. I was at a number of meetings that you were not at—and you acknowledged that.
MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Barr, address your remarks to the chair. Mrs Dunne, cease interjecting.
MR BARR: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I will not labour this point, but if Mrs Dunne checks the Hansard from last year she will acknowledge that I attended every meeting and she did not.
Mrs Dunne: I did not, because it is not true.
MR BARR: You did not attend every meeting I attended, Mrs Dunne, and you know that.
MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Barr and Mrs Dunne, cease playing tennis and direct your remarks through the chair—either as a point of order, or, Mr Barr, in terms of your comments, to me. Cease being intimidated by Mrs Dunne.
MR BARR: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. It is, indeed, a sidetrack from the main issue, which is the level of consultation that was provided and the level of transparency and accountability. No-one could claim through that process that they did not have hours with me directly, poking me in the chest at umpteen meetings—700 meetings over six months—demanding answers on each of the issues. I utterly reject the assertions from Mrs Dunne that this was some sort of closed process that was done behind closed doors. For Mrs Dunne, in receipt of 10,000 folios and 13,000 pages of information from the Department of Education and Training, to claim that there is some cover-up going on here is another ridiculous assertion.
The mind boggles at just how much staff time within the Department of Education and Training has been devoted to this. I would have to say—I would give her credit—that Mrs Dunne has probably created her own public sector employment scheme within the Department of Education and Training. There would be a number of officers whose full-time job since June 2006 has been responding to Mrs Dunne’s FOI requests—requests that sometimes border on being preposterous in terms of the level of information and documentation required from the department.
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