Page 3358 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 19 August 2009
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Clause (5) states:
calls on all ministers of the ACT Government to make full and frank disclosures of any involvement they, their staff or their representatives may have had in influencing the decision making process of the Labor Club board.
The interesting thing is that we have had some disclosure from four out of the five ministers. Four out of the five ministers have offered up; they all said, “No, we have not had any involvement.” They said that they have not had any attempts at making influence by themselves, their staff or their representatives. It is curious that one minister, the Chief Minister, has refused to rule it out.
I think that leads to there being some weight to leaving these clauses as they are. The Chief Minister should come back down here. Indeed, the Chief Minister has been conspicuously absent from this debate. He should come down and clear the air once and for all, and actually say, “No, I have not.” That would make it very much easier for this debate to proceed.
But the minister is now putting a cloud above himself. We have got four ministers who have said, “No, I have not done anything improper.” We have one minister who refuses to rule that out. You have to ask the question why the Chief Minister would do that.
I think it is very important, therefore, that particularly clauses (4) and (5), as contained in this amendment, remain. If we go to clause (2), I still make the point that clause (2) is quite true. There are concerns about the proposed windfall which is truly outside the effect of what was intended by the act. Clause (3) simply, again, states the fact:
the potential for the proposed transaction to undermine the public acceptance and original intent of the community based gaming model;
We have all heard the Chief Minister stand up in this place, and those of us that have been at the Clubs ACT annual night have heard the Chief Minister stand up on at least seven occasions, and say, “We are a club town.” He has to remove the cloud that his actions are now putting over Canberra being the club town, about the community-based gaming model that exists in this town.
If he will not do that, you have to question why. If four out of five of his ministers can simply stand up and say no to this question, you have to ask why the Chief Minister will not do the same. It is only the Chief Minister that can answer that. I would ask the Greens to reconsider. It is not unreasonable to leave these four clauses in. They are not inconsistent.
I believe, in fact, you could probably say that clauses (2), (3), (4) and (5) lead to the request that is embodied in clause (6) that Ms Hunter has moved. Therefore, it makes the motion more complete. When people look back in time at this motion and, indeed, when the Gambling and Racing Commission looks at what is being asked of it by the Assembly should this get up—and it appears that this will get up—they do so in the light, first, of this debate and, second, the fullness of what would be the entire motion.
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