Page 1087 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 6 May 2014
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required to tell the truth is trivial, Madam Speaker. I think that that is important. If you read the ministerial code of conduct and if you go out into the community and say, “When it comes to a piece of legislation before a committee that is inquiring into a massive circumvention of our planning rules with regard to some of the biggest projects this territory has ever seen, when we have a committee that is so controversial, a piece of legislation that is so controversial, do you think it is important that the minister tell the truth?”
The government is saying it is trivial. They do not seem to worry about that. It seems that Mr Rattenbury unfortunately has the same view. He has accepted that we have had untrue versions in this place. He has said that we have had untrue versions. He has said that the Chief Minister’s seems to be the truest version. What Mr Rattenbury is then saying is, “It is okay to have untrue versions. I do not mind if there are untrue versions. Eventually we will get to something that appears to be the truth and my guess is that the Chief Minister’s is the truest version.” That seems to be Mr Rattenbury’s position: “Okay, as long as one of the four versions is remotely true, I will accept that now.”
But that is not trivial. That is not inconsequential. That is the important business of an opposition. If an opposition does not say, “Stop, a minister is not telling the truth,” then what is the opposition here for? I say on behalf of the community, on behalf of the dozens of people—I am not quite sure how many people—who put in submissions to the inquiry who are concerned not just about the initial legislation but about the actual conduct of that inquiry, the way it has been rushed through, the way it has been imposed on the community, that I think they would be horrified if they were sitting in the chamber today.
They would be horrified if they knew that there is a version of the truth—and Mr Rattenbury agrees with that—out there somewhere whereby Mr Corbell has got detailed knowledge of what was going on in that committee. Then Mr Corbell, when that was exposed, when he basically coughed it up in his speech, said, “Okay, firstly it was a review and you’re not meant to do that.” But it was not true, because Mr Rattenbury said that is not a true version.
The second version was: “Go and look at it online.” That is not a true version, and Mr Rattenbury agrees that is not a true version. Then there was a third version. He came into this place in this debate—this most important of debates, as you reminded us, Madam Speaker—and gave another untrue version, according to Mr Rattenbury, the “Mick Gentleman said it” version, that we have proven is not true.
Then finally the Chief Minister has to come in and try and mop it all up. We see them go over and talk to Mr Rattenbury and say, “Please, don’t vote no confidence. Simon tries really hard. He’s a nice guy.” That is not good enough. Mr Rattenbury seems to accept that and says, “Okay, that sounds plausible. That is a plausible idea; that sounds reasonably plausible. I accept that version of events.” If he accepts that version of events then he accepts that the other three versions that were put forward by Mr Corbell are not true.
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