Legislative Assembly TUESDAY MARCH · Frawley, Desmond John, Esquire Gibbs, Ivan James, Esquire...

Queensland

Parliamentary Debates [Hansard]

Legislative Assembly

TUESDAY, 28 MARCH 1978

Electronic reproduction of original hardcopy

QUEENSLAND

'Parliamentary [HANSARD]

FIRST SESSION OF THE FORTY-SECOND PARLIAMENT

Appointed to meet

AT BRISBANE ON THE TWENTY-EIGHTH DAY OF MARCH, IN THE TWENTY-SEVENTH YEAR OF THE REIGN OF HER MAJESTY QUEEN ELIZABETH 11, IN TH:E YEAR OF OUR LORD 1978

TUESDAY, 28 MARCH 1978

OPENING OF PARLIAMENT

Pursuant to the proclamation by His Excellency the Governor, dated 23 February 1978, appointing Parliament to meet this day for the dispatch of business, the House met at 2.15 p.m. in the Legislative Assembly Chamber.

The Clerk read the proclamation.

COMMISSION TO OPEN PARLIAMENT

The Clerk acquainted the House that His Excellency the Governor, not being able conveniently to be present in person this day, had been pleased to cause a Commission to be issued under the public seal of the State, appointing the Honourable Johannes Bjelke-Petersen, the Honourable William Edward Knox, and the Honourable Ronald Ernest Camm, Commissioners in order to the opening and holding of this session of Parliament.

The Commissioners so appointed being seated on the dais, and the Clerk having read the Commission-

THE SENIOR COMMISSIONER (Honourable J. Bjelke-Petersen-Barambah) said: Honourable members, we have it in command from His -Excellency the Governor

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to let you know that as soon as the members of the Legislative Assembly have been sworn, the causes of this Parliament being called together will be declared to you: And it being necessary that a Speaker be first chosen, it is His Excellency's pleasure that you proceed to the election of one of your number to be your Speaker, and that you present such person so chosen to His Excellency the Governor, at such time and place as His Excellency shall appoint.

The Premier thereupon produced a Commission under the public seal of the State empowering him, the Honourable Johannes Bjelke-Petersen, the Honourable William Edward Knox, and the Honourable Ronald Ernest Camm, or any one or more of them, to administer to all or any members or member of the House the oath or affirmation of allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen, which Commission was then read to the House by the Clerk.

RETURN OF WRITS

The Clerk informed the House that the writs for the various electoral districts had been returned to him, severally endorsed as follows:-

Albert-Ivan James Gibbs. Archerfield-Kevin Joseph Hooper. Ashgrove-John Ward Greenwood. Aspley-Frederick Alexander Campbell. Auburn-Neville Thomas Eric Hewitt. Balonne-Donald McConnell Neal. Barambah-Johannes Bjelke-Petersen. Barron River-Martin James Tenni.

2 Return of Writs [28 MARCH 1978] Members Sworn

Brisbane Central-Brian John Davis. Bulimba-John William Houston. Bundaberg-James Robert Henry Blake. Burdekin-Valmond James Bird. Burnett-Claude Alfred Wharton. Caboolture-Desmond John Frawley. Cairns-Raymond Jones. Callide-Lindsay Earle Hartwig. Carnarvon-Peter Richard McKechnie. Chatsworth-Terence Michael

Mackenroth. Condamine-Victor Bruce Sullivan. Cook-Robert William Scott. Cooroora-Gordon Leslie Simpson. Cunningham-Jannion Anthony Elliott. Everton-Glen Richard Milliner. Fassifern-Selwyn John Miiller. Flinders-Robert Carl Katter. Greenslopes-William Douglas Hewitt. Gregory-William Hamline Glasson. Gympie-Allen Maxwell Hedges. Hinchinbrook-Edward Charles Row. Ipswich-Llewellyn Roy Edwards. Ipswich West-David Francis

Underwood. Isis-Lionel William Powell. Ithaca-Colin John Miller. Kurilpa-Samuel Sydney Doumany. Landsborough-Michael John Ahern. Lockyer-Anthony James Bourke. Lytton-Thomas James Burns. Mackay-Edmund Denis Casey. Mansfield-William Bernard Kaus. Maryborough-Brendan Percival Hansen. Merthyr-Donald Frederick Lane. Mirani-Thomas Guy Newbery. Mt. Coot-tha-William Daniel Lickiss. Mt. Gravatt-Guelfi Paul Scassola. Mt. Isa-Angelo Pietro Dante Bertoni. Mourilyan-Victoria Ann Kippin. Mulgrave-Roy Alexander Armstrong. Murrumba-Raymond Charles Kruger. Nudgee-Kenneth Hamilton Vaughan. Nundah-Wi!liam Edward Knox. Peak Downs-Vincent Patrick Lester. Pine Rivers-Robert George Akers. Port Curtis-William George Prest. Redcliffe-James Edward Hiram

Houghton. Redlands-John Philip Goleby. Rockhampton-Keith Webb Wright. Rockhampton North-Leslie John

Yewdale. Roma-Kenneth Burgoyne Tomkins. Salisbury-Rosemary Annette Kyburz. Sandgate-Neville George Warburton. Sherwood-John Desmond Herbert. Somerset-William Angus Manson Gunn. South Brisbane-Demetrios Fouras. South Coast-Russell James Hinze. Southport-Peter Nicholson Duckett

White. Stafford-Terence Joseph Gygar. Surfers Paradise-Bruce Edward Bishop. Toowong-Charles Robert Porter. Toowoomba North-John Aubrey Ross

Lock wood. Toowoomba South-John Herbert

Warner. Townsville-Norman Reginald

Scott-Young.

Townsville South-Alexander McLachlan Wilson.

Townsville West-Maxwell David Hooper.

Warrego-Neil John Turner. Warwick-Desmond James Booth. Wavell-Brian Douglas Austin. Whitsunday-Ronald Ernest Camm. Windsor-Robert Edgar Moore. Wolston-Robert James Gibbs. Woodridge-William Theodore D'Arcy. Wynnum-Eric Frank Shaw. Yeronga-Norman Edward Lee.

MEMBERS SWORN

The Commissioners, who with other members of the Ministry had been sworn in before His Excellency the Governor on 2 March 1978 and subscribed the roll (the Honourable Neville Thomas Eric Hewitt and the Honourable John Ward Greenwood having been sworn in before His Excellency on 22 March 1978 and subscribed the roll), then administered the oath or affirmation of allegiance to the following other members, who thereupon also subscribed the roll-

Ahern, Michael John, Esquire Akers, Robert George, Esquire Armstrong, Roy Alexander, Esquire Austin, Brian Douglas, Esquire Bertoni, Angelo Pietro Dante, Esquire Bishop, Bruce Edward, Esquire Blake, James Robert Henry, Esquire Booth, Desmond James, Esquire Bourke, Anthony James, Esquire Burns, Thomas James, Esquire Casey, Edmund Denis, Esquire D'Arcy, William Theodore, Esquire Davis, Brian John, Esquire Doumany, Samuel Sydney, Esquire Elliott, Jannion Anthony, Esquire Fouras, Demetrious, Esquire Frawley, Desmond John, Esquire Gibbs, Ivan James, Esquire Gibbs, Robert James, Esquire Glasson, William Hamline, Esquire Goleby, John Philip, Esquire Gunn, William Angus Manson, Esquire Gygar, Terence Joseph, Esquire Hansen, Brendan Percival, Esquire Hartwig, Lindsay Earle, Esquire Hewitt, William Douglas, Esquire Hooper, Kevin Joseph, Esquire Hooper, Maxv,;ell David, Esquire Houghton, James Edward Hiram, Esquire Houston, John William, Esquire Jones, Raymond, Esquire Katter, Robert Car!, Esquire Kaus, William Bernard, Esquire Kippin, Mrs. Victoria Ann Kruger, Raymond Charles, Esquire Kyburz, Mrs. Rosemary Annette Lane, Donald Frederick, Esquire Lester, Vincent Patrick, Esquire Lockwood, John Aubrey Ross, Esquire Mackenroth, Terence Michael, Esquire McKechnie, Peter Richard, Esquire Miller, Colin John, Esquire Milliner, Glen Richard, Esquire

Election of Speaker (28 MARCH 1978] Election of Speaker 3

Moore, Robert Edgar, Esquire Muller, Selwyn John, Esquire Neal, Donald McConnell, Esquire Powell, Lionel William, Esquire Prest, William George, Esquire Row, Edward Charles, Esquire Scassola, Guelfi Paul, Esquire Scott, Robert William, Esquire Scott-Young, Norman Reginald, Esquire Shaw, Eric Frank, Esquire Simpson, Gordon Leslie, Esquire Tenni, Martin James, Esquire Turner, Neil John, Esquire Underwood, David Francis, Esquire Vaughan, Kenneth Hamilton, Esquire Warburton, Neville George, Esquire Warner, John Herbert, Esquire W~ite, Peter Nicholson Duckett, Esquire W1lson, Alexander McLachlan Esquire Wright, Keith Webb, Esquire ' Yewdale, Leslie John, Esquire

ELECTION OF SPEAKER

Hon. J. BJELKE-PETERSEN (BarambahPremier): I move-

"That Mr. James Edward Hiram Houghton do take the chair of the House as Speaker."

Hon. W. E. KNOX (Nundah-Deputy Premier and Treasurer): I have very much pleasure in seconding the motion.

Mr. BURNS (Lytton-Leader of the Opposition) (2.40 p.m.): We on this side of the Chamber believe that this is a most important debate and one that should not be allowed to pass lightly by. We all know that the coalition parties have agreed that the National Party should nominate the Spea~er and that _the Liberal Party should nommate the Cha1rman of Committees.

Mr. Campbell interjected.

Mr. BURNS: Yes, that is the coalition agreement, printed for all to see in the magazine of the Young Liberals. Look at it and you will also see what Bill Knox, Charlie Porter and a few other Liberals were savinothen. · "'

The democratic process provides that this Parliament elects its Speaker. He is our Speaker. If we go back 700 years in historv we see that it was the ordinary people who wanted a parliament that represented them. They wanted to throw off the yoke of the Crown and rid themselves of its oppressive acts. They stood up then and decided to have a parliament and to get rid of the barons and the serfdom of the workers of those days. They took it upon themselves to elect a Speaker.

Now this Parliament has to elect its Speaker. During the last Parliament Mr. Houghton showed that he was fair and reas~nable, so we have no objection to his appomtment as Speaker. But we do believe

that on this occasion we should remind the people of Queensland and the new backbench members--

Mr. Knox interjected.

Mr. BURNS: With all due respect to the Treasurer, he has shown little guts in his term as leader of his party, and he does not show very much sitting back there and shouting now. His backbone has not been as stiff as the walking stick that he has been carrying during the last few months. He should not pretend to have something that he has not so far demonstrated.

The office of Speaker dates back to the parliament that was known as the Mad Parliament. I might add that from the way in which things have been happening in this State under the tyranny of Cabinet in the last few months this Parliament could be similarly described if its ordinary members do not stand up for their rights. Bureaucracy has gone mad in this State. Secret decisions are being made by Cabinet day in and day out. Cabinet has thrown aside all the normal forms that have evolved over the years.

Fifty years after the Mad Parliament came what could be called the Good Parliament, this became the second time the office of Speaker is recorded. That Parliament tried to do something about throwing aside the excesses of the Crown at that time. I suggest that that is what back-benchers today have to do. The members of this Parliament have to start to say very clearly, "We want the right to have a say on behalf of the people outside this place." Every member of this House will have been subjected to the cry that members of Parliament do not count-that they are secondgrade citizens. Today, people tend to look down on parliamentarians-they do not look up to them-and they look down on them because over the years Parliament has given its rights away to the Executive.

For the past six months the Gang of Eighteen sitting on the benches opposite have made all the decisions, and made them in secret.

Mr. Hinze: Honourable gentlemen.

Mr. BURNS: The Gang of Eighteen have made all the decisions on matters that demanded an expression and a vote in this Parliament. They are matters in which all the people of this State have an interest. I refer to issues such as SEMP, MACOS, Tarong, lwasaki and the investigation into the criminal law. The Minister is mistaken if he thinks that by shouting and screaming today he will bring any credit on the Parliament and the Government, which has been using antiquated Standing Orders to keep the Parliament in line and to hold back public opinion. If that achieves anything for him, it will be a sorry day for parliamentary democracy and responsible government in this State of Queensland. Make

4 Election of Speaker (28 MARCH 1978) Election of Speaker

no bones about it, the people outside want us, not just the eighteen members of Cabinet, to make decisions. They want Parliament to make the decisions. Right through their school lives children are taught about responsible government. We talk about parliamentary government and the right of the ordinary member of the public to run for Parliament in order to have a say in the conduct of the affairs of the community in which he lives. It is right to say that Cabinet does not give this right to the back-bench member; it is right to say that Cabinet runs this Parliament.

Even today when we on this side agree with the nomination of the honourable member for Redcliffe, it must be said that his nomination is part of an agreement that was made when members of the Liberal and National Parties were arguing about their numbers in Cabinet. An agreement was signed that the Speaker would come from the National Party and that the Chairman of Committees would come from the other party of the coalition. That is just not good enough. In the past people have been killed while holding the office of Speaker. In the days when Parliament was fighting the Crown, nine Speakers were put to death by the reigning monarch. A number of others were gaoled. I am not suggesting that poor old Jim Houghton should be put to death, but I do suggest that if he fought for democracy for us here he would be stoned or put to death. He would meet the same fate as other Speakers 700 years ago when the office of Speaker was created.

Mr. Knox: Sit down!

Mr. BURNS: Go home, Billy. Weekkneed Willy! You don't make it. You're not on. You don't count in this House. You are Joh's man in this House. You get the Liberals to vote with him. You go out :md ask the people to vote for the Liberal Party at election-time and then come in here afterwards and do everything that Joh wants you to do.

Mr. Bjelke-Petersen: We're a solid team over here, not like your side.

Mr. BURNS: Oh, Joh! Behave, Joh.

Mr. Knox: How many times have you resigned in the last few years?

Mr. BURNS: The Treasurer should hesitate before speaking of resignations because if he ever submits his resignation the members of his party will accept immediately. They are so eager to get rid of him that they want him to submit his resignation. I suggest that he offers it any time he likes.

Let me issue a challenge. The Treasurer has said that there will be a vote in this Parliament on Tarong. I want a vote on Tarong. I want to see how the Liberals who are running around saying that they

believe in Millmerran are going to vote; I want to see how the National Party members from the Darling Downs are going to votethose people who are saying they believe in Millmerran and support Ron Camm's statement that people were robbed, that the economic report was thrown aside, that $259,000,000 of the people's money is being thrown down the drain because the Premier wanted the power station in or near his area. We want to have a vote on it. We challenge the Government to have a vote on it. We: challenge the Government to give this Parliament an opportunity to have a say. We want Government members to assure us that they believe in parliamentary democracy.

We would also like to have a vote on SEMP. That is the project about which Bill Knox said on television, "I never saw it. I didn't need to see it. I'm against it." It is the project that the Premier, in his "Personally Speaking" column, has ripped apart. He never saw it; he never read it: he knew nothing about it; but we are told that the educators, the decent people that the Government has appointed to the Department of Education, are trying to destroy our young children by producing this project. I want a vote on SEMP! I would like to see the Parliament declare whether it supports the Cabinet on SEMP.

Let us go a little bit further. Let us have a vote on Iwasaki. Let us see whether secret deals are being concluded with Iwasaki, with his land transactions on Windmill Plains and Sandy Point. Let us have a vote on wheth<!r the people of Queensland want Iwasaki taking over thousands and thousands of acres of our land with the compliance of some Ministers. Let us have a vote on that issue.

Let us have a vote on the Budget issues, on all of the prices that have gone up sine~ the last Budget, such as electricity, rail freights, gas, milk and bread. I see the honourable member for Albert laughing; he does not mind if the workers have to pay more. He enjoys it, and he is on record as laughing and carrying on in that way in the Parliament. Let us have a vote on that issue, too!

There is issue after issue after issue that should be brought before this Parliament and upon which we should vote, but the way parliamentary democracy has evolved in this State has made this impossible. The mother Parliament, the Commons itself, is held in high respect by the people. The office of the Speaker there is held in the highest possible respect. Our Speaker, whom we respect, is supposed to represent the dignity of this House and the responsibility of this Parliament to the people, but it is obvious to each and every one of us who goes to any school or goes anywhere into the community that people do not respect this Parliament any more, and the reason they do not respect this Parliament any more lies in the excesses of the Ministers in Ca':Ji,Jet

Election of Speaker [28 MARCH 1978] Election of Speaker 5

and the compliance of the Liberal c>nd National Party back-benchers, who have spinelessly given in to them all the wav along the line. -

I see Mr. Porter and some other Ministers laughing. I remember the report that was produced by Mr. Ahern as chairman of a committee that was set up to inquire into the establishment of parliamentary committees. Charlie Porter was a member of the committee that submitted that report. Claude Whart<;m, too, was a member, as was Mr. Tomkms. They all sat on that joint Government committee to inquire into the setting up of standing committees.

Mr. Ahern interjected.

Mr . .BURNS: I will read from the notes that were put out. The members were Mr. Ahern (chairman), Mr. J. Murray, M.B.E., Mr. C. R. Porter, Mr. C. A. Wharton, and Mr. K. B. Tomkins, who was eo-opted to the committee on the recommendation of the chairman. The chairman was the honourable member for Landsborough, so don't let him argue.

That committee report, which was confidential to the joint Government parties, recommended after a privileges committee and a regulations committee were set up that in the following year there should be two more standing committees. The report recommended to the joint parties that public accounts and public works committees be set up. We have not seen them yet. Why not? Because on that side of the House we have a group of people who do not want this Parliament to work. They do not want to see that members of Parliament have an opportunity to challenge and question public spending or decisions on matters such as Tarong and Iwasaki. They do not want there to be the opportunity to bring people before committees and inquire into the costs that are mounting and being met out of your pocket and my pocket. That is happening all the way through. Why haven't we had those committees set up?

That committee recommendation was made years ago. Since then we have struggled along with a couple of committees only. Why don't we have a select committee to look into the procedures of this Parliament so that Parliament can become relevant to the 1970s? Why do we hide behind Standing Orders that restrict Mr. Speaker from doing the job of allowing the people's representatives in this House to debate the issues the people are interested in? It is not Mr. Speaker who is to blame· it is the fault of the Standing Orders. It i~ our fault, as members of Parliament not the Cabinet Ministers. The fault lies 'with all of us here. If we want a select committee to look !nto parliamentary procedures, we can set It up. If back-bench members of the National and Liberal Parties want to stand up and fight on the issue, we can do

it right now. Of course we know what will happen. Back they will go to the party room where crack goes the whip. That would be the last we would see of any backbone or any fight other than a few interjections and a few written speeches.

It seems to me that at this time this is one of the most important debates we can have in this Parliament. It is the right of the Parliament to assert its role of electing a Speaker-our Speaker-to represent us. The office that Mr. Houghton is going to occupy in this Parliament is the highest position to which we can elect one of our fellows. Those on the other side of the Chamber have no right to make the decision that Russell Hinze will be a Minister. He is appointed; Charlie Porter is appointed; they are all appointed Ministers. Their appointment is the product of being on side with the people in power. Here today we have our right-our right to say that this man will represent us as a fair and impartial adviser in this Parliament. We have our right to say that this man will be placed in this office where he will be held in high regard and given respect because we believe the office he holds and he himself deserve it.

In saying that we cannot hide from the fact that this Parliament is not held in respect. Vv'hy? Because it runs away from the issues that bedevil our fellow Queenslanders. I refer to issues such as the right to march. Let us have a vote on the right to march. I throw out that chalienge. More than half of the members of this Parliament are against the present legislation. Why won't they have a vote on that issue? Because there is a lack of spine on that side of the 01amber when it comes to letting the people have a say. They demonstrate a lack of spine when it comes to letting rankand-file members of the Parliament run free.

The Opposition does not object to the nomination of Jim Houghton. We know that he has treated us fairly in the past. However, we say this to him: We are sorrv that you are placed in the position where the Standing Orders and others restrict you in giving the impartial decisions that you could and would give if vou had the opportunity. -

Hon. R. E. CAMM (Whitsunday-Minister for. Mines, Energy and Police) (2.55 p.m.): It Is not often that we see an exhibition such as we have witnessed here today when a member of Parliament has taken advantage of the opportunity to speak while the House is not under the control of Mr. Speaker. The Leader of the Opposition has castigated this coalition Government on the issue of the election of Mr. Speaker. That is exactly what this Parliament is doing; it is in the process of electing Mr. Speaker.

The coalition parties have nominated a man who they feel will ably occupy the position of Mr. Speaker in this House. His nomination was put forward by the Leader

6 Election of Speaker (28 MARCH 1978] Election of Speaker

of the National Party and it was seconded by the Leader of the Liberal Party. All this Parliament is doing at present is electing one of its members to the position of Mr. Speaker.

The Leader of the Opposition-perhaps in an endeavour to hide the inadequacies of his party-is castigating the Government for doing precisely what he claims it should be doing, that is, electing Mr. Speaker. The Leader of the Opposition has traced the history of the position of Mr. Speaker right back to the early days of the British Parliament. Might I remind him that in the British Parliament the occupant of the position of Mr. Speaker is not opposed at the next election. Would the Leader of the Opposition agree to the adoption of such a practice in this Parliament? Would he agree to his party's not opposing Mr. Speaker at the next election? He stands up and says, "This is what we should do in line with the tradition of Parliament," but he will not agree to do what is done in the British Parliament, that is, elect a person to the position of Mr. Speaker and have him returned unopposed at elections until his election as Mr. Speaker is questioned. No, the Leader of the Opposition would not agree to that.

The Leader of the Opposition has criticised our Standing Orders; yet he is a member of the Standing Orders Committee. I challenge him to tell us any improvement to Standing Orders that has been suggested by him and has not been considered by the other members of that committee. In fact I challenge him to mention any improvement that he has suggested to our Standing Orders. So in effect the Leader of the Opposition, in criticising the Standing Orders, is merely castigating himself.

I remind the Leader of the Opposition that we on this side of the House are a solid team. Collectively we have nominated a man who will prove to be a very good Speaker, as he has in the past. I wou1d remind the Leader of the Opposition that the coalition parties have no reform group examining their representatives as the Labor Party has such a group examining its representatives. The Leader of the Opposition should watch out. It is common knowledge throughout the State that the skids are under him as Leader of the Labor Party. I forecast that in three years' time he will not be Leader of the Opposition. In fact he might not even last three years.

The Leader of the Opposition will have ample opportunity during the next few weeks to discuss and debate all those issues that he raised this afternoon. In the Addressin-Reply debate he will be able to school all his members to get up and criticise decisions arrived at by Cabinet during the parliamentary recess. However, I remind the Leader of the Opposition and in fact

all members on his side of the House that Cabinet comprises 18 members and that it is thev who arrived at the decisions. This situation is totally unlike that in which Mr. Whitlam and Mr. Barnard-only two menconstituted themselves the Executive Council and ruined this country. The very measures that they brought down put this nation on the road to ruin. They created mass unemployment and they devalued the dollar. And the Leader of the Opposition criticises decisions made by the Queensland Cabinet consisting of 18 Ministers elected by the back-bench members!

Honourable Members interjected.

Mr. CAMM: The back-bench members will soon make their presence felt if they are not satisfied with the action of Cabinet.

The Leader of the Opposition is reported manv times in the Press as commenting on the iwasaki issue. I do not intend to debate it fullv this afternoon. I know, and the honourable member should know-indeed, every member of this Parliament knowsthat the Iwasaki project is in the form of a franchise agreement. Every franchise agreement is brought into this House to be fullv debated and voted on before it becomes an ·Act of Parliament.

Mr. Burns: What about Aurukun?

Mr. CAMM: The honourable member will have plenty of time to talk about Aurukun. He has not yet come out in the Press to say which side he is on. Let him stand up and be counted! Which side are members of the Opposition on? Are they in favour of the Commonwealth Government's coming in here and taking over Queensland citizens and Queensland land? Let them stand up and be counted-every one of them-so that the people of Queensland may know where the A.L.P. here stands on Aurukun.

Mr. Burns interjected.

Mr. CAMM: No doubt other Opposition speakers will follow the Leader of the Opposition this afternoon. I challenge each of them to stand up and say he agrees that the Commonwealth Government should come to Queensland and take over the control of our Aborigines and our reserves and create a new State in the North of Queensland. Let them stand up and be counted as saying that they are in favour of the take-over of Aurukun. They will have plenty of opportunities to debate Aurukun. There will be plenty of opportunities to debate the Iwasaki project and they will have weeks and weeks of question-time to direct questions to Ministers about what they did while the House was in recess.

As I said at the outset, gentlemen, at this time we are electing the Speaker. I support the Premier and the Deputy Premier, who nominated and seconded Jim Houghton as Speaker of this House.


Mr. CASEY (Mackay) (3.2 p.m.): I have listened to an amazing speech by the deputy leader of the National Party, who spent five minutes castigating the Leader of the Opposition because he tried to raise in this House, on the very first sitting day, items that are of major interest to the people in all areas of Queensland. The Leader of the Opposition certainly did that when he indicated our interest in certain matters and in wanting to ensure that this Parliament gets back its responsibility of discussing, debating and voting on these issues. He then virtually said that we should not be doing these things in this Parliament. In the same breath he talked about our having ample opportunity to vote on certain things but, as he well knows, the only way in which a vote can be held on these issues in the early stages of Parliament is by moving an amendment to the Address in Reply. We will be ready to move an amendment to the Address in Reply if that is what the Government wants. There will be plenty of opportunities in the future for the Opposition to bring forward these major issues in Parliament.

Without question the people of Queensland are very concerned about the need to check Executive power, which they have seen develop in this State not just since the last election, but since 1975. Executive power developed because after the 1974 election there was a huge imbalance in this Parliament. It was evident not in the percentage of support outside Parliament, but in the numbers in Parliament. Consequently, instead of the Parliament being the true forum of the people, the place in which all matters appertaining to the State of Queensland were fully and properly discussed, its place has been taken by the Executive. Executive power came into being, and it has become more evident since the last election.

Despite the warnings that back-bench members of the Liberal and National Parties received at the last election, despite the warning by the people of Queensland, which clearly indicated that the Labor Party is on the march again in Queensland-and it will continue to march forward in Queensland until Labor occupies the Government benches again-Executive power has been extended.

I have no doubt that many Government members came here this afternoon and looked round for absent friends, those who did not return and will never return to this House. No doubt they also looked at each other and said, "How many of us will be back here next time?" Many more faces will be absent (with a few from Cabinet as well) after the next State election if Executive power continues to be exercised in the way that it has been over the last few months.

There is a need for a check on Executive power. Traditionally it is the role of Parliament to provide that check. It is the Parliament-the forum of the people; the

people's House-that must provide a check on government by the Executive. It has always been the right of the Opposition in Parliament to provide that traditional role and to assist in bringing forward in the Parliament those points which the people desire to have clarified. Parliament does not recognise political parties. Parliament recognises only Government and Opposition.

Mr. Campbell: The people do.

Mr. CASEY: The people perhaps mayand they will continue to recognise that the Liberal Party is on the downhill slide, as has been pointed out by the Leader of the Opposition when he referred to the leadership of the Liberal Party.

The sharing of time in Parliament is very important. In this debate on the election of Speaker, I want to draw the attention of members to some of the very alarming things that have been happening in this place over the last few years. Very few avenues are open to the Opposition to initiate legislation or any other measures in this House. Those avenues we have are traditional and have been accepted down through the years by all Governments, both Labor and NationalLiberal, until 1974, when we saw such a big imbalance in the numbers in this Parliament-but not in support outside. We are now seeing that imbalance rectified. Because it is, we are relying on the man who will occupy the position of Speaker of this House to be a man who will bring complete fairness and impartiality into this Chamber again. I recognise that Mr. Houghton did an excellent job during his first term as Speaker. Certainly the big imbalance of numbers made the House very difficult for him to control. However, it must now be accepted that that imbalance has been corrected, and he has a better opportunity in this Parliament of ensuring a return to the traditional procedures of Parliament.

Let me take one instance. One of the best means of probing a Government is through questions in this Parliament. During the last Parliament, question-time was turned into an absolute circus. We saw the farcical situation--

Mr. Hinzc: That's because of the silly questions you asked.

Mr. CASEY: Fancy the Minister for Local Government and Main Roads interjecting like that! He would have provided some of the best circus stunts of all at questiontime. In fact, they tell me he is almost ready to enter into a contract with the Moscow Circus On Ice. The only trouble is that he cannot balance on skates.

What happened was that when questions were asked in the Parliament the Ministers completely dodged the issues. They ref~sed to give Parliament answers to questiOns.

8 Election of Speaker [28 MARCH 1978] Election of Speaker

They would side-step them. They displayed an obvious and complete lack of knowledge of what is going on in their departments and in issues involving them. On the other hand, if they had one of their own members put forward a Dorothy Dix question, they would have a prepared answer.

This is supposed to be a democracy-a place in which Ministers can be questioned and their responsibility for their departments queried. This is supposed to be a place where a Minister displays a complete and clear understanding of everything happening in his department. But we have seen a complete lack of that displayed by our Ministers. In saying that I could go right round the Ministerial benches almost without exception.

The Premier sets the example by sidestepping. I do not know if he ever played football, but he would be one of the best side-steppers ever in this House. Perhaps he would have made a good winger playing for Kingaroy in his earlier days.

Mr. Bums interjected.

Mr. CASEY: He didn't like it too much when he played against Cherbourg, though.

Side-stepping questions has become a popular game for Government Ministers. The lead for such conduct is provided by the Premier. On one occasion a Minister had the hide to suggest during questiontime that a member should not ask him a question without notice without first indicating to him that he was going to ask a question without notice. What an absolute farce! On so many occasions questions probing Ministers' handling of the departments go unanswered.

Traditionally, the asking of questions in Parliament is the major responsibility of the Opposition. However, during the last session, Opposition members were confined, on an average, to asking one question to each 1.5 questions asked by Government members. On some days, the ratio was worse. I understand that, in the coming session, Government back-benchers want a ratio of two Government questions to one Opposition question. Democracy is going completely the wrong way.

Let me compare the Parliament of Queensland with some of the other Parliaments in Australia. The people here like to draw comparisons with the South Australian Parliament, so I shall point out firstly that, in the South Australian Parliament, the members of the Liberal and National Parties, as Opposition members, have the opportunity to ask questions in the ratio of three Opposition to one Government. That fact is taken from the official publication dealing with the last session of Parliament in that State. I repeat that the Opposition in South Australia is given a ratio of three questions to one.

The Speaker in the Commonwealth Parliament, which is currently controlled by a Liberal-National Country Party Government, sets about deliberately and impartially to allocate the call at question-time in the ratio of one Government question to one Opposition question. We would settle for that in this House. In the 1973 session in the Commonwealth Parliament, when a Labor Government was in control, the Opposition enjoyed a ratio of 1.08 questions to one. The ratio has been 1.04 to 1 during the term of the present Government.

We believe that Mr. Houghton will be the man to bring this sort of fairness back into Parliament again. That is why, as our leader said, we will support his nomination.

This is only the first stage. Also, in fairness, we ask Ministers to look to their departments and to their own work, because we expect them to supply us with the information we ask for. Parliament must be again the place where Ministers, departments and officials are made accountable to the people. Parliament must become again the most important forum in this State-this Parliament, not a television studio in the Executive Building or somewhere else. Much of the responsibility for the public forum's being taken from this Parliament must indeed fall onto the shoulders of the Premier.

The Leader of the Opposition mentioned a short time ago the need for a parliamentary accounts committee, which was recommended by the Government's own subcommittee many years ago. Last year, we reached the stage where not one Estimate was debated in this Parliament. The Government was not made accountable last year for any effort, financial or otherwise.

Matters of public interest are brought before this House. Again we believe that the Opposition should have an equal opportunity to bring forward any matter of public interest. It falls on the shoulders of the Speaker to ensure that Parliament does function in a proper and democratic way in these matters.

We must have a Government that is prepared to encourage and accept criticism. That is certainly not the case with this Government. Indeed, when it does receive criticism, it would much rather send in the secret police or somebody else to have a look at the matter.

This House has several standing committees. They are the Library Committee, the Parliamentary Buildings Committee, the Printing Committee, the Refreshment Rooms Committee and the Standing Orders Committee. Down through the years, and despite the imbalance of numbers (sometimes it has been as high as two Labor members to one National-Liberal member) the committees have comprised equal numbers from each side of the House. Parliament was then playing its true role of recognising only


Government and Opposition and not recognising political parties. The history of this House shows that that was always the case-one for one-with the Speaker as the independent chairman, again adopting his supposedly truly independent role of leader in this Chamber. He was the independent chairman of these groups. We now have a 2 to 1 imbalance in favour of the Government. We believe that there should be a return to the previous practice.

There are many other things that could be brought forward. Members of the public are concerned about the number of sitting days of the Parliament. The Queensland Parliament reached an all-time low last year of only 38 sitting days. It was also an alltime low over the length and breadth of the Commonwealth for the last 11 years. This Parliament at one time had one of the best records for sitting days, even during the term of the National-Liberal Government. I again point out that this slide started in 1975. At one stage the yearly average of sitting days for this Parliament was 63.6, and the only Parliament to sit longer was the Parliament of the Commonwealth, which sat for 66.3 days. That was an average over 11 years.

Let us now look at the average sitting days of this Parliament for the last three years. The average sitting days since 1975 for this Parliament slipped to 56, compared with 72 for the Federal Parliament. In 1977, as I said before, the Queensland Parliament slipped to an all-time low of 38 days, the lowest figure for any Parliament in Australia since 1967.

The whole system of sittings is completely outmoded. Perhaps we can discuss that matter at another time. I believe there is a need for the instigation of a new system of parliamentary sittings whereby we would sit for two weeks and have at least one week free to work in our electorates. There should be longer sittings, or more sitting days within a session. At a later time I may enunciate such a proposal in the House.

Always we must remember that the great role of this Parliament is to ensure that the rights of the people are upheld. The Opposition has a duty to see that there is full discussion of all measures proposed by the Government. And, believe you me, this Opposition will do everything possible within the Standing Orders, crude and restrictive as they are, to see that that is done and to see that every opportunity is given to us to debate every issue that comes before us that is important to Queensland. But we do need to ensure that Mr. Speaker is able to carry out his role impartially and without fear of being lynched from behind by members of his own Government.

Mr. W. D. HEWITT (Greenslopes) (3.18 p.m.): This is the one occasion in the life of each Parliament on which we are totally undisciplined. No person has any authority to control us in any way at all. In the light

of proceedings to this moment, I think we should ask ourselves whether in fact we should continue to indulge ourselves with this luxury. The Address-in-Reply debate is brought on immediately following the Opening of Parliament and in that debate everv member has 40 minutes in which to ventilate any matter with which he wishes to deal. If a colleague is prepared to forgo his own right, any member can have an extension of his time. We in this Parliament are by far the most generously served in speaking time during the debate on the Financial Statement; on that occasion we are each given an hour. Each Wednesday we have an opportunity to ventilate matters of public interest. All members of the Opposition, including the Leader, would acknowledge that on the introduction of Bills a great deal of latitude is permitted by the presiding officers.

Therefore I ask very seriously whether we should enjoy at the start of each Parliament the luxury of being totally undisciplined. This is happening in fewer and fewer Parliaments. More and more parliamentarians in an increasing number of Houses think that when a Speaker is being installed, the Clerk of the Parliament should have some authority, that indeed the Standing Orders should cover this situation also. Standing Orders are totally silent on the proceedings in which a Speaker is installed. Certainly they tell us that he will be nominated and seconded but as for thereafter they impose no discipline whatever. I believe they should.

The Leader of the Opposition lamented the fact that the Standing Orders Committee has not met in recent years. I share his lamentations but I say to him that if he wants to make this critical assessment, and if he believes that Standing Orders should be amended and that this is the first one that should be attended to, I will support him. I do not think that we do much of a favour to ourselves by being so undisciplined and so unruly by having no-one who can preside over us in any way at all during proceedings for the installation of a Speaker.

This debate is taking place because we are installing a Speaker, on this occasion a continuing Speaker, and I am rather sad that no-one. not even the mover and seconder, has touched upon the very fine qualities of the man we will re-elect today. He has had 18 years in this House; he was a distinguished mayor of the city of Redcliffe; and since he became the Speaker of this House in 1974 he has presided with firmness and reasonableness. He has been an innovator, and if this Parliament has ever needed a Speaker who is an innovator, it has found him in James Edward Hiram Houghton. It is therefore with a good deal of pleasure that I support his nomination.

I support his nomination because of those fine qualities which he has demonstrated but also because it is consistent with a coalition


agreement, and Liberals are very scrupulous in the way they observe .agreements. The coalition agreement says quite clearly that the senior partner-and that is for the time being the National Party-will have the Speaker and the Liberal Party will have the Chairman of Committees, and we accept that. We accept the agreement. We believe that agreements should be honoured to the letter and it is for that reason that with a good deal of pleasure we support the nomination of Mr. Houghton.

Because the debate is so open-ended a great number of other matters have been touched upon, and I suppose since the example has been set it is not inappropriate to follow it. I would say this to the Governmentthat it should be sensitive to some of the criticisms that have been made in recent days about sitting times and the occasions when it makes itself available to the scrutiny of the Parliament. Let us look very carefully at the structure of this Parliament. There are 18 men comprising the Government, who have to justify themselves and explain themselves to the 64 people who are members of Parliament. Occasionally when people want to berate me for something those 18 men have done, they say to me, "But you are a member of the Government." I go to great pains to emphasise that I am not a member of the Government. The Government does not comprise the joint Government parties; the Government is composed of the 18 men who sit before us right now, and there is a continuing obligation on them to explain all of their actions and all of their proposals and to submit themselves to the close scrutiny of the Parliament, and that should be done as frequently as is possible.

I had occasion in recent days to enter into some disagreement with one of my colleagues, who made the observation, "Well, when Parliament sits we are only passing laws and inflicting greater restrictions upon the people." That is not the only role of Parliament and it should not be so seen. I always tell young people that there are three roles of Parliament as I see themcustodian of the public purse, a legislative body and a forum, and in that last role if the Government does not have one legislative proposal to bring forward it would still be important to call the Parliament together on frequent occasions because Parliament must discharge this role of being a forum, a place where those 18 men are submitted to close scrutiny, questioning and observation from the other 64 members in this place. I was innovative enough to suggest to that gentleman that on occasions the Government should bring forwa:rd White Papers, not indicating in precise terms what it is going to do but saying, "These are particular problems that face us at the moment. These are the pros and these are the cons. We present this paper. We move formally that the paper be noted." That would precipitate a debate in which members on all sides

of the House could make their observations upon its contents, and in the light of those observations the Government could possibly then determine which course to adopt. So there is plenty of room for innovation in this House and there are plenty of ocasions ;vhen the Government should meet the Parliament.

But having said all of that, I return to the principal reason for our meeting todayto elect a Speaker. It is an important occasion. I think that, as on all other occasions when the Parliament sits, it should be disciplined, and the Leader of the Opposition nodded his head in affirmation when I put this proposal a few minutes ago.

Mr. Moore: We're running the show, not him.

Mr. W. D. HEWITT: I am saying this because I want him to put his actions where his mouth is. He is the one who was critical of the Standing Orders. Then~fore, if he seriously believes it, then 1t is up to him to put proposals to the Speaker. I know that the Speaker will entertain thJse proposals seriously, and give them the sHme due consideration he has given every other thing that has been submitted to him since he became Speaker in 1974. It is with a good deal of pleasure that I support the nomination of Mr. Houghton.

Mr. WRIGHT (Rockhampton) (3.26 p.m.): I would agree with the honourable member for Greenslopes that there is a need for discipline in this debate. I find it passing strange that previously when I have been here and a debate such as this has been used by the defeated member for Townsville South to castigate judges and attack Opposition members, members of the Government parties have sat back thoroughly enjoying it, but now, when a member of the Opposition, in the person of the Leader of the Opposition, presents to the Chamber issues of importance, he is abused and jeered at by Government members, including, surprisingly enough, some Ministers.

Surelv there is a time in every new Parliament f~r this Assembly to review its opemtions. I suggest that the Queensland Parliament is failing, and has failed, as a House of the people. It has failed, and will continue to fail, as an Assembly that legislates. It is failing, more importantly, as the honourable member for Mackay mentioned, as an instrument to keep a check on the Executive. When it does this it fails as a democratic institution. The problem centres on the failure to keep a check on the Executive.

It has been suggested that Cabinet Government is a form of dictatorship. But there is no dictatorship as long as there is an Opposition. l am not speaking only about political parties here. In the past we have had traditional controls over the Executive. These have mainly


been financial ones, but they have long ceased to be effective. So it is now a myth to talk about the controls on the Executive, especially as far as parliamentary control is concerned. \Ve have become little more than a rubber stamp-a rubber stamp that does the bidding and the will of the Government in the form of the Cabinet. As a Parliament we have failed to devise effective ways of keeping the control within this Chamber. We have failed to devise ways of influencing policy, whether we are in the Government or in the Opposition. We have certainly failed to find ways of controlling the machinery of administration.

The system under which we operate goes back to 1377. It has been going for 600 years, but I suggest it has been going down for almost that long. What has happened is that the bureaucracy has become too complicated, with so many difficult decisirn;; to make, and no longer can we depen1 on what we call ministerial responsibility. I accept that. We cannot say, "It i,; up to the Minister to be responsible for every decision made within his department." He has a myriad of departments under his control. We have failed to find a complete answer to this. One answer has been the establishment of select committees and parliamentary committees. Whilst this has occurred even in this State, it certainly has been slow in coming. I suggest that it has been far too slow. The gradual change has done little to restore the prestige, authority and usefulness of Parliament. The power of the Executive has grown while the power of this Legislature has shrunk.

A Government Member: You are living in the past.

Mr. WRIGHT: The honourable member may say that we are living in the past and, therefore, he is willing to cop it. If he is really responsible he will want to do something about it.

Vve have to expect a growth in the size, ramifications and expertise of the bureaucracy. But surely there must be some way of curbing this flow against us. There must be some change to ensure that the decisionmaking role stays within this Assembly. Let me cite some typical examples of where it has not.

We hear the Liberals saying what they now want to do with the Traffic Act. They are now saying exactly what we said as an Opposition months ago when amendments were brought before the Chamber. Obviously they did not get the opportunity in the caucus rooms to do anything about it, so it is clear that they, too, have lost control. As I said, the decay has been expected.

Government Members interjected.

Mr. WRIGHT: I am always prepared to admit my mistakes. It is a pity that some Government members do not admit theirs.

As I was saying-the decay in Queensland has been unnecessarily hastened. I think this has happened firstly because of the inability of Ministers to carry out their roles. Some Ministers seem to depend totally on their administrative officers. Perhaps that is to be expected in a society in which we do not have experts leading those departments, but we cannot have a situation in which there is total dependency.

The situation has arisen also because of the dictatorial control that Cabinet has over the Government parties. I have heard Government members talk outside of the problems and what they would like to do about them, but rarely do they stand up in this Chamber and raise these issues. I recall that a group of us once met in these precincts and talked about working together as Government and Opposition to try to stop changes being made to the liquor laws, yet I recall that one of the more outspoken members of the Government (who is now a minister) didn't even dare stay for the debate. I also recall that when the Aurukun issue was raised we crossed party lines and met as members with certain representatives of the Methodist Church.

Mr. Lane: Rubbish!

Mr. WRIGHT: Yes, we did. I will not name the members. Some have since resigned in protest. We met and discuo;sed what could be done about Aurukun, and although certain members were very keen to do something at the time they were missing when the debate occurred. So obviously there is dictatorial control by Cabinet and members are told, "If you do not do as you are told you will never make Cabinet."

Worse still, there is dictatorial control over Cabinet by the Premier. All sorts of "Truth to Tell" stories are told about how, when the Tarong debate was going on, the Premier walked in and said there would be a vacancy in Cabinet and the Cabinet Ministers suddenly supported him. These are the things that are being said. It is passing strange that 18 men can sit down on important issues and, having declared themselves in opposition to those issues previously, vote in favour of them. The Premier always gets his way. One begins to wonder how much control the Premier has. It certainly happened in connection with one of the issues raised by the Leader of the Opposition, that is, the SEMP resource material. Eighteen responsible members-! might put the word "responsible" in inverted commas-sat down to discuss a project that cost this nation $3,000,000. They then decided to ban it and cast it out without even having looked at anything but one photostat copy of one or two pages. Surely there is something wrong when that can occur. Surely there is something wrong when this State appoints a committee of educators to draw up a consumer protection policy that


is vitally needed and that policy is rejected by Cabinet without its even having seen the proposed draft. Something is wrong.

I also believe that a problem arises from the subservience of the Liberal Party to the National Party; but I will not expand on that. A problem arises also because of the absence of opportunity given to members to play a part in the decision-making role. It has been suggested that we have come a long way because we now have a Committee of Privileges and a Committee of Subordinate Legislation. But what about a public accounts committee and a public works committee such as we were promised 10 years ago? Queensland has as its Treasurer a man who was one of the progressive thinkers on the matter of committees of this Parliament. But he seems to be very quiet now that he occupies a position of power. This is a great pity. I have read some of his earlier speeches and can see that he was one of the radical and foremost thinkers in this area. But what happens when a member is appointed to Cabinet? Does he shut up and not want to change the system? Does he not want to rock the boat?

Mr. Hinze: You mature.

Mr. WRIGHT: I think he goes slightly yellow, like the bent banana.

A comparison with other States shows that Victoria has a Public Works Committee, a Public Accounts Committee, a Privileges Committee and a Subordinate Legislation Committee; South Australia has similar committees; even the Conservative State of Western Australia has them; and naturally New South Wales, under a Labor Government, has them. Queensland, however, does not have such a role for members to play.

Members also are faced with the lack of opportunity to raise matters in this Parliament. This matter has been mentioned by the member for Mackay. On Wednesdays in the Matters of Public Interest debate a member is given 10 minutes in which to speak. Sometimes there is time for only five members to take part in the debate; if we are lucky there is time for six to participate in it.

A Government Member: You get the Address-in-Reply debate.

Mr. WRIGHT: That is correct, but I am talking about important issues that come up suddenly. The Address-in-Reply debate occurs only once a year, and no member can determine that issues will arise only once a year.

As I said, in the Matters of Public Interest debate 10 minutes is allowed for each speech, and each Wednesday five or six of the 82 members get a chance to speak. If a member is lucky, he has an opportunity to speak once every twelve weeks. If one

examines the figures submitted by the member for Mackay, one sees that a member may get one or two chances a year to raise matters that he believes to be important. A member may be lucky enough to get two opportunities. Some honourable members-the honourable member for Caboolture, for example-get quite a few opportunities, but that is only when they are bucketing people and tipping cans. That is why they get privileges.

l\·:1r. Frawley: You will get bucketed later on.

Mr. WRIGHT: I am sure that the honourable member for Caboolture will be doing a lot of that, but the Government is a little bit short on numbers this time and we will be able to give as good as we get.

Opportunities must be provided for a member's voice to be heard in this Chamber. Under our parliamentary system, we say that a member is speaking for the people or for his electorate, but he does not get many opportunities to speak.

One of the greatest farces in this Chamber is the presentation of petitions. A member mav work for hours or weeks to have a petition prepared; people in the community may spend many days gathering signatures for a petition. However, when it comes to Parliament it is virtually thrown in the bin. Some Ministers look upon petitions as a joke. They take no notice of them. I think petitions are filed in the clerk's room downstairs. We can never get at them again, anyway; they seem to be dust collectors.

Mr. Camm: There are a lot of Mickey Mouses and Donald Ducks in them.

Mr. WRIGHT: That may be so. Even if there are Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck signatures on a petition, that should not destroy its value. Does the Minister think that should destroy the right of people to come to this Parliament and say, "We humbly petition you to do so-and-so as a matter of great importance."? Should a petition be merely received and read and then thrown somewhere downstairs? Surely that is not the proper procedure.

There is a real problem but it is not up to the Speaker to try to resolve it. As it is, he has an onerous task in trying to contain members in this Chamber. Over the years that I have seen him in action he has done extremely well. I have not always agreed with him-in fact, I have sometimes disagreed with him-but I have generally accepted the way in which he has carried out his task, and he has carried it out well.

I suggest to honourable members that it is not Mr. Speaker's role, but our role. If we continue to allow bureaucracy to usurp our power, if we continue to allow Cabinet to usurp our power, we are at


fault. I could refer to issue after issue other than SEMP. I could cite the interference by the Premier in the bashing of a young girl, MACOS and many other issues which, I believe, demonstrate the irresponsibility of members of Cabinet in not standing up for what is right. I suggest that if we do not do something about it we will demonstrate our irresponsibility as members of Parliament.

It is easy to criticise, but surely we must criticise when we believe that something is wrong. We must be willing to use opportunities to tell Parliament that there is a need for change. I suggest that we should advocate through Mr. Speaker that changes must take place in 1978. The Standing Orders Committee has not met for three or four years. It must meet. There must also be an extension of the parliamentary committee system. We must have a committee of works and a committee of accounts. There must be a radical change in the legislative approach in this Chamber. We should copy the New Zealand system under which legislative committees are set up. Instead of waiting until a Bill is presented in the Assembly, members, irrespective of their political beliefs, get together in a committee and investigate the problem. If an irrigation scheme is involved, they go out and look at it. When they come back to Parliament they speak positively, with knowledge.

We must also do something about private members' Bills. We talk about democracy and about our role as private members-we are not A.L.P. members, National Party members or Liberal Party members; we are private members-yet the right to introduce a private member's Bill in Queensland is Yirtually non-existent. Provision is made for such Bilis in the Standing Orders, but it \vould cost $2,000 and many months of hard labour to try to bring a private member's Bill before the Chamber. If there are to be changes, this must be one of the first areas to be looked at.

Many other matters have been referred to. The honourable member for Mackay dealt with the need to review sitting times, which surely is necessary. If we do only one thing in 1978 as an Assembly, we ought to introduce further instruments of control over the bureaucracy. The bureaucrats are controlling this State-yet they are nonrepresentative of the people. This surely is our responsibility, and I ask all members to get behind the Speaker, once he is elected, to ensure that this Parliament is truly an instrument of representative democracy in Queensland.

Hon. R. J. HINZE (South Coast-Minister for Local Government and Main Roads) (3.41 p.m.): I join with all previous speakers in supporting the nomination of a very good friend of mine. I refer particularly to James Edward Hiram "Abiff" Houghton on his being nominated to the position of Speaker of this

42nd Parliament. He is having a little grin to himself-and well he might, too, because in his first term as Speaker he acquitted himself so well that today we do not hear one speaker on either side of the House opposing his nomination. All he is hearing is commendation-and so he shouldfor the way in which he conducted himself as Speaker and attended to the duties of this most important position. That is why we are all so pleased and proud to be able to re-elect him. I hope that he occupies that chair very shortly. I also congratulate his wife, Mary, for the way in which she has carried out her onerous duties as wife of the Speaker of our Parliament. I hope that the next term will be a very happy one for them.

We know that he was a member of a local authority. He was mayor of the city of Redcliffe. He served his country in war. In business he did all of the things that we could expect from a person of his ability. It is for those reasons that we are pleased to see Jim Houghton nominated as Speaker.

I spoke briefly to one of my ministerial colleagues, who said, "I think he is the best Speaker we have ever had." Some of us remember many of the other Speakers. We remember Sir David Nicholson. We remember "Bugger 'em" Bill Lonergan. Every time he came into the House and something went wrong he said, "Bugger 'em", so we called him "Bugger 'em" Bill Lonergan. Before those days we had that great Australian Labor Party Speaker whom we all loved so well, the late Johnno Mann. On my entry into Parliament I passed through the usual procedures, came through the House and went down to the bar. Johnno Mann met me there. He said, "Congratulations, son. I am pleased to see you. I knew your predecessor. I knew him well, but he got a bit sour after the last term here. Don't get like that." He said, "You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. I've been here for 30 years. It's the best club in Australia and I hope you stay here for 30 years." That is what I intend to do. These are the blokes we have seen on our way-Speakers of this Parliament; the personalities and the various people of ability.

I congratulate the new members who sit in this Chamber today. They have already had a taste of what takes place in this forum. Irrespective of the diatribe from the member for Rockhampton, all members can say their piece. When it comes to democracy in Queensland, he would have you believe that all is gone and forgotten. That is not the case. Everything that is necessary for democracy under the Parliamentary system has been preserved in this State. It is yours. All you have to do is use it. Of course, some people would believe that, if you want to change the law, you get down to the city square and change it there or link arms and march up the street. That is another way of changing the law, they think. However, the


only way to change 1t is on the floor of this Parliament. You will have ample opportunity to do it.

We all listened to the Leader of the Opposition. He knew he had no alternative to heaping commendation on James Houghton today-but what did he do? Rather than do that in a fitting manner, he had to attack the Cabinet on the way in which it has conducted the affairs of this State since the last election. We can prove to him that in Queensland our record is good. In fact, except for the Australian Parliament, we have the best record in Australia.

Opposition Members interjected.

Mr. HINZE: If you don't believe me, go and get the figures. When you do, you will see that we in Queensland sit more than does any other State Parliament in Australia.

Opposition Members interjected.

Mr. HINZE: You think you know, but that is like the rest of your figures.

Mr. Wright: You're wrong.

Mr. HINZE: Of course they're wrong. fhey are jacked up. You would not know. If you want 20c on the side I will take it, because you will lose the bet.

What did the Leader of the Opposition do? He set about criticising the members of Cabinet, one by one, and said that, since we last met on the floor of this Chamber, all of the things that have transpired and all of the things that we have done have been wrong for Queensland. We admit that we have not met since last November and perhaps we should have met before now.

Mr. Burns interjected.

Mr. HINZE: No. My voice is not going. No way in the world. I get a little bit of a girlish cackle now and then, but I will come good. There is no way in the world that my voice has ever let me down. It will stay with me for another half an hour or so and you will have to sit there and cop it. What did you sc.y? You came out with a lot of poppycock about Iwasaki. But what did you do last week? You were invited to attend a public meeting at Yeppoon and you squibbed it. That is what you did. But who attended? I attended the public meeting. Your name was on the list but you were not there. Invitations went to the Minister, the Leader of the Opposition--

Mr. Burns: The day after.

Mr. HINZE: Not the day after. I received my invitation the day before. I put off other ministerial duties and I attended the meeting. About 220 people were present. I put the maps on the wall and I said, "Tlv~re is nothing secretive about this Op':~tnment.

There is the map. There is what we propose to do." Then what did we do? We sent our beloved Premier to Japan to try to bring back into this State a $100,000,000 deal. What did the Leader of the Opposition do? You screamed and cried about who was paying the bill. That is all you did. You were wondering who put somebody up in Japan. We said, "Joh, go to Japan and stay another month. If you can get the Iwasaki crew here, it will be good." There is no doubt about it. Mr. Iwasaki would go into any other State in Australia if it would have him, so don't go crying about him. You will have your opportunity to debate the Iwasaki deal on the floor of this Chamber.

You will have the opportunity to debate Tarong and all of the other things you are talking about. In case you have some cock-eyed idea that somebody pushed me overboard, I voted for Tarong because I believe that it is the best place for the power station to go. Nobody in this Chamber can claim that Ronny Camm and I are not the best of friends in this Chamber. But when it came to making a decision I said that I was standing up for Tarong because of the facts and reasons placed before me. The other 17 Ministers did the same.

Trot them out one by one. What else did we do? SEMP and MACOS. This is the proudest Government in Australia when it comes to the amount spent on education. We have increased tremendously the Education Vote in Queensland. What do we find? Nothing but criticism from people such as the honourable member for Rockhampton, who should know better but obviously does not. He wants to go on with a lot of claptrap that we have to change the laws and that we have to change them by street marches or in some other way, but certainly not on the floor of this Parliament. Look, my friend, you will have ample opportunity.

Mr. Wright interjected.

Mr. HINZE: We are not ducking for cover on anything. There is no way that any of the decisions you think have been made secretly or any of the other matters you are talking about have in fact been decided on secretly. They have been made after due consideration by what I believe to be the 18 most sensible men in this Parliament-my 17 Cabinet colleagues and myself.

Opposition members might well ask themselves why we are charged with the responsibility of electing a Speaker. It is for the simple reason that the A.L.P. got the second worst result on record. Out of the 82 seats in Queensland, it won a miserable 23. And members opposite cried about that. We have the right to elect a Speaker because the people of Queensland returned us with 59 seats to 23 to govern this State. That is exactly what we are doing and we are doing it in--

Mr. Wright: In the Cabinet room.


Mr. HINZE: We are doing it in accordance with the best traditions of parliamentary democracy anywhere in Australia and anywhere in the world.

Mr. D'ARCY (Woodridge) (3.50 p.m.): It is disappointing that we are not going to have a ballot for the appointment of the Speaker of the Forty-second Parliament, because that would be the only opportunity that many of the new members would have of taking part in a secret ballot in the Parliament. As most of us know, this is the only time during the life of a Parliament in which a secret ballot can be held. It is a shame that there are not other secret ballots because in the Queensland Parliament, as has been pointed out, we now have the abuse of Executive power by 18 men. As the Leader of the Opposition pointed out, they are virtually 18 faceless men.

It is interesting to hear the cackling coming now from the back benches on the Government side because we hear in private all the whingeing and whining about Cabinet decisions, particularly the ones that have been mentioned today. We look with interest, too, at what has been happening within the Liberal Party. I heard the Premier say on television the other night, "The Liberals had a victory. They got an extra one in Cabinet." Those of us who know Charles Porter know who had the victory. The Premier had the victory, because Bill Knox and Charles Porter are Joh's men. They always have been and they always will be.

It is a shame that the Liberal Party in this State has not given the leadership that a political party should give. It is a party that is in decline; it is on the skids in Queensland and its members well and truly know it. Their figures at the polls are sliding so rapidly that they are not game to go into a fair and equitable redistribution in this State.

Mr. Knox interjected.

Mr. D'ARCY: The Treasurer knows as well as I do that he is not able to stand on his own feet on the issue of redistribution or anything else. The number of seats in this Parliament is 82 and most of those held by the Liberal Party have an enrolment of about 18,000. I suggest to the Treasurer that he divide the 1,100,000 people in Queensland who went to the polls by 18,000 to find out how many seats that would produce. If the Treasurer is not good at mathematics, I can inform him that it works out at 60, not 82. There are therefore 22 superfluous members; there are 22 who are not needed, and we know who they are. They are to be found in the ranks of the National Party in this State.

At the present time in Queensland there has been abuse of the Executive function. Back-benchers on the Government side have very little chance to make any decisions at all. Unfortunately the honourable member

for Greenslopes, the paragon of the democratic s·ociety and the Constitution, has left the House; but even he was not able to stand up and be counted on this issue.

We all know that the Liberal Party in Queensland is undergoing very great stress. We know that it will be wiped out in this State, and by the National Party. Its Cabinet colleagues are supervising the demise of the Liberal Party in Queensland and they are doing it by attacking the middle class through their decisions, such as economic decisions concerning Tarong and Millmerran and education decisions concerning SEMP.

SEMP raises probably the most interesting situation because from talking to Ministers I can assure the House that they still do not understand what SEMP is all about. They still do not understand that SEMP is a social education materials project designed to supplement teaching in this State. They do not even know that most of the material still has not been published. SEMP was designed by all the Education Departments of the States in conjunction with the conference of New South Wales head-teachers. The SEMP material was prepared by those people at great cost to the Australian public-and this was the material on which the Cabinet of Queensland made a decision without even understanding what it was doing! SEMP is not a course like MACOS; it is a list of material to be used at the discretion of teachers. The interesting part is that within the curriculum that is taught in Queensland today, and has been taught for the last decade, there is no part of the SEMP material that is available that could not be taught under a separate cover. That has gone completely and utterly over the heads of members on the other side of the House. The New South Wales Minister for Education did not miss those members the other day when he said-

"This action by the Queensland Government represents in my view a most improper intrusion of Government into the detail of academic policies. In totalitarian States it is the practice for the State to determine what should or what should not be taught in its schools but this has not hitherto been the practice in Australia and it is inconsistent with democratic concepts."

All the actions of Cabinet have been inconsistent with the democratic processes of this State.

The failure of the Parliament to sit, the role of Cabinet and its inability to oversee the economic future of the State of Queensland are the most important issues that will come before the new Speaker of this Parliament, and by far the most important is the failure of this Government to oversee the economic future of Queensland. Government members quote figures that are not accurate, and the Minister for Local Government and Main Roads quoted some figures


in his usual bombastic way, and figures that cheat and lie. We see this when Government members talk about building a hospital with so many beds. We do not hear anything about the aesthetics of the situation such as we do in other States, nor do we hear about parking. All we hear is that the hospital has so many beds. Great stuff!

The same principle applies to education and to all other aspects of Queensland life, particularly our social life. We saw even in this morning's "Courier-Mail" that people in Queensland are at last realising the failure of this Government to provide even reasonable cultural activities within the State and reasonable theatres such as those in New South Wales or the Festival Centre in Adelaide. We are so far behind the other States--

Mr. Bird: We're so far ahead, it's not funny.

Mr. D' ARCY: The Minister has even been brainwashed by his own propaganda. I am amazed.

Mr. Bird: We're so far ahead in Queensland, you wouldn't know.

Mr. D'ARCY: The Minister did not even know what SEMP was. He still does not know. Somebody told him what MACOS was and he thought that SEMP was the same thing. That is what happened, and the Minister is still talking about the same thing. A great Minister for Education! The Minister's counterparts in other States take great delight in looking at his record and realising that Queensland, economically and educationally, has a lot to learn. We are well aware that during this Parliament the Government intends again to try to cover up the economic inefficiencies of the past two decades.

Jim Houghton has ruled over this Parliament for the past three years and today he will be re-elected unanimously. We in the Opposition say that he should be fair to everyone in the Parliament during questiontime and during debates. He must realise that there is now in this Parliament a most viable Opposition, one that with fewer than 2,000 more votes would have won 10 more seats, and will do so at the next election.

Mr. LANE (Merthyr) (3.59 p.m.): I am happy to join in this debate here today for two reasons, firstly to support the very able former Speaker of this Parliament, Jim Houghton, on his nomination for that role again in the following three years. Jim Houghton has been one of the greatest Speakers this Parliament has ever seen, and I am ready to support him and openly vote for him in this Parliament on this occasion.

Secondly, I am pleased that this debate is taking place because it will allow the new members, on this side of the House at least, to understand something of the nature of the Australian Labor Party, particularly as

it is presently constituted in this Parliament. The Australian Labor Party members who occupy seats in this House have just embarked upon one of the greatest frauds ever perpetrated on this Parliament. The Leader of the Opposition led this great fraud with the most hypocritical speech I think we have ever heard. Here is a man who talked about the institution of Parliament, the man who stood up here and said that it must be protected so that Parliament shall have its will, when in fact we all know that none of the members on that side of the House have any real say in a policy sense at all. They merely do what they are told to do from outside.

The double-standard speech of the Leader of the Opposition-the temporary Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Burns)-in this place today illustrated what a great actor he has become. It showed how he is being groomed by his public relations men. I notice that he has even shaved off half of his side-levers and is wearing more conservative suits. He is grooming himself to become respectable on the highways and byways of this State. Little does the Leader of the Opposition know that the people of Queensland are not as foolish, shallow-minded or as simple as he may think they are.

The proposition that Parliament should govern and make day-to-day decisions affecting the State is one that is understood well by us on this side because we understand what the traditions of the Westminster system mean. The members of the Opposition understand, too, but of course they are very much opposed to that system.

In this brief debate todav on this unique occasion when there is no· Speaker in the chair, many thousands of dollars will be wasted on the printing of "Hansard" and the hours of labour of staff that have to be paid for, but all for what? No really good purpose, because it is the responsibility of the Government in this place to govern. The 18 men sitting there who make up the Executive and have the responsibility of dayto-day government in this State have their commission from the Governor, and they will govern in the true sense. We accept that here. It is part of the platform of the two parties on this side of the House to respect and honour the \Vestminster system. We know that it is part of the Labor Party platform to do a\vay with the office of Governor in this State, to abolish this system and to change to a situation similar to that of the Republican Governments we see in some overseas countries. Beyond anything else, the Australian Labor Party is a republican party. That is why it does not respect the role of Executive government. It does not respect the proposition that the Executive is responsible to the Parliament and that the Parliament, in turn, is responsible to the people.

The A.L.P. is a republican party; it is an anti-monarchist party. It would tip up the whole system of government as we know it.


The speech made by the Leader of the Opposition today is a two-faced speech; it is a fraudulent speech. The period that this debate runs depends on members coming in here with respect for the system. We know that the members of the Opposition have no such respect. We depend on all members coming in here and behaving with a sense of dignity and a sense of goodwill towards the system that we honour in this Parliament. But we know that Opposition members do not respect or hold to any of those ideals. They have no respect for the institution of Parliament as it is constituted in this State or, for that matter, in this nation. All one has to do is look at how their counterparts in the Federal Parliament-Whitlam and some of his henchmen-conducted themselves towards this system of parliamentary democracy when they were in power. They were contemptuous of it; they ignored it. They held Executive Council meetings in the middle of the night through to the early hours of the morning; they maligned the Governor-General; they poked fun at the Queen; they made decisions outside the Commonwealth Constitution.

They did these things repeatedly, and they did them proudly, just as these men who sit opposite us would do today if they were honest enough to admit it. Of course we all know that the decisions made by their party are made in other places. Each and everv one of those 23 Labor members is subject t~ a set of rules-the Constitution and Rules of the Australian Labor Party. I have a copy here before me.

An Opposition Member interjected.

Mr. LANE: That was a new Opposition member interjecting. There is another aspect of parliamentary tradition that is not respected by new members on that side. The tradition is that they remain silent in their place until after they have made their maiden speech so that they will be treated with respect and courtesy during their maiden speech. They have no respect for that tradition either. Most of them have demonstrated it here today. The member representing the Palamas Club at West End has demonstrated it today. That applies to all the other trade union officials sitting on that side.

I was about to read the pledge that members of the Opposition signed prior to receiving endorsement by the Australian Labor Party. It is set out in the Australian Labor Party's Constitution and General Rules as follows-

"! (Little Tommy Burns) being a Candidate for selection by the Labor Party's recognised political organisation in the (Lytton) Electorate hereby give my pledge that if not selected I will not in any way oppose the Candidature of the duly selected Nominee, and, if selected, I will go through with the contest."

That is quite a reasonable and an acceptable proposition and most parties hold to it. However, then it goes on to say-

"I agree, if elected, to advocate and support the principles contained in the Australian Labor Party's latest Federal, State, and Local Government Platforms ... "

That means all platforms, not just the State platform of the party. They will support the principles contained in the Federal platform, pronounced by some other people in some other State. It then continues--

" ... and on all questions affecting the Platform to vote as a majority of the Parliamentary or Municipal Labor Party may decide at a duly constituted Caucus meeting. In the event of the question of the interpretation of any Plank in the Platform being in dispute, it shall be referred to the Queensland Central Executive for decision, and that decision shall be final."

That decision shall be final and binding on the actions and utterances of the members of the Australian Labor Party who are elected to this Parliament. So we see the hypocrisy of the Leader of the Opposition and his colleagues in playing out this farce, in pretending that they have any respect for this institution and in pretending that they will do anything other than respect the final decisions of the Queensland Central Executive of the Australian Labor Party. That is the pledge that all of them have signed.

Let us look at some of the Labor Partv members who have been elected to this Parliament. Among them are six former fulltime trade union officials, who, incidentally, were elected at the last State election. 'When we look at them we can see something of the motivation behind that pledge. It is a typical Trades Hall pledge, a pledge that all these men joyously embrace as they enter this Parliament.

Mr. Moore: What about the two aldermen?

Mr. LANE: I am hoping that a member with closer affiliations with local government might say something about the two aldermen. I want to make a comment or two about the six Trades Hall officials who recently came to this Parliament to join their brethren in this place. Opposition members can laugh their heads off; it happens to be a fact, and it is understood quite clearly by the majority of people in the electorates represented by the members on this side of the House. These former officials from the Trades and Labor Council of Queensland--

Mr. Bjelke-Petersen: Will you name them?

Mr. LANE: Certainly I will name them, but first I want to read some of the aims and objects of the Trades and Labor Council of Queensland. In other words, I want to read some of the objects that these men


subscribe to first and foremost, before they subscribe to the will and wishes of their constituents.

The rules of the Trades and Labor Council of Queensland, under the heading "Objects", state in the paragraph lettered (d)-

"To wrest from the capitalist class the economic powers which it as a class possesses, and to use them in the interest of the workers."

That is one of the aims and objects of these trade union officials.

We can also easily learn the objects of the Australian Council of Trade Unions. Its first objective is set out as-

"The socialisation of industry, i.e., pro-duction, distribution and exchange."

That is the first objective of the body from which many Opposition members have come. The methods to achieve that objective are set out, and the last one is as follows-

"Political action to secure, where appropriate, legislative implementation of the declared policies of the A.C.T.U."

That, of course, includes the socialisation of production, distribution and exchange.

We are entitled to know where the allegiance of these members lies. I would like them to tell us today without my having to spell it out in detail as I have just done. I would ask the two new representatives of the Electrical Trades Union, the member for Sandgate (Mr. Warburton) and the member for Nudgee (Mr. Vaughan), where they stand. Thev are former full-time officials of the E.T.U. I do not know which master Mr. Warburton serves. I do not know whether he serves the 16,000 people in Sandgate or the municipal caucus in the city hall, or whether he is still under the thumb of Neal Kane in the E.T.U. office up at the Trades Hall. I suspect that his true allegiance is to the last one named.

Mr. Vaughan, another full-time official of the Electrical Trades Union, is a man famous for his wild, radical, Left-wing remarks in journals of all kinds. Mr. Davis of the Transport Workers' Union is back with us today by courtesy of Arch Bevis. Would he care to stand up and take a bow? We will now be subjected to three more years of his nonsense in this place when he reads the Trades Hall briefs prepared for him by Arch Bevis, delivered to him by messenger from the back of a truck. He will get up here and read them. He will say anything, and slate anyone on this side of the Chamber, to keep in favour with the Trades Hall and to keep his seat in this place. Unfortunately, we will now have three more years of it.

And what about Mr. Smith, the President of the Trades and Labor Council in Townsville?

An Opposition Member: Who is that?

Mr. LANE: I mean Mr. Wilson, the president of the Townsville Trades and Labor Council. My point is still valid. There he is. W c will hear from him because he has his political and industrial bosses to answer to. And there are many others in this Opposition who answer to trades unions.

The real motive of the Leader of the Opposition in making this move today lies in the fact that pressures within the Labor Party at the moment demand that he, the Temporary Leader of the Opposition (little Tommy Burns from Lytton), the man who signed the pledge to do what he is told, is in a very insecure position in the Labor parliamentary caucus. He is surrounded by a group of heavier Trades Hall heavies. They have been in the game longer and know that they are better than he is at it. One of them will knock him off in the next three years, but he is not sure where the dagger will come from. He is trying to get a group of men around him today to protect his back from the other Trades Hall heavies in this place. The feeling of insecurity in the Leader of the Opposition gave rise to this debate-it is nothing more and nothing less; it has nothing to do with the institution of Parliament, which is not respected by even one of those opposite.

Mr. HOUGHTON: Honourable members, I express my sincere thanks for the honour proposed to be conferred upon me, and I submit myself to the pleasure of the House.

Honourable Members: Hear, Hear!

There being no other nomination, Mr. Houghton, on being called, was conducted to the chair by the mover and the seconder. Speaking from the dais, he said: I thank honourable members for the honour bestowed upon me. I shall endeavour to carrv out my duties to the utmost and to give satisfaction to all honourable members.

Hon . .J. B.JELKE-PETE.RSEN (BarambahPremier) (4.13 p.m.): It is with a great deal of pleasure that I rise to congratulate you, Mr. Speaker, on your re-election to that high office. I was very interested to hear the overall words of commendation, support and goodwill extended to you by honourable members on both sides of the House. You must be gratified to know that you have the goodwill of people in every party. I and my Cabinet colleagues congratulate you. I am sure that each of us will try to co-operate with you to make your task a little easier. At times you are called on to make difficult decisions and it behoves every one of us to realise the heavy responsibility devolving on you. As we ponder on what is involved, I am sure we realise what it means to this House and to the people of Queensland to have a democratic form of Government, a Government that we inherited from Great Britain, which means

Election of Speaker [28 MARCH 1978] Special Adjour-nment 19

much to this State and nation. I congratulate you, Mr. Speaker, and certainly look forward to co-operating with you in your difficult and responsible task.

Hon. W. E. KNOX (Nundah-Deputy Premier and Treasurer) (4.15 p.m.): I have very much pleasure in supporting those remarks. I take the opportunity also of pointing out that at this time, when the House elects its Speaker, the House is probably at its greatest strength and possibly at its greatest weakness. If there is ever a time when Parliament is vulnerable, it is when the Speaker is being elected, and yet we managed to survive. No doubt we always will, even in the absence of a set of rules.

To you, Mr. Speaker, we offer our congratulations on attaining this office again. During the last term you showed considerable dignity and quiet control of the House. It was very seldom that you had to raise your voice in order to discipline the members. It is quite true that your strength lies very much in the hands of the members themselves. Whether or not the Parliament succeeds under your leadership depends on the support which the members give to you. We give it to you not only because you are a person of dignity and authority but also because you hold in your hands the responsibility which we have entrusted to you. The role of Speaker is such that the link between the Crown and the Parliament is in your hands as our spokesman to the Crown.

During this term you will have the opportunity of seeing for the first time the presentation of a mace to this Legislature, which is long overdue. One would have thought that possibly our Mother Parliament-the Parliament of New South Wales-would have ensured that this House was equipped at the. till!e that it '>Yas established. In many ways It did. It provided many of the officers of the Parliament, but apparently overlooked the provision of a mace. We are very grateful, Mr. Speaker, that you have taken a special interest in seeing that this Parliament is properly equipped. During this term you will see the opening of new facilities for members, which, too, are long overdue.

I am quite sure that everybody will applaud the way in which you have handled the affairs of Parliament since becoming Speaker. I assure you that you have the full support of all members.

Mr. BURNS (Lytton-Leader of the Opposition) (4.17 p.m.): On behalf of the Opposition, I join with the Premier and the Deputy Premier in offering you congratulations on your election as Speaker. I pass on our good wishes to your wife, who has always been very kind to us when we have been entertained in your Speaker's rooms.

One of the reasons we as an Opposition felt that we should support you on this occasion and not nominate anyone against you was that during the last term of the Parliament you were always accessible to the Opposition. You made the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association here work

for the first time in many, many years. The parliamentary committees that are in existence-library, refreshment rooms and so onhave worked, and worked well. You have ensured that they have met regularly. As a result, members of Parliament have been able to participate in that way. We wish you good health and good cheer and we thank you for your good work in the past.

Mr. SPEAKER: Honourable members, the Honourable the Premier, the Deputy Premier and the Leader of the Opposition-! thank you for the kind words you have spoken about my wife and me. I assure you that they are deeply appreciated. I would also say to the new members that the behaviour they have seen here this afternoon will now end. I support the expressions of one speaker about the behaviour of the House and its dignity; it is entirely in your hands. I can assure you that \vhilst I am in the chair there will be no more of the behaviour that we sighted here this afternoon. I particularly draw that to the attention of the new members. I would not like them to think that the behaviour of the House will continue along those lines for the duration of the session.

I deeply appreciate the co-operation and assistance of all honourable members in the past. This has made my task so much easier. I look forward to your continued co-operation. I assure all honourable members that my door is always open to them to make suggestions for the benefit of all honourable members and of Parliament itself. This could make your job easier and mine as easy as it has been. I repeat that I look forward to the co-operation of all honourable members in making this a very successful term of office.

PRESENTATION OF MR. SPEAKER

Hon. J. BJELKE-PETERSEN (BarambahPremier): I desire to inform honourable members that His Excellency the Governor will receive the House for the purpose of presenting Mr. Speaker to His Excellency at Government House this afternoon at 5 o'clock.

Mr. SPEAKER: I wish to inform the House that at 4.45 p.m. today I shall leave for Government House, there to present myself to His Excellency the Governor as the member chosen to fill the high and honourable office of Speaker, and I invite such honourable members as care to do so to accompany me.

SPECIAL ADJOURNMENT

Hon. J. BJELKE-PETERSEN (BarambahPremier): I move-

"That the House, at its rising, do adjourn until 2.12 p.m. tomorrow in the late Legislative Council Chamber." Motion agreed to. The House adjourned at 4.22 p.m.

Legislative Assembly TUESDAY MARCH · Frawley, Desmond John, Esquire Gibbs, Ivan James, Esquire...

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Transcript of Legislative Assembly TUESDAY MARCH · Frawley, Desmond John, Esquire Gibbs, Ivan James, Esquire...