[Greens-Media] Liberal MLAs stomp their feet!

[Manderson, Roland]

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ACT GREENS MLA DEB FOSKEY MEDIA RELEASE
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4 April 08




Liberal MLAs stomp their feet! 

ACT Greens MLA Deb Foskey, who is chair of the Public Accounts
Committee, has described Liberal Party behaviour in the Assembly as
childish.

 "I understand the Liberal MLAs are demanding the chair of the Public
Accounts Committee and are threatening to refuse to pair with Labor
members in the Chamber if Chief Minister Stanhope doesn't toe the line"
Dr Foskey said today.

"Already this week we saw all Liberals MLAs thumb their noses at a long
standing Assembly agreement, in order to secretly sneak their own bit of
business onto the Notice Paper." 

"They are happy to feign outrage when the Government fails to be
straight with the public, but are quite prepared to be entirely
deceptive themselves whenever it suits."

"Now it seems they are prepared to sacrifice one of the basic procedures
used to manage parliamentary business all around the world, which is for
oppositions to pair their members with the government when a member
cannot attend, because they have not got what they want."

"In the ACT of course, with such small numbers, and the need for
Ministers quite often to be at inter-governmental and other meetings,
this pairing convention is particularly important."

"This shoddy attempt at blackmail is simply the behaviour of a foot
stomping toddler who is not getting its own way."

"Unfortunately, the preparedness of all Liberal MLAs to hold the
conventions and practices of parliament in contempt will have
implications on how effective our Assembly can be."

"We are all aware that too many Canberra people see the Legislative
Assembly as a self important irrelevance.  It seems that the Liberals
are doing their utmost to reinforce that view" Dr Foskey said.

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Roland Manderson   Media Advisor
ACT   Greens    MLA  Deb  Foskey  
Legislative Assembly for the ACT 
ph(02)62050551      m 0412241379
==== www.act.greens.org.au ===== 
  
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