Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the report by the Joint Standing Committee on the National Capital and External Territories on the committee’s visit to Norfolk Island. I have not studied this report in any detail, but I was pleased to hear the two presentations that have just been made, by Senator Carr and Senator Hogg, on the report. I congratulate Senator Lightfoot, the chairman of this committee, on the work that the committee has done. I was delighted to hear from the previous two speakers of their support and determination to do something because, as I recall, in the years when I was the Minister for Regional Services, Territories and Local Government—from 1998 to 2001—I am not sure that the Labor Party was always supportive of some of the reforms that obviously had to be implemented.

I achieved fame far beyond my abilities by being attacked on New York radio by none other than Colleen McCullough, world renowned author and then resident—and I think still resident—of Norfolk Island. I had tried to implement some first-toe-in-the-water reforms, but they were very strongly resisted by many on the island, including the good Colleen McCullough, who had very strong views then, and I am sure still does, about the way life should exist on Norfolk Island.

The voting system in those days—and I assume it is still the same—was such that an individual voter was given a handful of votes and could then cast all of those votes for one candidate or cast one vote for five or six different candidates. I am not sure of the exact detail, but it was a very strange system. The thing that always galled me was that, in such a small community—from memory I think there were about 800 voters and a couple of thousand people on the island—they had a parliament with, in those days, four ministers plus a chief minister and, because it was such a small community, very often those in parliament and those who took the name of minister were actually dealing with themselves. There were a couple of celebrated incidents where contracts were being let by ministers to companies in which they had a very direct interest—and that obviously could not continue.

Some of the remarks that Senator Hogg and Senator Carr have made certainly do highlight some of the difficulties, particularly for those people on the island who cannot fly at the drop of a hat to the mainland for medical or other attention that might be needed. Reform is long overdue. Of course, I have no idea what proposals are going to cabinet, although I am aware, as the two previous speakers are, that there is a package of measures going to cabinet for consideration to try to address some of the quite obvious problems on Norfolk Island. I wish those deliberations well, and I am delighted to hear that there will be, hopefully—depending on what the proposals are, I suppose—bipartisan support.