David Bushby (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I withdraw the comment about corruption. Tasmanians have a choice between more of the same and voting for a government that will work towards rebuilding public faith in our democratic institutions. Sure, in the lead-up to an election Labor are adept at promising that they have changed. They are doing it now—promising to do better and saying that they are sorry for all the mistakes and everything that has gone wrong over the last four years—but they promised the same thing before the last election, in 2006. You only have to look at what has happened since then to make a rational decision on whether they are likely to deliver this time.

Examples where the current government and its integrity and management have failed are numerous, but let me remind you of a few, Madam Acting Deputy President. First was the bungled plan by the Minister for Health, Lara Giddings, to build a new Royal Hobart Hospital on a totally inappropriate site at a hugely inflated cost with tens of billions of dollars spent pursuing the proposal, before abandoning it under pressure from the Liberals, the medical profession and Tasmanians in general. Next was the poorly planned and poorly executed forced takeover of water and sewerage services, ripping these functions off local councils, the majority of which delivered them well and at realistic cost to their ratepayers. The result of the government’s bungled approach imposed massively more expensive water bills and created a new, centralised bureaucracy which in some cases cannot even deliver clean, safe drinking water. Of course, one of the highest profile scandals surrounded Labor mate Richard Butler, a long-time Kevin Rudd associate and diplomatic mate, who got a gratuitous $650,000 go-away incentive from Tasmanian Labor to end what was turning into a very embarrassing situation for the government.

One of the worst scandals Tasmanian Labor has faced involved a former Deputy Premier and then Attorney-General—the so-called ‘Shreddergate’ affair, regarding the appointment of a new magistrate. Mr Kons initially denied in parliament that he had approved the appointment of lawyer Simon Cooper, but he was caught out when a document that he had signed as Attorney-General confirming that selection was found shredded in a rubbish bin outside his Burnie office, leading to his forced resignation as Deputy Premier and Attorney-General. The allegation is that he was told to change the appointment because Mr Cooper had expressed dissent regarding government decisions on the pulp mill approval process and therefore was not deserving of reward.

This followed another Labor mate scandal involving yet another Deputy Premier, this time long-time Labor insider and union official Bryan Green. Just days before the 2006 election, Mr Green signed off on a secret and exclusive contract with Tasmanian Compliance Corporation, a company in which ex-Labor minister John White was heavily involved, delivering a guaranteed multimillion dollar income stream—a decision that led to criminal charges being pursued against him and to two criminal trials, both of which delivered hung juries, meaning, of course, that he was never actually acquitted. Mr Green’s actions were again called into question regarding his knowledge of and blatant denial of financial problems with the Spirit of Tasmania III, prior to the 2006 election. After the election, it became clear he knew all about them, as the government proceeded to close down the service because it was losing money hand over fist. Then there was former Premier Lennon’s acceptance of free hospitality from a company associated with Betfair on the eve of signing the lucrative Betfair gambling deal.

You might ask: what about David Bartlett, the current Premier? Most of the scandals that I have referred to so far occurred under his predecessors; what about the current Premier of my home state? When he was installed as Premier by the Labor backroom operators, he promised change, which sounded good. He promised ‘new government within government’; he promised to ‘fix the mess’; he promised to ‘tell the truth at all times’. But Mr Bartlett has failed and Tasmanians have got more of the same. David Bartlett has proved to be too weak to change the culture of this Labor government, and in fact is representative of that culture. Examples of his leadership in ‘fixing the mess and delivering new government’ include keeping the former chief of staff to the then Premier, Mr Lennon, on his massive salary package for more than a year at taxpayers’ expense after he was replaced by Mr Bartlett’s preferred candidate but had no actual job to do. There was the Premier’s failed Tasmania Together education reforms, which have left the secondary school system in chaos and the education unions campaigning Tasmanians to vote for a party that will ditch these reforms—that is, the unions are out there saying, ‘Vote for anyone but Labor.’ There has been a massive blow-out in Labor minders and spin doctors under Labor generally, but it has occurred exponentially under Mr Bartlett in the past two years.

Another scandal that dragged Tasmania’s reputation through the mud as it made the pages of tabloid magazines involved then Minister Paula Wriedt, who admitted to an affair with her ministerial driver. In itself that should have been a private matter for those involved, but the problem with Ms Wriedt’s affair was the cost under David Bartlett’s government to Tasmanian taxpayers, which was a payout of $55,000 to the driver with whom she was having an affair, because he was harassed. In the middle of last year we had another resignation of another senior Labor minister, Allison Ritchie, when it was found she was employing two of her sisters and her mother in her own office. Ms Ritchie made an apparent admission that she had not informed the Legislative Council, which directly employed her staff, that a candidate for a job in her office was her mother, Christine McIntyre.

Then there was the bungling over the police commissioner. Over 12 months ago, Jack Johnson temporarily stepped down facing charges revolving around advice that he had provided to former Premier Lennon. While the case was taking place, the current Premier approached the former police commissioner, Richard McCreadie, and announced publicly that he was going to appoint him, before withdrawing that appointment less than 24 hours later. The bungling continued after Mr Johnson was cleared when the government refused to reappoint him. In what became a long drawn out comedy of errors, Mr Johnson has now resigned, Mr McCreadie was never reappointed and Tasmania still does not have a police commissioner.

Then there was the case of a senior departmental head and Labor mate having his contract renewed only days before his entire department was abolished. Only days before hundreds of employees in the Department of Environment, Parks, Heritage and the Arts were told their jobs no longer existed and their department was abolished, a Labor mate and ex-chief of staff to Jim Bacon, Scott Gadd, signed a $750,000 contract of reappointment as the secretary of that department. That is right: a Labor mate and former chief of staff to a Labor Premier renewed his lucrative SES employment contract under David Bartlett only days before the public announcement that the department he ran was to be abolished by the government.

With each new headline, more details emerge of this Labor government’s lack of respect for process, for the principles on which responsible government is founded and, indeed, for the people of Tasmania. Given the ongoing series of scandals in Tasmania in recent years, almost all related to allegations of cronyism, it is entirely clear that this government is simply not capable of delivering the high standards of accountability and transparency that Tasmanians expect and deserve. On Saturday, the Tasmanian people face the prospect of taking the first steps towards reforming their failed government at the ballot box. They should remember the difference between what Labor says and what Labor does. After 12 long years of hard Labor, what they do is clear, and Tasmanians should stand up and say that they do not want it any more. If they want to change the government in Tasmania, the only way is to vote Liberal. A vote for Labor or the Greens will only deliver four more years of hard Labor.