Mr BAYLEY – That contribution from the Leader of the House was laughable. Standing Order 226 provides for this situation – for a bill with amendments from the other place like this to be laid aside. While the leader of government business will make the case that the Legislative Council was clothed with the information about the donations admitted by the developer, that is our very point. This House was not clothed with that information when we made our decision.
We were not clothed with the knowledge, now on the public record, that Tipalea had donated to someone or something, whether it was the Liberal Party itself or candidates running for election. It could have even been the minister who tabled this bill in this parliament and ran the debate on it. The difference today compared to last week – last week was bad enough. You suspended Standing Orders, you did not let this this bill mature for long enough, you rammed it through our House so you could ram it through the upper House.
Mr Jaensch – You cannot ram it through in minority. The parliament decided and you lost.
Mr BAYLEY – You suspended Standing Orders to do it. The parliament was not clothed with the information, and now we know that somewhere down the line, the Liberal Party and/or its candidates received money from this developer.
Leader of government business, this is chalk and cheese to the Bob Brown Foundation. Of course they put an ad in the paper.
Members interjecting.
Mr BAYLEY – They are not seeking to make a massive profit from a development with special favours.
CHAIR – Mr Bayley, if you direct your comments through the Chair you might avoid such interjections.
Mr BAYLEY – Irrespective of the merits of the project or the community support that we have heard about in this Chamber, the reality is it is non‑compliant with elements of land use strategy, traffic management and the like. The Planning Commission found that it was non‑compliant. It should simply go through the process. There is no justification for putting ads in the paper to make your case for this.
The proponent said it in his own words. He said he hates doing these ads. He feels like an ‘entitled twat’ doing this. That is what he wrote in his newspaper ad. He should feel entitled because it is entitled. It is completely entitled to think that you can publish an ad, pay a political party or a candidate, possibly even the minister, and get legislation put into this House and pushed through in a rush. They should not be allowed to get away with it, but they do. That is the sad thing.
I have had a lot of people call me up and say how is it that the Liberal Party, re‑elected in minority, are worse than they were in majority? They are doing worse things in minority than they were when they were in majority. The simple fact is because the Labor Party let them get away with it. The Labor Party backs them every step of the way, and there is no daylight between the Liberal and Labor parties when it comes to these kinds of dodgy issues.
Members interjecting.
CHAIR – Order.
Mr BAYLEY – That is the reason. There is no daylight between the two of them.
This is why property developers are banned from giving donations in many other jurisdictions, including New South Wales, where they have been caught out for giving donations and corrupting the process.
It begs the question, where does this end? We now have a review of kunanyi/Mount Wellington, a completely cooked up review headed by the Minister for Business, Industry and Resources and State Growth via a steering committee of heads of departments. That review is clearly trying to change the frame about how that place is managed so it can make the case for a new application for a cable car that may or may not be assessed against the planning scheme and the management plan. There may or may not even be a management plan.
This sets the precedent for special legislation to be passed for development such as a kunanyi cable car, or indeed many of the other problematic proposals that Tasmania has seen over many years.
It has been mentioned that this parliament has passed special legislation for other developments in the past, including the cable car and pulp mills, but this is unique in the context of a private commercial developer having special legislation given to them.
Without wanting to pre-empt an order of the day, there are other issues we are going to discuss today that go exactly in this space, which is the government pre-empting a process, cutting out the community , diminishing community voices, making decisions against evidence, or without any evidence, and at the end of the day, perverting process along the way.
That is exactly why we think this bill should be laid aside. There is critical new information that has emerged in this space. Who knows who may need to investigate this into the future. From our perspective, it certainly warrants investigation from a body such as the Integrity Commission, as toothless and as underfunded as it is.
This is exactly why the Integrity Commission has such limited powers and is funded the way it is. It does not have the capacity to do the work that this state needs, to actually look into the dark corners of our democracy and the dark places where these kinds of deals are made, and make some adjudications and square it away.
I want to reiterate that the Standing Orders provide for bills to be laid aside. It is unfortunate that the Labor Party are going to back in the Liberal Party again on this and wave it through. Irrespective, there is new information on the table that really begs the question about the credibility and the integrity of the government and the business that it brings to this House.
That is why this should be laid aside. We should allow the normal planning process to play out for the developer; he should spend his money, not on newspaper ads, but on actually doing the planning work needed. The government needs to get on with the job of making sure that the land use strategy and any other road blockages that the Planning Commission has found are actually dealt with. If it is such a good project, it can be assessed against the proper process, and if it can stand on its own two legs, then it should pass through that process.
The fact that this bill has been rammed through this House and the other place, now with the knowledge that there is money changing hands from a private commercial property developer to the Liberal Party – to candidates, possibly even the minister – is an absolute blight on the business of this House and of this government. I fully support the motion that this bill be laid aside.
