MINISTERS — GIFTS AND TRAVEL
594. Mr R.S. LOVE to the Premier:
I refer to the Premier's
comments in this place yesterday during debate on a matter of privilege
regarding the disclosure of gifts. Given that the Premier believes that
declaration on a ministerial gift register is appropriate reporting for his cabinet members, will he commit
to tabling that register each year in Parliament with the members'
annual returns?
Mr M.
McGOWAN replied:
It was an instructive debate
yesterday because it showed that the opposition really does not understand much
at all—that is what it showed. For members who were not here who may
not have been listening—I realise that members listen intently to
Parliament most of the time—and for the press who may not have been
listening intently, what was raised
yesterday was about the disclosure return of members of Parliament and the fact
that those disclosure returns did not necessarily include gifts for
members of Parliament. Of course, there is a gift register that ministers
compile, and that was released recently to the press. That contains all the
relevant gifts, whether it is a baseball cap, tickets to the ballet or
football, or whatever it might be. All those gifts are compiled in that
register. The opposition was alleging that
somehow ministers should do it twice, even though, as I pointed out, the Leader
of the Opposition, when she was a minister, did not do that. Michael
Mischin, when he was Attorney General did not do that. Colin Barnett, when he was Premier did not do that. Brendon Grylls,
when he was Leader of the National Party did not do that. But now the
opposition is alleging some grand conspiracy that somehow this should be
happening and it wants to refer a Labor minister to a privileges committee for
that, even though members opposite did exactly the same thing. There has been
full disclosure of gifts by ministers. Just so members opposite understand—full
disclosure. And they have been published. The ordinary course of events for
these things in past governments was that the opposition would ask a question
and the ministerial gift register would be tabled. That is what we did when we
were in opposition, frankly because we did a little bit of work: we put a question
on notice and it was tabled. Unfortunately, putting a question on notice seems
to be beyond the capabilities of the current opposition. That is all it has to do—a question on notice. If
members opposite like, I will show them how to do it later on. That is what
we did and that is why they were tabled under the last government, and the
information was provided. But the press asked a question, so we gave the
information to the press.
It came out the other day that I went to the football. As I said—it
is a significant story—we acquired the AFL grand final for Western Australia
at no cost and I was invited, so I went. Many people were invited, including
the Leader of the Opposition; the federal
sports minister, Mr Colbeck, who is from Tasmania—and the Tasmanian
sports minister decided to come along as well; Mr Ken Wyatt; Michaelia
Cash; Colin Barnett; Ben Morton; the member for
Roe, who seems to frequent many of these events; and other Liberal–National
MPs. That is a good thing. Family members attended as well. That is a good
thing. If the opposition's argument is that somehow we have done the
wrong thing because we went to the footy, well, so did you.