8249 iEtginlalti (llnt Tuesday, 30 November 1993 THE PRESIDENT (Hon Clive Griffiths) took the Chair at 3.30 pm, and read prayers. STATEMENT.- BY HON JOHN HALDEN Leader o~f the Opposition, Edwards, Hon Graham. Stood Down; Holden Hion John, Elected; Neville, Hon Mark, Elected Deputy Leader of the Opposition HON JOHN HALDEN (South Metropolitan) [3.32 pm] - by leave: I rise to confirm advice to you, Mr President, and to the House that Hon Graham Edwards today stood down as Leader of the Opposition for personal, family masons. That decision was accepted with deep regret by me and my parliamentary colleagues. At a meeting of the State Parliamentary Labor Party earlier today I was elected Leader of the Opposition in the Legislative Council. Hon Mark Nevill was elected as deputy leader. Hon Graham Edwards will join the Opposition front bench in this House on his return from leave. I will not go into a homily, but if ever we had an example of a person who has overcome great disability and adversity in life it is Hon Graham Edwards. He has performed in this place with great credit to himself, this Parliament and, of course, the Australian Labor Party. I am sure that all members in this House will congratulate Hon Graham Edwards for his efforts, and look forward to his continued performance in this House when he returns from leave. Members: Hear, hear! PETITION - COMO SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL, GYMNASIUM- PERFORMING ARTS CENTRE The President presented a petition signed by 29 citizens of Western Australia requesting the Legislative Council recommend to the Government that it give a firm undertaking to include an appropriate allocation in the 1994-95 Education budget for a gymnasium/perfonning arts centre at Como Senior High School. [See paper No 882.] PETITION - LAND (TITLES AND TRADITIONAL USAGE) BILL The following petition bearing the signatures of 39 persons was presented by Hon J.A. Scott - To the Honourable the President and Members of the Legislative Council in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned, (or the designation of petitioners), showeth: That we the undersigned as fair and reasonable minded West Australians, do call upon the Government of the State of Western Australia to recognise the will of the people of this State, (not just vested economic interests), who oppose the wholesale extinguishment of Native Tidle claim proposed under Part 3; Clause 7 of the Court Liberal Governmnent's Land (Titles and Traditional Usage) Bill 1993. Your petitioners humbly pray that the Legislative Council in Parliament assembled should uphold the spirit of the High Court of Australia'sa Maboo decision, which recognises the existence of Native Tidle under Common Law, and fulfil the democratic responsibility of elected governments to act on behalf of all West Australians by amending Part 3; Clause 7 of the Land (Tites and Traditional Usage) Bill 1993, as not to deny the fundamental human right of equality under the law to the Aboriginal peoples of Western Australia, and your petitioners as in duty bound wil ever pray. [See paper No 883.] I4 5- 8250 [COUNCIL] STANDING COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION - DISABILITY SERVICES BILL HON DERRICK TOMLINSON (East Metropolitan) [3.40 pm] - by leave: I present the first report of the Standing Committeecon Legislation entitled "Disability Services Bill 1993, Clauses 4 and 13" and move - That the report do lie upon the Table of the House and be printed. Question put and passed. [See paper No 884.] MOTION - URGENCY Free Speech, Supression of; Health Department, Alleged Intimidation of Ni gel Beckett Order of the day read for resumption of debate from 25 November. Debate adjourned, on motion by Hon George Cash (Leader of the House). MOTION - GAMING COMMISSION AMENDMENT REGULATIONS (No 4), DISALLOWANCE HON AJ.G. MacTIERNAN (East Metropolitan) [3.43 pm]: I move - That the Gaming Commission Amendment Regulations (No 4) 1993 published in the Government Gazette on 6 July 1993 and tabled in the Legislative Council on 3 August 1993 under the Gaming Commission Act 1987. be and are hereby, disallowed. We have touched on this issue on a few occasions in question time. However, I have waited some time for an opportunity of debating the issue in full. Unfortunately. I have not had as much notice as I would like of this matter being brought on. Therefore, members will have to bear with me if I am not as well prepared as I should be. On I1I May 1993 a series of regulations under the Gaming Commission Act was published in the Government Gazette. That Act regulates lotteries, raffles and ventures of that nature. The relevant regulations provided that the cost of conducting a standard lottery shall not exceed 60 per cent of the value of the chances sold. The expenses included the prizes, the selling commission or salaries, printing and advertising costs. Thierefore, one was required to look at the total value of the tickets sold in any lottery and ensure that 40 per cent of the moneys collected by on behalf of the purposes approved by the Gamning Commission, which we would describe by and large as charitable and sporting purposes, were returned to the organisation which was listed as the beneficiary. That allowed 60 per cent of the value to be retained by the party conducting the lottery on behalf of the charity. It is important for us to recognise that there are a number of professional fundraising organisations in Western Australia which contract with various charitable organisations to run lotteries and raffles on their behalf. However, there has been grave concern from a consumer affairs perspective arising out of a number of horror stories in which various charitable organisations found many hundreds of thousands of dollars had been collected in raffles on their behalf but they received a return of only $15 000 to $20 000. Many representations were made to the Government for it to prescribe some limits, as is quite proper. An example of the problem is the Asbestos Diseases Society raffle which received widespread press coverage a number of months ago. The West Australian newspaper carried an article which stated that Mr Vojakovic of the Asbestos Diseases Society had said that kind Westernt Australians had donated in excess of $250 000 to the society through a raffle but a West Perth marketing company had claimed more than $195 000 in expenses. The article stated that when $20 000 was taken out for prize money, the final amount received by the society was less than $20 000. That was not acceptable to the last Government and provision was made to put some fetter on those companies. The reason for the fetter was that, by and large, the people bought the raffle tickets to support the charity nominated on the ticket. Therefore, not only were the charities being duped, but also the ticket buying public were being deceived. [Tuesday, 30 November 1993] 925125 These regulations were drawn up by the last Government on the recommendation of the Office of Racing and Gaming, which had received many complaints. Hon Max Evans, the Minister for Racing and Gaming after February 1993, quito properly gazetted those regulations. However, 1o and behold. less than two months later, regulations have popped up in this place which repeal regulations 28A and 28B. Regulations 28A and 28B limited to 60 per cent the amount that could be diverted from the proceeds of a charitable lottery and also limited the total amount of chances that could be sold when compared with the value of the pize. There were rumours in the industry when the repeal was gazetted that sources close to the Liberal Party had made representations to the Premier and the Premier had directed Hon Max Evans to repeal the regulations. We sought in question time to investigate the truth of these rumours. We did our homework and found that one Chilla Porter, die former State Secretary of the Liberal Party, was a shareholder and a director of a company called Controlled Marketing, which is one of the largest of these fundraising companies. At this stage we have no evidence that other persons closely connected with the Liberal Party also had interests in these fund raising companies. I asked Hon Max Evans whether to his knowledge he or the Premier had received submissions regarding the repeal of the Gaming Commission regulations. His response was very interesting. He said that no official submissions bad come ftrm Chilla Porter to him on that matter. Hon Graham Edwards then asked about unofficial submissions, but unfortunately that question was not answered. It would appear that a person very close to the Liberal Party has a great interest in the repeal of the regulations controlling fundraisers. The Minister said that no official submissions were received, which could imply that unofficial submissions had been received. The Minister for Racing and Gaming went on to explain why, less than two mots after the regulations had been put in place, they were repealed. He said that he had found that the Attorney General had called a meeting between her staff and the Minister's officers, and it was decided that for the time being the regulations regarding raffles should be withdrawn. This was to allow the Attorney General to introduce regulations which were consistent for all charitable organisations. He said that this matter had been under consideration for some time, including the time when David Smith was Minister. Hon Max Evans said that it was illogical to have a retention rate of 60 per cent of funds collected in many circumstances. He explained that he was responsible for raffles and that the Attorney General was responsible for telemarketing, donations and the sale of goods.