13/1/05
Mid-West, Wheatbelt and Great Southern Minister Kim Chance has again called on the Liberal-National Coalition to come clean on its position on the future of regional development commissions.
This follows National Party leader Max Trenorden’s bizarre claim on ABC television on Tuesday night that the Coalition would soon unveil plans to expand the role of development commissions.
“Perhaps Mr Trenorden should check with his Liberal colleagues, as they have already said they want to abolish at least one of the commissions (South-West), as well as retain another in its current form (Peel),” Mr Chance said.
“More to the point, this seems to be another case of the Coalition’s left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. They have a promise for every person and no plan to pay for it.”
Speaking in Geraldton today, the Minister said Mr Barnett also had tried to make light of comments by Mr Trenorden in 2001 that he hardly ever went near country areas as a minister in the former government.
“How can we forget the late-night sitting on November 15 that year, when Colin Barnett lost control and crossed the floor of Parliament to aggressively confront the Premier over Mr Trenorden’s comments that Mr Barnett had never shown any interest in rural issues when he was a Court government minister,” he said.
“This angry outburst highlighted the truth of Mr Trenorden’s comments that Mr Barnett had rarely visited country areas and had publicly opposed road building programs for country areas, such as the $100million Southern Transport Corridor at Geraldton.
“Not only has the Gallop Government fully supported the Southern Transport Corridor, but we are committed to the future of the regional development commissions.”
Minister's office: 9213 6700
