PETROL PRICE BOARDS

Mrs REDMOND (Heysen) (15:02): I am indeed, sir. Again, to the Attorney-General: given the Attorney-General's response, is he saying that, rather than apply the usual mechanism of introducing regulations which, although passed, will not commence until a date to be proclaimed, he has some other power which allows him to override the operation of a regulation that came into force on 1 October? If so, what is that power?

The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (15:02): Mr Speaker, in another period of your service here you had the privilege of being both consumer affairs minister and attorney-general, and I am sure that at times you yourself were surprised by your powers. Reflecting back on those halcyon days, Mr Speaker, you must have felt a bit like Luke Skywalker felt when he first discovered that he was possessed of the Force. So it is that occasionally—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.R. RAU: I am addressing the Chair, Mr Speaker. So it is that occasionally one discovers that one is able to do things that one was not entirely aware of being capable of doing in the past. Sometimes this awareness comes through the assistance of public servants who have made it their business to study one's special powers, and to assist one in the rolling out of them at appropriate moments, and thus it was for me.