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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-06-22 Daily Xml
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Question Time

LEE, PROF. L.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Leader of the Opposition) (15:12): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Urban Development and Planning a question about Professor Laura Lee.

Leave granted.

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY: Members will be well aware that, since the election, I have asked the minister a couple of questions regarding Professor Laura Lee and, in particular, in respect of her expertise and professional qualifications. He was unable to answer that question but then, by way of interjection, I reminded him, and in the last sitting week he provided the following response:

Let me tell you: I am quite happy to do so. Laura Lee has extensive experience in a number of cities—minor little towns like Pittsburgh, Washington DC, Antwerp, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Rome and Gdansk! She has worked on an urban design program in Doha in Qatar and has also been involved with the oldest urban design program in the United States for some 20 years...I am told, 18 commercial-based programs of urban design in 18 cities and communities in the United States. So really, come on, let us stop this rubbish about trying to denigrate.

I thank the minister for his response. I thought the best way to deal with it was to put in an inquiry to the parliamentary library. It was done on my behalf by my PA, and it stated:

On 26 May 2010, throughout his response to the first question in question time, Minister Holloway listed a number of cities worldwide, in which Professor Lee has done architectural work.

David Ridgway would like a summary of the projects that she had worked on in each of these places. The summary need not be extensively detailed—just a brief description of the nature of work (whether practical or academic) and a time frame of when the work occurred.

I received a response from the library, which stated:

My report is as attached. I have been able to identify Professor Lee's teaching positions and also times of private practice. However with regards to the latter, while it is possible to show when and where she was working in practice, I have not been able to identify specific commercial architectural projects.

We also note that the Premier's office has provided some information that Professor Laura Lee has asked for a delay in her appointment to this professional position. The opposition has also had it suggested that the appointment may be something of a six months on/six months off arrangement. My questions are:

1. Given that the parliamentary library cannot find any examples of Professor Lee's practical architectural work, does the minister still stand by his earlier statements that Professor Lee is the best person in the world for the job?

2. Can the minister clarify whether the position is a full-time position in Adelaide or a six months on/six months off arrangement?

3. Is the position, as the minister said on radio some weeks ago, still in the order of some $250,000?

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY (Minister for Mineral Resources Development, Minister for Urban Development and Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister Assisting the Premier in Public Sector Management) (15:17): The answer to the first question is yes.

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway: Even though she has not done anything of any practical nature in the world.

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: The honourable member and his Liberal colleagues' vision for Adelaide is Dubbo with a car race. That is how they see Adelaide. That's what they think.

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway interjecting:

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: You should be ashamed of it! This person comes in here and denigrates—

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway: You're a disgrace!

The PRESIDENT: Order! The Hon. Mr Ridgway will sit there and listen to the answer.

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: What I think is disgraceful is the Leader of the Opposition in this place personally attacking in a completely scurrilous way, along with some of the newspapers in this town. If you don't want any international people—

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: These people think they know everything. These people think that in their tiny little world, the small, little world they exist in, that that is where we should be, that that is the future of this city. It is all in their own narrow little minds.

Here we have a person of international repute chosen to be a Thinker in Residence in this state who has come in and, with great commitment to the state, put forward her views on integrated design—and that's what it is about. Although she is a professor of architecture, her expertise is on integrated design, which is actually linking up buildings and the spaces in between and what the city so badly needs. I think it is absolutely pathetic that we have an opposition within this state that can only denigrate international experts who come to this state to offer their expertise. They really have an incredibly stunted vision. You should be ashamed of yourselves!

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Ridgway has a supplementary question deriving from the answer.

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