❓ Question regarding the Minister's prior knowledge of issues with the transport executive and licensing information system (TRELIS) before its implementation. The Minister deflects by blaming the previous government's underfunding and delays.
AnsweredQoN 477Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
Yesterday the Leader of the Opposition claimed on radio that the minister had been briefed about problems with the transport executive and licensing information system before it was introduced last month. He also said that the minister would be grilled about the issue in Parliament this week. Will the minister advise the House what she was made aware of - if she was made aware of anything at all - prior to the introduction of the transport executive and licensing information system? Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN
AnswerView source ↗
I thank the member for some notice of this question. I, too, heard the Leader of the Opposition on Radio 6PR saying that I was going to be grilled. I came to Parliament quaking, and praying to Saint Lawrence, the patron saint of the grilled. I also came well prepared. The Leader of the Opposition often makes announcements, either in the Press or on radio - while doing some hairy-chest beating - that he will attack me and the Government. However, on this occasion, when we got to Parliament, we got nothing. Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question. I, too, heard the Leader of the Opposition on Radio 6PR saying that I was going to be grilled. I came to Parliament quaking, and praying to Saint Lawrence, the patron saint of the grilled. I also came well prepared. The Leader of the Opposition often makes announcements, either in the Press or on radio - while doing some hairy-chest beating - that he will attack me and the Government. However, on this occasion, when we got to Parliament, we got nothing. Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
I thank the member for some notice of this question. I, too, heard the Leader of the Opposition on Radio 6PR saying that I was going to be grilled. I came to Parliament quaking, and praying to Saint Lawrence, the patron saint of the grilled. I also came well prepared. The Leader of the Opposition often makes announcements, either in the Press or on radio - while doing some hairy-chest beating - that he will attack me and the Government. However, on this occasion, when we got to Parliament, we got nothing. Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
I, too, heard the Leader of the Opposition on Radio 6PR saying that I was going to be grilled. I came to Parliament quaking, and praying to Saint Lawrence, the patron saint of the grilled. I also came well prepared. The Leader of the Opposition often makes announcements, either in the Press or on radio - while doing some hairy-chest beating - that he will attack me and the Government. However, on this occasion, when we got to Parliament, we got nothing. Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
[See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN replied: I thank the member for some notice of this question. I, too, heard the Leader of the Opposition on Radio 6PR saying that I was going to be grilled. I came to Parliament quaking, and praying to Saint Lawrence, the patron saint of the grilled. I also came well prepared. The Leader of the Opposition often makes announcements, either in the Press or on radio - while doing some hairy-chest beating - that he will attack me and the Government. However, on this occasion, when we got to Parliament, we got nothing. Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
I thank the member for some notice of this question. I, too, heard the Leader of the Opposition on Radio 6PR saying that I was going to be grilled. I came to Parliament quaking, and praying to Saint Lawrence, the patron saint of the grilled. I also came well prepared. The Leader of the Opposition often makes announcements, either in the Press or on radio - while doing some hairy-chest beating - that he will attack me and the Government. However, on this occasion, when we got to Parliament, we got nothing. Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
I, too, heard the Leader of the Opposition on Radio 6PR saying that I was going to be grilled. I came to Parliament quaking, and praying to Saint Lawrence, the patron saint of the grilled. I also came well prepared. The Leader of the Opposition often makes announcements, either in the Press or on radio - while doing some hairy-chest beating - that he will attack me and the Government. However, on this occasion, when we got to Parliament, we got nothing. Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms K. Hodson-Thomas interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, member for Carine! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: The Leader of the Opposition obviously did not allow my good friend the member for Carine any air time for this important grilling. I am pleased to say that the Government is prepared to assist in this regard. I consider myself duly grilled by the member for Riverton. First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
First, I will refer to a letter I recently received from a member of the public - Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Mr M.W. Trenorden interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, members! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I received a letter from a member of the public who was concerned that the member for Carine and the Opposition had been a touch hypocritical about the transport executive and licensing information system. He sent me a letter that he had received when the previous Government was in power after he had asked when TRELIS would be introduced. He was told that TRELIS would be phased in over a period and was expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2002. Now we are being told that we rushed the system through! Apparently the previous Government was to have the system operational in 2002. I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
I will outline again what has happened with TRELIS, because it is important that people understand it. The project got off to a bad start with the Court Government’s decision to drastically underfund it. Its own report stated that it would cost $28 million to implement the system, so it put in the 2000-01 budget total funding of $5 million for this project. That was another BBB - a Barnett budget blow-out! It is true that when we came to government TRELIS was floundering. It was a problematic program. The previous Government said that it would be introduced by the first quarter of 2002. It became very evident when we came to government that this was a project with major problems. The project had to be reviewed. Would we go ahead with the TRELIS project? We looked at the project and made the decision in 2002 that we would proceed with it, but that we would have to get the funding right. We had to get a commitment through Treasury that the project could be properly funded. We did that and our Government made the decision to allocate proper funding of $32 million so that the project could go ahead. That recognised the importance of the project. One of the key reasons we needed to progress with the project was that we had to vacate the police mainframe. The job of the police is to go out and catch criminals and to help in that, space was needed in the police mainframe. Because of the growth in licensing activity, more and more space was being gobbled up - Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms K. Hodson-Thomas: You’re not convincing anybody, and certainly not the general public. The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order! I call the member for Carine to order for the first time. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I know that the member is grilling me by way of interjection. Some issues cannot be reduced to 25 words or less. They are complex. Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Several members interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, members! Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Mr C.J. Barnett interjected. Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: Order, Leader of the Opposition! Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Mr J.N. Hyde interjected. The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: Order, member for Perth! Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: At regular intervals we have assessed the progress of this project. On three occasions we had to set the implementation back because the project was not ready. It was always going to be a difficult project. We were concerned that the project was being delayed, but, at the end of the day, we agreed with the department that we would not progress with it until it was absolutely ready to go live. I have a briefing note. The Opposition claims - perhaps this is why there has been no grilling - that it has some sort of evidence that I have been told that we should not go ahead with the project but that, nevertheless, I made the department go ahead with it. That seems to be the line of argument. I am happy to table all the briefing notes I have received from the department over the past year, before the system went live, to show that the department was quite properly determined that it would solve the problems before it implemented the system. [See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
[See papers Nos 2686 to 2688.] Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
Ms A.J. MacTIERNAN: I think that the decision to go live was correct and that the system has been implemented successfully. That is not to say that there have not been problems. I point out that 99 per cent of the transactions have been dealt with in a timely fashion. I am not arguing that there have not been some failures. Clearly the department did not monitor the implementation closely enough to determine that errors were occurring and backlogs were building up in some areas. It left it perhaps two weeks too late to start a detailed program of addressing those backlogs. I recognise that, and I recognise that there has been some inconvenience to the public as a result. All these matters are recoverable. When I first learnt of these problems, I directed the director general to personally take charge of the matter and to report to me on a daily basis on the progress of dealing with those backlogs so that I could be sure that satisfactory progress was being made. Some of the backlogs have been dealt with, others will be discharged by midweek and the remainder is expected to be dealt with in three to four weeks. I am confident that this system is functioning well for 99 per cent of transactions. There are some pockets of problems, and we are dealing with them. It cannot be expected that a system such as this can be introduced without creating problems. The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
The SPEAKER: My comments are directed to ministers. We are 47 minutes into question time and we have dealt with six questions. I urge ministers to answer questions more briefly so that we can deal with more questions.
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