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MR BERRY (3.49): Lesson No. 1: Take the business paper and have a look on the back of it under Executive business. You will notice that there is a list of Bills which relate to revenue. It is pretty simple and straightforward. They are occurring before the budget is brought down.

Ms Follett: I tried to explain that, Wayne.

MR BERRY: I thought you did pretty well. I will go more slowly. They are being brought before the chamber before the budget comes to the chamber for debate. This has not happened before.

Mr Humphries: Yes, it has. Rubbish!

MR BERRY: You had your chance, Mr Humphries, to debate the issue. This has not happened before. This is a period when the budget has been delayed because the Government has been unable to put it together and has put it off for three months. In the meantime, they have been involved in putting forward Bills on important revenue issues. What is proposed in the amendment is to allow those revenue measures to be specifically addressed by the Estimates Committee. Are you saying to us that you want to hide those from the Estimates Committee? If you are not trying to hide those from the Estimates Committee, there is no reason why you should oppose this very minor amendment. I cannot understand where the philosophical hang-up about this issue is.

Mr Humphries tried the old spin doctor approach again, by trying to say that this is the way it has always been done. It has never been done this way. The September budgets - - -

Mr Kaine: It has always been done that way, except last year.

MR BERRY: Do not start waving your angry old finger at me, Mr Kaine. The fact of the matter is that there were September budgets in the past; it was changed to June last year. This year the Government has not been able to put it together, because it is incompetent. Now we have a situation where there are revenue issues that ought to be considered in the estimates process. That is why the amendment has been moved. If you are not trying to hide these things, you should support the amendment.

MR KAINE (3.51): I cannot believe, after sitting through six years of budget debates in this place, what I hear from the former Treasurer and her chief offsider. One would think this Government had totally revised the way that budgets are put together and dealt with in this place. That simply is not true. I have always known that the former Chief Minister and Treasurer deserved a very low mark in budget management, but her comments today have indicated that she does not know anything about the way her departments prepared their budgets for five of the last six years. I have always said that the budgets were out of control and that she exercised no control. It is obvious now that that is the case, because she simply does not understand the process.

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