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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 5 Hansard (26 August) . . Page.. 1389 ..

MS CARNELL (continuing):

If we have an organisation, an institute, that is not operating efficiently, does the ACT Government say, "We do not mind; we do not need to know. Have the money anyway. Fund the 12.5 per cent increase in teachers' salaries that was not funded by the ANU". There was a 12.5 per cent increase in salaries at the ANU that it did not fund. Is that what the ACT's money is being spent on? I would not think that was appropriate, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, but Mr Wood seems to think it would be; that it really does not matter what they spend the money on; the fact that they exist is enough. Well, I do not accept that, and nor does this Government. This Government believes that all taxpayers' money must be accounted for appropriately and that the people of Canberra should be funding services from the institute to the ACT community at a reasonable price.

Would it be all right for the institute to provide a service at, say, double or three times the cost that the same service could be provided for by another educational institution? Mr Wood thinks it is. Would it be all right, say, if the open art program could be provided by CIT at a third the price? Would you still say, "No, we will go for the institute at three times the price."?

Mr Wood: It could not be done.

MS CARNELL: Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, how does Mr Wood know? He simply does not know. What we need to get to the bottom of, and I would have assumed this whole Assembly would have needed to get to the bottom of, is exactly what we were paying for what outputs.

Judging by Mr Wood's comments over the last few weeks, he really needs to sit back and ask himself a question. Does he believe that the Institute of the Arts is operating to maximum efficiency, or even to middle-range efficiency? The fact is that he has not got a clue because, I have to say, they did not have a clue when we started this whole process. Mr Wood, would you think that an institute operating with 15 per cent administrative costs was all right? I have to say I would not. We would not accept those sorts of costs anywhere else in the ACT Government. Yet, on their own figures, that is what administration costs. They are their figures, not ours.

I also have advice from some of the people working in the institute - they are quite open about the fact - that a number of the administrative activities conducted by the institute duplicate those offered centrally by the ANU. Is that all right? Should the ACT Government be funding duplication in administration? Mr Wood says yes. This side of the house says no.

Would it be all right for us to be funding almost $200,000 worth of overseas travel for an organisation with a budget of, say, $15m? You would have to ask questions, would you not? We would not allow those sorts of figures or that amount of overseas travel, undocumented, to happen in the ACT Government for a department or for an entity of that sort of size. That is a lot of travel. If you would like to consider some similar sized entities or entities in the ACT, InTACT has a travel budget of $24,000; ACT Forests, $19,000; and EPIC, $7,600. I am not saying that they are the same entities or that they

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