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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 1 Hansard (2 February) . . Page.. 68 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

What we know is that there was a significant superannuation liability, that it was something that we had to deal with and that we would all prefer to find a different solution if we could. So far, nobody has come up with a viable solution that does not have a major impact on our budget; so it is about choices. I think Mr Osborne, for his part, has a particular responsibility to come up with an alternative. The reason I think Mr Osborne has a particular responsibility to come up with an alternative is that he has tabled in this Assembly the Financial Management (Amendment) Bill, which says basically that you cannot ever spend more than you are earning.

That is fine, Mr Osborne. If you really want that sort of legislation on the table, provide a solution for us that is an alternative. He, in particular, having done that and having run this issue through the election period, has that responsibility. It is not for him just to sit on the crossbench, having taken those actions, and say, "Sorry, you are not going to do this, you are not going to do that, you are not going to do the other". He has to come up with something in a positive way, if he is capable of doing it. (Extension of time granted) Mr Osborne was part of the committee that brought down this report today; yet there is no valid solution in the committee report. It certainly does an effective job of challenging some of the other issues.

I heard Ms Tucker talking on radio about the Chief Minister being petulant because she says that we are going to have to make some hard decisions in terms of the budget. Indeed, the reason is that the choices are now limited. The Auditor-General put the choices very clearly. The same Auditor-General was not called before the committee to give advice, not called on by Mr Quinlan's committee to appear on the second day of sittings that they had booked, although I do understand that the secretary of the committee sent out a form letter to the Auditor-General, as he did to other people, saying, "Do you wish to make a submission?". The Auditor-General neither accepted nor declined. That was a matter of choice for Mr Quinlan. The Auditor-General brought it out in his report and the report was on the table for the committee to deal with. The Auditor-General said that there was a limited number of choices.

If we were to follow recommendation 9 of Mr Quinlan's committee, we would have to begin by recognising that it involves a $40m withdrawal of money from the budget. The $40m is equivalent to an increase in rates, on average, of $400, give or take a bit, for each and every household. That may be a reasonable and rational way to go about it; it is something that we ought to look at.

Ms Tucker raised one other issue that we do need to deal with; that is, the regulatory framework and whether the Government should continue with the work on the regulatory framework. Of course we should and of course we will. In just this morning's paper there is a picture of raw sewage floating through Turner, not from a privatised ACTEW, but from the ACTEW that we currently have, the one that people are very keen to protect. Nevertheless, there was raw sewage flowing through Turner. What should happen there? I think there is a clear public health risk arising from this sort of issue and I think a regulatory framework should be considered by this Assembly and that we should make sure that we have the appropriate regulatory framework in place for whatever body is dealing with our essential services.

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