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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 4 Hansard (28 March) . . Page.. 989 ..

MR OSBORNE (continuing):

input into the way that money is spent prior to the budget being handed down. Perhaps those opposed to this process have some realisation that at some stage they will control the purse strings and they do not wish to include anyone else in the drafting of the budget. In an Assembly of this size the people who control the purse strings control the parliament, and ways of putting the power back onto the floor of this Assembly rather than on the second floor of this building are long overdue. I thank all the other members of the committee, you, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, Mr Hargreaves, and Mr Kaine. It was a difficult process at times, but it was one that I enjoyed, and I look forward to doing it all again next year.

MR HARGREAVES (5.12): Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, I wish to comment on my dissenting report which is at the end of this rather large tome. I concurred with 14 out of the 17 recommendations of the committee, which in a sense says something about the level of compromise that each of the members brought to the process. Like Mr Osborne, I would like to pay a tribute to members of the committee for the compromises they came to. One other compromise was reached but was not taken up. Before getting on to the dissenting report, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, I would like to put on the record my appreciation of the work of the committee's secretary, Fiona Clapin. In my view she did an incredible job in stitching together the views of the witnesses who came before us and presenting a coherent report. I think she did an excellent job and she should have recognition for that.

Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, the major area of dispute that I had was the process. It is quite reasonable that standing committees be involved in the contemplative stage of budget development. In this sense I agree with my fellow committee members that there is a role to be played by standing committees in this Assembly. The community, through the process of the standing committees, can be involved meaningfully in the consultative process, and can inform the standing committees and the non-Executive members of the implications that a draft budget may have on the services that impact on them. This process also enables the standing committees to scrutinise the programs that the Government is proposing to introduce in the following financial year. In some cases, if the consultation process reveals something the Government was not aware of or has not taken into account, it can be a braking mechanism. That is a point on which all on the committee agreed.

We agreed that our role in the contemplative stage of budget development was a vital one and a good one, and I wish to commend the Government for that part of it. But, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, standing committees ought not to be regarded as distribution agencies. It is not their role to be distribution agents for the Executive arm of government. Governments are elected on their platforms and programs and often stand or fall on whether or not those programs are funded. It is not up to a standing committee of the Assembly to find money or to receive money and then distribute it according to priorities that it sets, which may or may not be in accord with the Government. I accept that the Government may very well return and say, "Hang on a second; at the end of the day we are going to accept or reject the recommendations of standing committees".

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