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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 10 Hansard (18 October) . . Page.. 3180 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

As Mr Humphries has just explained to me, it is an additional committee which will meet before the draft budget is produced and the draft budget will still go to the portfolio committees for them to look at. This committee is an addition to the whole process. I understood it to be a select committee that was being set up to have carriage of the budget issue for the whole time-through the pre-budget, budget and estimates process.

That was one of the things on which we had something to say to Mr Humphries in response to his request for feedback on the trial for the last draft budget process. The Greens wrote back to Mr Humphries and expressed concerns about the draft budget being split in such a way that we are confined to looking at one portfolio area because we want overall priorities to be discussed as well.

This model, as I understand it from what Mr Humphries said a minute ago when we had a very quick chat on the floor, is supposed to deal with that concern. I can see how, if it is preceding the normal draft budget process, it is not reasonable to have a reporting date of 28 February, as has my proposed amendment, so I will not move that amendment. But I want to put on the record that I am still concerned about how this process is going to work. I still do not understand quite what it is we will be doing.

I did talk about it to one of Mr Humphries' advisers this morning and she said that she was aware that the Greens are interested in revenue issues being a part of any broad discussion about the budget in the ACT. I can see from this motion that it is not restricted to the things listed. I am just trying to see what Mr Humphries has put there. There is a reference to any other related matter. That could cover the revenue issues. I put on the record now that I would want to see those issues as part of the discussion.

I am not quite sure whether the government is envisaging having the community come into this process in that short timeframe. Maybe Mr Humphries explained that. There has been a lot going on in the chamber this morning and there was a lot of discussion at the same time as people were presenting arguments on this issue. He may have explained it, but I did not hear him do so. That is a concern I would put on the record as well. We need to allow some vehicle for community input to the broad discussion about such an important issue as well.

Those are probably the main points that I would want to make at this time. I will work with this committee with good will, but I will also not be shy about saying what I think is not working with this proposal if something is not working. Clearly, it is an important initiative but it will need to be refined as we work with it.

MR HUMPHRIES (Chief Minister) (11.58), in reply: Mr Speaker, I want to speak briefly in closing the debate. I will explain again, very briefly, how I see this process working if the motion is passed today. The government will present to the select committee which this motion establishes an outline of the matters that it sees governing the coming year's budget, the 2001-02 budget, such as, approximately speaking, the government's spending priorities-that is, approximately the division between different agencies of government in terms of spending-the way in which we intend to deal with unfunded liabilities, and the projected surplus or deficit, whatever it may be, for the coming financial year.

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