Page 650 - Week 03 - Thursday, 15 March 2007
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key words being “community it serves”. But somehow the Stanhope government came to believe that it could fix 17 years of budgetary malpractice or incompetence, whatever you like to call it, in one fell swoop in one budget, relying on a tiny group of economic advisers who had little, if any, social or environmental expertise or experience. And these, interestingly enough, were the very areas which were identified for the deepest cuts.
The Treasurer said, “Today, I hand down a budget and announce a suite of structural changes that will put the finances of the territory on a sustainable path.” There we have it: in one day he could fix it all. That was the first we heard about the problem and the Treasurer gave us what he considered to be a fully baked fait accompli solution—an incredible feat by anyone’s standards. And, what is more, he and his cabinet were apparently wise enough to know how to fix it all without talking to the people it impacted: the people who provided the services, received the services or paid the taxes to fund the services. Basically, the government had become the experts.
More and more we are hearing “trust us; we are the government”. They claim to be a progressive Labor government, but, to tell the truth, I think they are starting to look and sound too much like the Howard government. Honest Johnny Howard survives on this “trust in me” approach and his perverse paternalistic governance. It is a case of “don’t you little people worry about the big decisions; I’ll take care of that”. Has there ever been more reason to be cynical of a government that divulges no information and publicly involves no-one in its decisions? I have no idea who gets listened to by this government. No doubt there are some, and I am sure that Mr Mulcahy might give some of these same people a good hearing too.
If this government really was suffering severe budgetary problems and had to find a way to increase its revenue, did it stop to consider the best manner in which it could produce taxation proposals that met its progressive dream? No, it did not. In regard to the new revenue measures, Mr Stanhope said in his speech:
I am pleased to say that, significant as these measures are, important as they are, they do not require the government to relinquish the social and economic principles we have articulated in our vision for this city—the Canberra plan.
This government’s lovely progressive words, enshrined in a number of documents and the Human Rights Act, mean nothing if they are not backed up by actions. Last year’s budget was a particularly regressive action and a wasted opportunity to advance social environmental concerns while paring back unnecessary spending commitments. No-one is going to put their hand up to say, “Yes, tax me, please—no problem.” But there are ways you can go about it without putting the community so offside as has been done. The best way to do that is to talk to them and tell them what you are thinking of doing and give them a chance to respond and a chance to come up with better ideas—because the government does not own them all—and go on from there. They may even be able to come up with suggestions as to how the government’s own proposals can be improved upon.
The Assembly has consulted with the community about revenue-raising measures before. Three key recommendations from the February 2004 Public Accounts Committee report on revenue-raising issues in the ACT were to encourage the
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