Page 1097 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 29 May 2007
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with the stripping of the ESA’s independent authority and its return to the department of JACS, his position had become “intolerable”. Chief Minister, why did you allow the position of commissioner of the independent ESA to become intolerable?
MR STANHOPE: I do not accept that at all. Neither I nor any of my colleagues made Mr Dunn’s position intolerable. If he found it intolerable, then that was a matter not of my doing. Mr Pratt, in his question, made a number of assumptions or suggestions in relation to decisions that the government has taken in these matters. It would be far more appropriate for the relevant minister, the minister for emergency services, to respond. I ask my colleague the minister for emergency services to do so.
MR CORBELL: It is important to stress that Mr Dunn also said in his interview—which Mr Pratt does not like to mention because it is not convenient to his argument—that he accepted absolutely the right of government to make decisions about how to best organise its agencies. Of course, Mr Pratt does not mention that. If he were to mention that, he would understand that Mr Dunn accepted the role of government to make these decisions and to decide the best way to organise the administrative arrangements for any particular agency, in this case the ESA.
It is worth putting on the record again that the ESA has its operational independence guaranteed. It has that guaranteed in legislation. The commissioner and the chief officers have certain powers outlined in legislation. That legislation is unchanged—unchanged since the change to the structure of the authority to an agency in the middle of last year. So operational independence is maintained. Mr Dunn accepted the government’s prerogative to make administrative arrangements in ways that it deemed to be the most efficient for the taxpayer.
Let us remember one of the primary issues that the government was seeking to address: an agency that had received budget increases of over 50 per cent on recurrent occasions but was still blowing its budget by $5 million to $6 million every year. There was a $5 million to $6 million budget blow-out every year, despite the fact that its budget had increased by over 50 per cent, or in the order of $20 million to $30 million over that period. Those were the issues the government was seeking to address.
Mr Dunn’s comments are no surprise. He clearly took the view that he could not advocate an agency within the organisation given that he had been an advocate for an independent authority. That is an entirely reasonable position for him to take. The government has no disagreement with him on that. That is a personal matter for Mr Dunn.
The government has strong confidence in the arrangements now in place. We are seeing the budget issues brought under control. We are seeing greater focus on those services that are focused on frontline support for our paid staff and our volunteer staff in our emergency services. The government will continue to work with our volunteers and with the members of the ACT ambulance and fire service to make sure the Canberra community has the resources it needs to provide it with protection in the event of emergency or accident.
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