Page 1618 - Week 06 - Thursday, 7 June 2007
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
highest taxing government that we have ever had, with the revenue hikes that were imposed. It reinforces some of the spending cuts to essential areas—things like business and tourism.
The tragedy of the 2007 budget is that it demonstrates that the approach adopted in last year’s budget was not necessary and that the various decisions made in that budget were in many ways irrelevant. It repudiates one thing, however, and that is the Stanhope government’s attempts to get the ACT public service back under control. After the reduction of some 500 full-time and 200 temporary and casual positions in 2006-07, we now see an immediate increase this year of 150 people—including, as my colleagues have eloquently pointed out, 22 policy officers who go into the Chief Minister’s office itself. You have to question that. How can you get rid of 500 permanent and 200 temporary and casual staff—say that we needed to cut back—but then immediately start to re-employ?
The budget papers reveal, for example, that there is an estimated increase of some $56 million in revenue generated by taxes, fees and fines during 2006-07. That is a seven per cent growth in these sources of revenue. But let us look at the Treasurer’s own budget paper 3, at page 5. The consumer price index forecast for 2006 is 2¾ per cent. So it is seven per cent. It is three times the growth of the CPI and the wage price index at four per cent. It is almost double the wage price index in terms of the revenue that we will collect. If that is the fair, equitable approach of the Stanhope Labor government, then God help the people of Canberra.
In other ways this is a budget of catch-up. For six years the Stanhope government has been furiously spending on additional public servants—I remember the Stanhope comment “I did not realise the many additional people that we had employed, because no-one told me”—a prison that is based on a questionable analysis; and an arboretum that has more questions about it than a quiz show. There is a statue of Al Grassby. Why? Why are we doing this for a federal minister? There have been a number of experiments. There was the small business commissioner—gone. There was the community inclusion fund—gone. There was the knowledge fund—gone. And so the list goes on.
The Stanhope government has finally realised that it has been neglecting the community where it lives—the real community, the community out there that pays the taxes. The government has been neglecting the footpaths, the bike paths, the drains, the parks, the road services and many other critical pieces of community structure. But not the ovals. They have not ignored the ovals. They have just totally written the ovals off. The ovals are just gone. There are community assets that are integral to having a community that has pride in where it lives and in its surroundings—disfigured by the staffer Mr Bruford some years ago with the infamous Bruford blue painting.
What happened in 2007 and in the lead-up to the 2007 budget? The Stanhope government finally rediscovered the community—the poor, abused creature from which the 2006 and earlier budgets extracted more and more revenue and from which increased revenue will continue to be extracted through the use of the wage price index and so on.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .