Page 1224 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 24 March 2009
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It is worth touching on the government’s financial management policy in relation to major projects. A policy of a prudent government would be one of generational funding for major projects. This means that projects would be funded and paid for over the economic life span of those projects so as to avoid financial strain on individual budget cycles.
Contrast this with the government’s approach when it asked Actew Corporation to pay for three major water infrastructure projects from its reserves at a total cost of $300 million. Lumping the present generation with a funding shortfall of such magnitude does two things. Firstly, it is unfair and discriminatory against the current generation, who are now expected to fund infrastructure for many, many future generations. Secondly, it leaves Actew with reduced reserves—a doubtful financial management strategy for an organisation of its nature—and therefore leaves the current generation with reduced means for meeting other more immediate needs such as major repairs or maintenance projects that may be required.
I now ask: what is it that allowed the Stanhope-Gallagher government to squander the spoils of a booming economy? Is there anything that the government has done to create this booming economy? The answer is no. The booming economy that the ACT experienced up until late last year was on the back of a booming economy nationally. This is demonstrated by the growth in GST funding enjoyed by this government. In 2007-08, GST funding for the ACT was some $856 million, almost one-third of the entire budget income. This has grown by $250 million since 2002-03. In fact, the average increase in GST funding enjoyed by the Stanhope-Gallagher Labor government since 2003 has been $43 million—$43 million a year in unexpected revenues which this government has wastefully squandered.
The bottom line is that this Stanhope-Gallagher Labor government’s finances have been propped up for year after year by the effects of a booming GST revenue base as a result of prudent federal government policies. There is nothing that the Stanhope-Gallagher government has done to create the boom in the ACT economy. It seems that now it is standing back and watching helplessly as the economy goes into reverse.
What else could the Stanhope government have done? They have utterly failed to broaden the economic base. They constantly bemoan the narrowness of the ACT’s economic base and its limited capacity to raise revenue. What happened when the government was presented with the opportunity—(Time expired.)
MS GALLAGHER (Molonglo—Treasurer, Minister for Health, Minister for Community Services and Minister for Women) (3.43): What we have just heard is the usual 15 minutes from the opposition trying to argue a case that this government is symbolised by and judged on its record waste, enjoying the boom times and not making provision for the down times. I think this is an argument that, no doubt, we are going to hear for the next four years from the opposition as they continually suffer from relevance deprivation syndrome over on the opposition benches.
The question that is constantly put by the opposition is: what have they done with it? Then we get the series of projects that they rattle off: $50,000 for a sign, $300,000 for
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