Page 2979 - Week 08 - Thursday, 25 June 2009
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MS GALLAGHER: There will be the opportunity for any member there to provide a submission into this process. The community consultation process will run till September. We will have the departmental process running alongside of that and reporting to the budget committee of cabinet. We think this is the responsible way to move forward after the shock that our budget endured. (Time expired.)
MR SPEAKER: Ms Porter, a supplementary question?
MS PORTER: Thank you, Mr Speaker. How does the ACT’s approach compare with that of other jurisdictions?
MS GALLAGHER: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thank the member for the question. It is interesting to look at the ACT’s response to the global financial crisis and the impact that the global recession has had on our budget and how other jurisdictions are responding. We are not alone in this. The pressures that we are seeing on our budget have been seen across the country, indeed, across the world.
Within our budget plan we have indicated that we will be constraining expenditure to 4 ½ per cent over the period of the forward estimates. That acknowledges that the budget will need to grow and that demands on services will continue but that we need to retain that expenditure as much as we can.
The federal budget also foreshadows constraining expenditure, although they have forecast that they will constrain their expenditure to two per cent once the economy recovers. So a similar approach from the commonwealth and some similar planning parameters; indeed, the federal budget has a seven-year recovery strategy as well.
The Queensland government in their recent budget outlined a revised fiscal principle which requires the government to achieve a general government net operating surplus as soon as possible, but no later than 2015-16, so again a similar long-term strategy. They have also announced additional efficiency savings and wage growth restraint combined with reforms similar to this government—structural reforms that we undertook in 2006, such as abolishing or reforming government boards, committees and statutory authorities, shared service reforms, changes to procurement practices and ongoing consolidation of ICT services across government. They have taken up some of the work that we did in 2006.
New South Wales has established the Better Services and Value Taskforce to improve service delivery and contain their growth in expenses. Their plan also involves wage growth restraint, efficiency dividends and a review of selected aspects of whole-of-government expenditure, including ICT and purchasing services.
South Australia have announced that they will establish a Sustainable Budget Commission which will be empowered to recommend measures to restore the budget to surplus. This commission will make its initial recommendations to government for next year’s budget. Their budget plan outlines additional savings targets which are to be held centrally and not allocated to agencies pending consideration of the recommendations of the Sustainable Budget Commission.
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