Page 3436 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 22 August 2018
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
MR RAMSAY: So that I can, pointedly, directly respond to the question: none, zero, nothing. But putting it in context, what it is that we have done is made very clear that what we will be doing is working for the benefit of the community as a whole.
It is interesting again that around this time last week we were debating a similar topic in this place and Mr Parton and Mr Milligan both talked about the fact that yes, sure, there are things about the scheme that need to be refined. The government is committed to the fact that it is improving on the scheme.
We do not believe that it is appropriate for Qantas club memberships to be paid for and classed as a community contribution. We do not believe that it is appropriate for staff mobile phones to be paid for out of community contributions. We do not believe that simply noting that something was a Bunnings payment is transparent enough for it to be classed as a community contribution. We do not believe that balloons for a prize night should be classed as a community contribution when it comes from the privilege that clubs have to be able to operate electronic gaming machines in the territory.
We will continue to work with clubs to help them as they build for the strength of the community. We are increasing the transparency. We are increasing the benefits to the community and we are increasing the overall strength of the community. We are happy to do that. We will continue to do that, notwithstanding the fact that there is fear, there is scaring that will continue to happen from the opposition. We are used to that. We expect it but it is deeply disappointing.
Access Canberra—staffing
MS CHEYNE: My question is to the Minister for Regulatory Services. Can the minister outline how the budget is growing the staffing at Access Canberra to better serve a growing city?
MR RAMSAY: I thank Ms Cheyne for the question. It is a pleasure to talk about the way that Access Canberra continues to build growing services for a growing community, including the way that we deliver an increase in on-the-ground staffing in Access Canberra to make sure that we are keeping up with the demands of a growing city.
In this year’s budget we are providing funding for new staff across a number of different areas of Access Canberra. There are going to be five new call takers for the Access Canberra contact centre to increase its capacity to take calls from members of the community throughout the day. This is going to build on the previous efforts that we had to bring down the call waiting times in the contact centre, which are already paying dividends. I note for the Assembly that the average wait time last week was down to two minutes and 43 seconds. There will be a number of new concierge positions in Access Canberra service centres to guide customers through their transactions and ensure that they have everything they need.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video