Page 409 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 27 June 1989
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Safety Bill 1989 be varied by omitting "27 June" and substituting "6 July".
SUPPLY BILL 1989-90
Debate resumed from 1 June, on motion by Ms Follett:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
MR COLLAERY (3.14): Mr Speaker, the Residents Rally does not intend to oppose, and would not contemplate opposing, the Supply Bill. I say that at the outset. The Supply Bill 1989-90 is a provision to bring funds into the system essentially for five months. This Supply Bill, the first of this Government, is based upon a foundation document which was prepared before self-government. In that respect, and in all my comments, the Rally acknowledges that the Chief Minister was not the author of the foundation document. As such, the Rally does not intend to comment about this Supply Bill in the manner in which it might otherwise comment on the Bill as an avowed instrument of the ACT ALP election program, because we all know in honesty that both the budget and to a great extent the forward estimates are a fait accompli for this Chief Minister. But there is great scope within the appropriation process for the Chief Minister, who is responsible for finance, to ensure that the election promises of the ALP to ensure that there is a community based budgeting process do take place. In other words, this Supply Bill sets funds aside formally, as is required by law, but it does not in itself, so far as the Rally's understanding of the system goes, preclude this Chief Minister from moving the funds around within certain allocations and votes. To that extent the Chief Minister could reprioritise within funding allocations, and it is in that area that the Rally wishes to make specific pertinent comment in relation to this budget.
The first emphasis the Rally wishes to see in the drawing of the Appropriation Bills by the ACT Treasury is that the ACT Government acknowledges that the budget for this city-state must be community based, realistic, and improve the economic situation of the Territory. By way of introductory comments, a little more needs to be said about the general economic circumstances that the Territory finds itself in with self-government.
There are increasing and profound concerns in the housing sector - the private housing sector in particular - with interest rates, measures to combat which cannot simply be initiated in this Territory. But the Chief Minister is a Labor Chief Minister, close to the seat of power, at the seat of government, and we expect that the Chief Minister will adopt a very statesmanlike role in ensuring, since she is of the same political persuasion as the government on the other hill, that the very great concerns in the
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