Page 976 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 26 July 1989
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self-governing body in the ACT, and the ramifications of it are quite significant. There are several changes of direction there.
Yet we find that on a day such as this there is presented to the Assembly a matter of public importance about AGL's pricing policy, a matter which has already been quite thoroughly reported in the Canberra Times on the initiative of Mr Graham Downie. As I said, Graham Downie is to be congratulated for the quality of his research on this. He went into the matter very thoroughly, and I am pleased that we as a government were able to be of assistance to him in the preparation of his material which was published in the Canberra Times.
I have no doubt that the Canberra Times will ignore the fact that a totally inappropriate matter was raised by way of a matter of public importance on the day after the Government made its first budget statement. It is just an extraordinary state of affairs. But if they are the priorities of the Residents Rally party then I think it is a sad day, sir, for this Assembly.
The Government is concerned, Mr Speaker, at the arrangements that exist in relation to gas pricing and to the franchise agreement currently operating between AGL and the ACT. That is a franchise arrangement which dates back to 1980. It was negotiated in rather primitive terms, and it was never legitimised in the form of formal arrangements or any legislation. Our Government, in recently approving the 5 per cent price rise in gas, which was announced this week, has written to AGL indicating that a full review of the existing agreement with AGL, including pricing, the Pipeline Authority charges and the appropriate legislation is to be initiated. So we are planning - and we have had this matter under active consideration for quite a few weeks now - to open up that whole issue.
The officers of my department have also had discussions with the executive of the New South Wales board of inquiry into gas pricing in New South Wales. This is a statutory inquiry which is due to report at the end of this month, although it is possible that an extension will be sought for it. We have followed closely that inquiry and we will consider closely the results of it and ensure that appropriate legislation is enacted in the ACT to ensure that ACT residents do not suffer any disadvantage as a result of any changes that occur in New South Wales subsequent upon that inquiry.
In those discussions with the executive of the New South Wales inquiry, and subsequently it was confirmed by AGL, we were told that the cost of gas to AGL Canberra from the Commonwealth Pipeline Authority, according to its position - and we do not necessarily accept this - includes the field price at the Moomba gas field, a proportion of the costs associated with the main pipeline from the Moomba gas field, the entire costs associated with the branch line from Dalton to Canberra and the 6 per cent profit margin.
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