Page 379 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 21 February 1990
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mean great duplication in a number of resource areas. Because negotiations have to be conducted energetically in the full interests of the people of the ACT, it is inappropriate for me to indicate more than the basic considerations and our basic negotiating position. I am sure that the Leader of the Opposition would agree with me on that aspect. We are unable to debate funding issues and the minutiae of budget and interrelated financial discussions on the public stage.
That brings us to the motion that Mr Wood brought forward. He is proposing that we conduct a most sensitive part of the fiscal adjusting process in an open forum in a select committee. That is really an abdication of the governmental function of conducting negotiations in the best interests of the people of the ACT. Sometimes one must acknowledge that openness is not initially the best way to go in negotiating with such hard-headed characters as the Minister for Finance, Senator Walsh. In our view, it would be better to consider the motion that the Labor Party has put forward further down the track. I accept that we should not see 1 July 1990 as a countdown. We have to get it right. There may well be a time when we would support a motion of this nature as put forward by the Labor Party today, but at this stage it is clearly inappropriate.
The suggestion that we have a select committee is not supported by the Alliance Government because, firstly, it would not be acceptable to the Commonwealth Government. No Commonwealth government would be prepared to negotiate with a select committee. The proposition is unworkable, I suggest. Inevitably, that is the process when we give governmental negotiating status to a select committee, which is, in effect, what the Opposition wants to do. It wants to call the shots publicly. I accept that the Opposition does not wish to grandstand on the issue, I accept that there is a genuine, deep public concern about this issue, but when the Opposition was in government, it did not move to implement that open select committee process. No suggestion was made to us in opposition, and seven months elapsed.
We are now in a position where we need to accelerate. We have additional difficulties with the caretaker period coming up in the Federal sphere. We need to get our working party going on that. The suggestion of confidentiality is an additional problem when we are talking about certain police roles and I suggest that the Opposition might care to indicate whether it has the support of the Police Association in the motion that it has put forward today.
Arrangements for the provision of police services in the ACT from 1 July 1990 will be determined by the Minister for Justice, Senator Tate, and this Government, based on the recommendations of a steering committee of senior government officials. I am pleased to inform the Assembly that negotiations are well in hand and it is expected that a draft report will have been prepared by the end of March.
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