Page 483 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 20 February 1991
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Mr Stefaniak quoted from a letter from Mr Tomlinson from ACTCOSS, where he said that he was pleased that there had been assurances given that the money would be so used for education processes. The problem is that it is merely an assurance in law. Under this Bill, should it proceed into law, the interest generated simply goes into Consolidated Revenue with any other interest generated on money held by the Government, and what goes back to the community, by way of consumer education services, tenant advisory services and the like, would depend on the success of the Minister in the budget negotiations, as the amount of money available to any government services depends on that. Our Bill quite clearly isolates the interest generated on the rental bonds for community purposes, for tenant education advisory services and the like, and at the end of the day it provides that, if a pot develops, some capital money may be invested in public housing.
I heard some extraordinary political diatribe from Mr Stefaniak. I take the implication that he thinks this is an attempt by Labor to set up some form of major state investment corporation, with a bit of political rhetoric about state banks. That can be dismissed in a line as simply irrelevant political puff. A more significant point about interest, which causes me some concern, is that the Attorney was trying to make the cheap political point that we had looked at the early draft of the New South Wales Bill, and we were not aware that there had been amendments to the Bill to provide that interest should go to landlords and tenants. The Attorney knows that that is not so.
We had a lot of puff earlier this year from the Attorney about more cooperation between Government and Opposition and, on a number of matters, that cooperation has worked quite satisfactorily and the Attorney does consult on Bills. It is appropriate that what occurs in those consultations does not get agitated in this house; but the Attorney knows full well, because I have discussed the matter with him, that we have looked at the question of interest and have made the decision that we would not want, at this stage, to pay interest to tenants on the bond moneys, for much the reasons that he referred to in his speech.
That is, at the early stage when you are developing a Rental Bond Board proposal, it is important that the interest generated by the bond money held goes into the community to establish and pay for those education funds, until such time as you develop a pot of money which makes it self-funding in perpetuity. Then you can introduce a proposal to pay the interest back to the person who holds the bond. That is the process around Australia, where New South Wales has had this - - -
Mr Collaery: We agree.
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