Page 981 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 19 March 1991
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Government Expenditure
MR BERRY: My question is to the Chief Minister. Chief Minister, I refer to your statement last week that the budget, which is enshrined in an Act of this Assembly appropriating money to particular uses, is no more than an estimate of expenditures. I quote from Hansard:
The objective of a budget is to implement government policies. They are budget estimates. That is exactly what they are. For anybody to assert that they are fixed figures that are set in concrete and cannot be changed -
and so on. I therefore ask the Chief Minister: What obligations do you believe that you and other Ministers have to keep expenditures within the budgeted figures?
MR KAINE: Mr Berry is obviously still trying to grapple with the concept of budget management. He did not do it so well when he was a Minister, and he is not doing any better now. As I have already indicated, my other Ministers and I understand full well our obligations to remain within the budgetary constraints; but Mr Berry seems totally to overlook the fact that part of the appropriation was a $13m Treasurer's Advance, from which the Treasurer is empowered to make extra advances should they be required and should they be justified.
I would also point out for Mr Berry's edification - since he does not seem to understand the system - that, should I make such advances, I am obligated to inform the Assembly that such advances have been made. And I adhere to that implicitly, Mr Berry. I, in no way, intend to depart from the normal responsibilities and constraints of budgetary management, and I wish that you understood as much about the budget as I
MR BERRY: I have a supplementary question. Chief Minister, are you saying that Ministers may freely spend more than the amount appropriated by law?
MR KAINE: I am not saying anything of the kind; I am merely saying that, if they can justify it - and I will repeat it - if they can justify it because of unforeseen circumstances, they can have an additional allocation of money. You, as a member of this Assembly, gave me a $13m Treasurer's Advance from which I can allow them to have that money. That is the way the budgetary system works. You voted with the Assembly to give me that Treasurer's Advance.
I know that you do not understand it, and you hate having a little lecture as to how the budgetary system works. You asked the question, and you get very sensitive when I touch on your total inability to understand the way in which the budgetary system works. But I will give you a little lecture anyway from time to time, because, if anybody needs it, you do.
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