Page 2018 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 28 May 1991
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MR KAINE: The Treasurer of New South Wales is in pretty good shape. If, by some default, Mr Carr inherits the premiership there, he will find that he has a very solid financial base to work from. I am sure that he will be most delighted. He will be inheriting a financial management system and financial management base that leaves those in Victoria, Tasmania and Western Australia for dead. He will be a very fortunate man indeed.
I might add, Mr Speaker, that, if in February Ms Follett again becomes Chief Minister and Treasurer, she will inherit a very sound financial basis to work from - not one where the Territory has been run into a financial pit like Victoria, Tasmania and Western Australia, but one in which we have exercised prudent financial management, which we will continue to do. We will generate yet another budget that will help you out in the future. We will take decisions that you would never make in a million years, whether you were Treasurer or not; so you will inherit a very sound system.
Members interjected.
MR KAINE: These people think that the budget base for the health delivery system is a huge joke. If they ever again have to confront the issue of managing the Treasury and managing a budget for the health department, they will find that it was no better joke than it was when they had it. It is not a joke; it is a very serious matter. The people of this community take it seriously, even if you do not.
The budget base for the health system next year will be last year's budget base, probably adjusted downwards in accordance with the financially stringent times we are in. I will be asking the Minister and his senior management to exercise very rigid control over the budget next year, with a clear understanding that their budget will not be supplemented. They will be required - as managers right across the ACT Administration are required - to manage their budget, not to allow it to get out of control. They will be required to manage it, and they cannot and will not be able to expect that if they cannot manage it they can come back to the Treasurer and expect him simply to top it up out of the Treasurer's Advance, or wherever else there might be some money available because other managers have done better than they have.
That is not the basis on which I work. I require managers to accept the responsibilities for which they are paid. Unlike Labor Treasurers throughout Australia, when I get into trouble I do not consider that my only recourse is to go to the Federal Prime Minister and the Federal Treasurer with my hand out, asking for a handout to get me out of trouble. That is not the way we work - not this year and not next year.
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