Page 2398 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 6 August 1991
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Treasurer says, "Look, go and ask the community what they think". She acknowledges that she had already consulted the peak councils - CARD, ACTCOSS and the Trades and Labour Council - as we had.
Mr Berry: No, you only do CARD.
MR KAINE: I consulted the Trades and Labour Council, and ACTCOSS gave me the same briefings that they gave you, Mr Berry. Let us be clear about that. They are the only people in this community who are really competent to make any contribution to balancing a budget, because they have all the information. When you go out and say to the average man or woman in the street, "What do you want me to do to balance the budget? I am only $17m short", what information does he or she have which could possibly enable him or her to make any substantial contribution? The answer is none. So, you have already been through all the processes in which one could reasonably engage. You are $17m short. You throw your hands up in the air and say, "Somebody come and tell me what to do". That is a plea for help, if ever there was one.
So, this statement, Mr Speaker, as I said, is a Clayton's strategy; it is a strategy that you have when you do not have a strategy. It contributes nothing to the debate on balancing this year's budget. It makes no, or very little, contribution over and above what the Alliance Government had already decided to do. As a ratepayer and a resident of this city, I would like to see what this Chief Minister and Treasurer and this Government have to put forward as their solutions to the problem.
I think it is totally unreasonable, when you get to the hard decisions, to go to the community and say, "We do not know. You tell us". The headline on the Canberra paper should have been, "Rosemary says, 'We do not know'", because it is a fact. I think this Government has to do what it failed to do in 1989 and what it is still failing to do in 1991, that is, face up to the responsibilities of government, make the decisions and tell the community what it intends to do. That is what it was elected for; if there is a question of a mandate, that is what its mandate is; and that is what the people sitting on the other side of the house are being paid good public money to do. For heavens sake, stand up, stiffen your spine, make some decisions and tell us what you are going to do, and stop this phoney community consultation process. It is phoney; it is a sham, and you know it. Let us have some character - - -
Mr Connolly: Like the decision on land tax. That was a tough one to make.
MR KAINE: Let us have some stiffened backs; let us have some decision making and fewer smart comments by the Mr Connollys of this world.
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