Page 3565 - Week 12 - Thursday, 19 September 1991
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There is also, of course, a large amount of reserves held by way of superannuation in the trust fund and, Mr Acting Speaker, that is a considerable amount of money. The last figure that I saw on the total amount of reserves held was over $60m. I believe that Mr Kaine is quite in error in saying that I have cleaned out all of the reserves. I have not; I never will; and I think it would be very poor practice to do so.
Mr Collaery, in his remarks, Mr Acting Speaker, was typically muddle-headed. It was extremely difficult to discern a logical line of argument in anything that he said. He did, however, refer to the removal of the cushioning effect which some non-government schools have enjoyed. It was very interesting to note that, in doing that, Mr Collaery singled out the AME school and appeared, in fact, to abandon the grammar schools in their quest to have that cushioning effect maintained. The fact is that we simply cannot afford the cushioning effect.
The reason we cannot is that the Alliance Government, under Mr Humphries' ministership, cut $1.6m from the non-government school sector. They did that and it is reflected in papers such as the forward estimates; but, of course, it was not announced by Mr Humphries as Minister and, of course, not acknowledged by anybody else in that Government, even if they realised that it had happened. But it had. One of the challenges that we had in framing this budget was to put back the $1.6m cut without any justification from the non-government school budget by the Alliance Government.
I find it hypocritical of the previous Government to utter criticism on that score. They clearly had intended pretty savage treatment of the non-government school sector. To turn around now and make accusations against the Labor Government on that score is, I think, a bit much. It really is a very cynical exercise on their part to try to grab a headline on an issue that I believe Mr Humphries feels is really only commonsense.
Mr Collaery again has made some muddle-headed remarks about police funding. I consider, Mr Acting Speaker, that Mr Moore has answered Mr Collaery more than adequately on that score. The fact is that Mr Collaery really did not do as good a job in negotiating on the police funding as he ought to have, and he completely denied the rest of this Assembly any opportunity to take part in that negotiating process. He has a disgraceful record on that front.
Mr Acting Speaker, the final interesting point that Mr Collaery made was that this budget represented a failure to tackle big issues. But Mr Collaery never, at any point, said what they were. I can only deduce what Mr Collaery might feel are the big issues, but I very much doubt whether I would agree with him that what he regards as the big issues are, in fact, the ones that are crucial for the ACT community.
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