Page 3801 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 16 October 1991
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I might remind the Assembly about the history of this matter and the concerns that it has given the Assembly over recent times. Of course, last year, for the second year running, a serious budget blow-out was experienced in the hospital budget. That budget blow-out, last year at least, was very largely attributable to the fact that the budget base for 1990-91 was simply too small for the number of activities which were sought to be carried out throughout that financial year. The Treasury report made it perfectly clear that that was the case; that there was a serious problem with the amount of dollars that had been attributed to that budget in order to do those tasks in that amount of time.
I know that the Government is very concerned to stop this motion, if it can, and it will be doing its best, of course, to do that. But government members might consider the advantages that might accrue to the Government if they are able to get to the bottom of a longstanding problem. Of course, Mr Berry has been very careful in the last few days not to pretend that he has the solutions to the budget problem at all at this stage; that "there are still many hurdles to be overcome" - I think that was the phrase he used - before that problem is behind us. I hope that this motion today will assist the Government in overcoming those hurdles.
In the context of a budget blow-out of some $17m, in large part because of a budget base that was too small, we have, in this year's health budget, brought down a few weeks ago, a budget base which has been, in fact, reduced by some 8 per cent. On top of that, we have clear signs, in the September figures released yesterday by the Minister, to show that receipts for 1991-92 are down on last year.
In other words, the total expenditure for the year is reduced; but, by the same token, there is a reduction in the amount of revenue the Government is collecting to balance its needs throughout 1991-92; and so far, although I do not have that in percentage terms, it is in the order of $118,000 for the first three months of 1991-92. The September budget figures produced by the Minister yesterday would, I think, give anybody who read them carefully some considerable basis for concern.
I quote the statement with respect to public and community health for this first quarter:
While other operating expenditure is showing as favourable, there are delays in the processing of some accounts associated with the implementation of the new accounts processing system.
That is a matter of some concern to me. I do not know what that means, I do not know how far it goes, and I think we all have some very great basis for concern about those figures. So, we have a generally murky picture with regard to funding generally.
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