Page 4422 - Week 15 - Tuesday, 19 November 1991
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I have said a number of times, and I do not resile from it at all, that when we talk about must-haves and can-haves the first and foremost responsibility of any government is the security of its citizens. At a national level that means an adequate defence force and at a local level - a State or Territory level - it means a properly equipped, capable, operationally sound and supported police force. So, when you talk about cutting budgets, the last area of any budget that should be cut is the police budget, and the last area of the police budget that should be cut is the operational area which delivers the services to the community. That is where this Government well and truly got itself found out.
It is interesting to note the recommendations on page 24 of the Estimates Committee report. If the Government looked a bit further at the agreement signed by Mr Collaery last year, indeed there is provision in that for funding to 1992-93. Look more closely at the Grants Commission report. The ACT is accepted as a special case in the area of police; not so in health and education, if it looks a bit further there. If it looked at that agreement it would find that there was provision for adjustable funding for the next financial year and this one as well, which is quite different from what the Government did.
The first recommendation, that that $1.2m proposed reduction is not in accordance with the agreement with the Commonwealth, certainly is something that this Government must ensure, because I think it has missed the point there. The second recommendation relates to community policing not being materially affected because that is so very important to the community, as can be seen by the huge amount of support the police, the Opposition and the Police Association had in the campaign against the cuts to the police operational budget.
Mr Speaker, there are a number of other points I would mention. Tourism is mentioned on page 14 of the report. The Government has closed the offices in Sydney and Melbourne. Apart from the points highlighted there as to whether tenants can be found and that we might still have to pay for those offices, I really wonder whether that was such a terribly sensible thing to do, because where do most of our tourists come from? Sydney is really a quite short drive from Canberra. A lot of tourists come up here, especially from the western suburbs and those areas of Sydney which are only a 2- or three-hour drive away.
Similarly, Melbourne is not all that far away. They are the two biggest cities in Australia. I wonder about the sound economic sense of closing the tourist offices there. Perhaps offices should remain there - maybe in cheaper accommodation, but as a visible presence. After all, we have all the States represented here, I believe, by their tourist offices.
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