Page 3919 - Week 15 - Tuesday, 15 December 1992
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In addition to these measures, $19m is to be made available for home loans to low and moderate income earners through an off-budget financing arrangement operated by the Housing Trust.
It is interesting, Madam Speaker, that this comment was made in the tabling statement by the Minister:
This Government announced in the 1992-93 budget that the Commissioner for Housing Loans program, the HomeBuyer program, would be extended through the use of an off-budget funding mechanism.
That is the only reference I can find in the entire budget to what appears to be this new initiative. I and the Liberal Party certainly have no problem about an initiative - call it HomeBuyer if you wish - that would allow people to purchase their own homes; but we do have a great deal of reservation, if I could put it mildly, about allowing anybody to borrow an amount of money without any restraint and without any control. It seems to the Opposition that there should be some responsibility sheeted home to somebody in relation to this borrowing.
I asked the Minister earlier to explain what this was all about. As I have already told the Assembly, this morning we sought information from his office so that he could give an answer this evening. The Minister has given an answer this evening and we are not happy with it. Therefore, I find it necessary to move this amendment. What we would like to do with this amendment is simply to tie somebody in to be responsible for the amount of money borrowed, so that we do not have a situation such as occurred in Victoria, in South Australia, and perhaps - - -
Mr Stevenson: New South Wales and Western Australia.
MR CORNWELL: Yes, indeed, in Western Australia, where it was nobody's fault. I could be accused of being biased if I suggested that the circumstances that occurred in each of those States occurred under a Labor government. Far be it for me to suggest for one moment that Labor governments were incompetent in allowing this sort of thing to happen.
Mr Stevenson: Coincidence.
MR CORNWELL: Indeed, as my friend Mr Stevenson says, that was a coincidence. We would not wish, Madam Speaker, that another Labor government fall into the same trap, or another State or Territory. We do not wish to see a situation such as we see now, Madam Speaker, where people in the previous Government in Victoria, and in the South Australian and Western Australian governments are running around trying to blame somebody else for what happened because it was not clear who was ultimately responsible. We now wish, Madam Speaker, to make it quite clear, unequivocally, that the money borrowed is within limits set by somebody. It could, of course, be Mr Connolly, who I notice has gone a little whiter, as Minister for Housing; but I have decided - - -
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