Page 1214 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 11 May 1993
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Mr Kaine has quite rightly pointed to the difficult situation in which the Grants Commission's recent report places the ACT. As he has pointed out, the changes in methodology that have now been applied by the Grants Commission do have the impact of placing a very large burden indeed on the ACT in 1993-94. Application of the findings of the Grants Commission would result in a reduction of Commonwealth revenues compared to this year of some $74m, and that is clearly a very large gap indeed. At the time of the last budget we did anticipate some reduction in the forward estimates, but our forward estimates reduction has been very much exceeded by the Grants Commission's report.
It is my belief that the ACT cannot be expected to absorb such a dramatic drain on our financial circumstances. This was recognised right from the start. I wrote to the Prime Minister on the day that the report was released, indicating that we could not accept that outcome. I said that I would be putting a case to the Commonwealth as soon as we had time to analyse the full implications to the Territory and that I would be seeking direct talks in advance of the financial Premiers Conference. That case is, even this week, being put to the Commonwealth. I will be seeking also the support of our local Federal members and I have been speaking progressively with them. I think it is extremely important that our Federal members understand what the Grants Commission report would mean for the Territory and undertake also, as I have done, to protect the Territory from such a dramatic and unforeseen burden. I will be approaching the Prime Minister and the Treasurer before the Premiers Conference in order to ensure that our case is well considered. Madam Speaker, I will be making a ministerial statement to the Assembly on Thursday of this week to give further detail of the strategy that I intend to adopt in response to the Grants Commission report.
I can say that, for the Government's part, we do not flinch from the responsibility of undergoing the financial adjustment that is required of this Territory, but I do recognise the limits to budgetary adjustments without inflicting unreasonable hardship on the residents of the ACT. Madam Speaker, so far the Government and the community have accepted a pace of adjustment in both the program expenditures and revenues which has been measured and has been sustainable, yet has been far greater than any adjustment required of any other State. I am proposing to the Commonwealth that we must have a digestible process of budgetary adjustment and that that sort of process must continue, and that special assistance be granted to the Territory over the rest of this decade to limit the reductions in overall revenue grants to that which is consistent with the pace of adjustment.
We will continue through our budgets to pursue the goals of social justice which I consider are paramount in this Territory. Those goals include matters like assistance to the unemployed, providing a stable future for our young people, taking up further and making further inroads into domestic violence, seeking justice and full equality for our Aboriginal citizens in the ACT, and so on. The budget difficulties will not swerve this Labor Government from its social justice course, Madam Speaker. I will be negotiating with the Commonwealth - I would ask members to bear this in mind - from a position of demonstrated fiscal responsibility. I will continue to restructure the budget to adjust to our financial realities; but I certainly, as I said, will not falter in the delivery of essential social programs.
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