Page 3955 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 23 November 1993
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Madam Speaker, instead of the Treasurer making hard decisions, she plans, as does Mr Wood, to leave it up to the service deliverers. We do not believe that that is an appropriate approach for any Treasurer. We believe that it is the Treasurer's job to make sure that what she brings down in her budget is actually sustainable in the community, and sustainable in the way that they claim it should be. We believe that that is a good reason to amend this no-confidence motion to include the Chief Minister. From my perspective it is the Treasurer who must take responsibility for her own budget. She must take responsibility for a budget for which she has not produced the appropriate information.
This amendment deserves the support of the Assembly. The Treasurer cannot be allowed to remain blameless for her Government's decision while Mr Wood is made to wear the total responsibility. It is a decision for which she must wear the responsibility. I suggest that it is important. Madam Speaker, I urge the Assembly to support my amendment to this motion.
MR CONNOLLY (Attorney-General, Minister for Housing and Community Services and Minister for Urban Services) (4.11): Madam Speaker, once upon a time the Liberal Party, both in government and in opposition, had a basic understanding of real life and economics and accepted the proposition that, across the board, when you had less money to spend you spent less money. That was a proposition that Trevor Kaine, both as Chief Minister and Treasurer and as Leader of the Opposition, consistently conceded. In debate after debate, on the issue of the police budget, when some of Mr Kaine's more enthusiastic backbenchers, one of whom is no longer with us, were ranting and raving, saying, "You must spend more on police; you must spend more on police", Trevor Kaine, to his credit, said in this place and in the media, "All budgets have to take a cut. When there is less money available, you must cut across the board".
Mrs Carnell: No-one is arguing that.
MR CONNOLLY: Mrs Carnell says, "I have no objection to that". Here you are, in a puerile manner, jumping on Mr Moore's band wagon, saying, "We have to spend more on education", and using a no-confidence motion, of all the inappropriate forms of this house, to back Mr Moore's absurd statement that we should be spending more on education.
As I say, Madam Speaker, once upon a time the Liberal Party took the view that everybody had to take their fair share in relation to the budget and every program had to absorb its share of cuts. I have quoted regularly from prominent Liberal Party members who have said that. I would like to quote again today. This is a guessing competition. Which member of this Assembly, in 1991 - that leaves Mrs Carnell out, but as it is a sensible quote it is unlikely that I would be quoting Mrs Carnell - said this:
When it comes to a minimal cut of $1.2m -
that is 2 per cent -
it is important that they wear their fair share of the cuts, as is being done right across the ACT budget, in order that we can avoid the problems of the other States in regard to borrowing.
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