Page 3968 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 23 November 1993
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MR KAINE: Mr Berry has not said anything yet, but I know that he had his hand up at one stage. I was not sure whether that was for some other reason or not. The fact is that the Government has incriminated itself because the Chief Minister said, "You cannot blame Bill Wood because he is implementing Government policy".
Then they proceeded to try to defend themselves, and with every word they uttered they proved, whether or not they know anything about education - I have to give Mr Wood some credit; I believe that he does know a bit about education - that they know nothing about managing money. What they attempted to do was to say, "That dreadful Federal Government ripped all the money off us and we did not have enough left". Mr Connolly, as he always does when he needs an authority to lean on, said, "But Trevor Kaine always said ...". Of course, he is right. Trevor Kaine has always been consistent. Trevor Kaine, when he was Chief Minister and Treasurer, and today in opposition, believes in managing the resources that you have, which is what this Government does not do. It takes a hands-off attitude and says, "We are going to chop some money off you. You public servants go away and tell us how you are going to fix it". That deflects the thing. What do the public servants do? I used to be a public servant, so I know.
Mr Stevenson: You still are, Trevor.
MR KAINE: No, I am not. I am an elected person. I know how public servants work because I used to do it when I was one. The Minister would come and he would say, "We have to save $100m this year. What can we do to fix it?". You always put up the ones that are difficult for the government to implement because if they implement them you will lose the money that you have been spending year after year. So public servants have their own internal politics to play. This is a case where the Government has fallen for it. Mr Wood goes to the Education Department and says, "We have to save $3m, $4m, $5m. How can we do it?". "Ah", say the public servants, "cut some teachers". The reason they say "cut some teachers" is that they know that there will be a public outcry the minute you start trying to cut teachers. I am saying this only because it is symptomatic of the way that the Government does not manage. It just seems to hope that it is all going to turn out all right.
The Chief Minister talked about the two tough years of budgeting. "The only worse one than this year", she said, "was last year". What happened last year? She ended up, by mismanagement, with $60m in her hand at the end of the year - $30m from an unexpected revenue source that she did not even know about at the beginning of the year, and Lord knows why because we have been selling land for long enough, and $30m that she did not spend last year.
Mr Connolly: Through our rigorous financial management, constantly looking for savings.
MR KAINE: Here is Mr Connolly again. He is saying, "This is by good management. We did not spend $30m that we had budgeted. We knew that we wanted to spend it on something, but we just inadvertently did not spend it". She cannot have it both ways. If by good management - let us concede it for a moment - she ended up $60m in front, why was it such a catastrophe that the Commonwealth took $75m off us this year? She had to find only $15m.
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