Page 1795 - Week 06 - Thursday, 19 May 1994
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I think the Government needs to examine itself. I suggest that the Chief Minister and Treasurer ought to do an analysis and ask herself why she has been told, presumably by the Treasury, that they need this much money to carry out the business of government for two months - or even less, because it is conceivable that the Appropriation Bill could be passed on the first sitting day of the Assembly in August. The Estimates Committee assumes that it will finish its business by about the end of June.
Mr Connolly: It will be such a good budget that you will just want to vote on it on the day.
MR KAINE: It will be another disaster of a budget, Mr Connolly. Let us be clear about that. We can absolutely count on it. It will be another budget that does not address the issues of youth unemployment, that does not address the question of fixing the health screw-up, that does not address the question of reducing expenditure on education, that does not deal with any of the problems that are confronting this Territory, that does not deal with stimulating business to get itself up off its backside and to be able to generate some jobs. It will do none of those things, and we can predict that here and now. Let us not have any of your smart comments about how brilliant the budget is going to be. We know that it will be another Follett budget that does none of the things that should be done and addresses none of the issues that should be addressed. But we will deal with that in due course.
Mr Connolly: It is nice to see that you are approaching it with an open mind.
MR KAINE: The other day Professor Gruen gave you the same advice that I have been giving you for five years - that there are only three things you can do. You can raise revenue, you can reduce expenditure or you can borrow. You had to wait for Professor Gruen, five years into self-government, to give you that same basic advice that I have been giving you for years. That has been hailed as a brilliant piece of economic analysis and advice. I have not seen you address one of those issues in five years. You have had four of those years in government. You have not addressed any of those issues.
You have not confronted the revenue raising problem, and it is going to be a real trouble for you this year. You have not addressed the problem of, essentially, getting the expenditure side of your budget down. I am sure that flows from this notion that somehow there is plenty of money. The Government has no defined target for expenditure reductions; they just cut expenditure by 2 per cent, and if the administration does not achieve that nobody cares. The Treasury simply advances them some more money, so they spend it anyway. That is the major criticism that I have of the Supply Bill. It leaves the impression that there is plenty of money lying around and that the Government is saying, "Do not worry. Just come back to the Treasury if you need some more and we will fix it for you".
That is even more obvious when you examine some of the items contained in this Supply Bill. I mention specifically the allocation for Housing and Community Services. It comes back to this question of how much is enough. Last year, for a five-month allocation, Housing and Community Services was given the sum of $45m in round figures.
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