Page 3302 - Week 11 - Thursday, 22 September 1994
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MR HUMPHRIES (11.47): Madam Speaker, I am picking up this debate on Mrs Carnell's behalf. It is true that these meetings have taken on an added significance in recent years in order that a number of the difficulties which have been faced by governments around the country might be dealt with in a way which brings them into line with each other. The Hilmer report is a crucial part of that process at the present time, as I understand it. "Micro-economic reform" was the way the Chief Minister referred to it in her presentation speech. I am glad to see at least the lip-service that the Government pays to the importance of micro-economic reform. I note the comments made by the Chief Minister yesterday, that Hilmer and the concomitant process of micro-economic reform were not merely about producing privatisation or corporatisation. I accept that that is true. Competition is the most important element in this process. Reading her remarks about the COAG meeting brings one swiftly to the conclusion that there has been an oversight by this Government in respect of those important arms of public policy. Those arms are being examined and implemented not just by Liberal governments in this country but also by Labor governments. I am talking particularly about the Federal Government. That cannot be disregarded as we move towards a process of making our economic arrangements more efficient and providing for real competition, particularly between public business enterprises and private ones.
Madam Speaker, the process that the Government has followed in its participation in COAG meetings has been welcome at least in terms of the lip-service that it has paid to these important issues. By the same token, I think that there is a great deal more that the Government can do. I look forward to their making a real, substantive commitment to implementing genuine micro-economic reform and not merely saying, "Yes, we are in favour of it because it is the flavour of the month; but we will sit on our hands and wait until this particular ideological fad passes, and then we will go back to our old favourite policies of state control of enterprises and no competition in public sector enterprises". Clearly, that is a stupid policy, and the Government should be up front about where it stands on this whole process from beginning to end.
MRS CARNELL (Leader of the Opposition) (11.50): The main issue that comes out of the Chief Minister's statements on the COAG conferences in Hobart and Darwin is the abject failure of the Follett Labor Government to make any improvements in the quality and cost of services in the ACT. There is much talk and little action about this important issue. Members of COAG have adopted the Hilmer recommendations and have, therefore, focused on the need for competition in the supply and delivery of services. Competition reform is something that this Government can hardly bring itself to mention, let alone initiate; yet this has never stopped the Chief Minister from attending the COAG conferences, where she smiles in agreement with the other heads of government about competition policy - including her Labor colleague the Prime Minister - and then returns to the ACT with absolutely no intention of honouring anything that has been agreed to at the conference.
Since the report by the Independent Committee of Inquiry into National Competition Policy was brought down by the chairman, Professor Frederick Hilmer, in August last year, there has been widespread agreement that effective competition policy has a critical role to play in transformation of the Australian economy if it is to meet the challenges before it, both now and in the future. The report set out a number of important principles
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