Page 3311 - Week 11 - Thursday, 22 September 1994
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Government Service - Personal Expenditure
MR KAINE: Madam Speaker, through you, I have a question to the Chief Minister and Treasurer. Chief Minister, in the Auditor-General's report tabled yesterday, there were examples cited of personal expenditure and tips being claimed by ACT public service officers as official expenditure. In light of the lack of Treasury direction and guidance in this matter, does the Chief Minister accept any responsibility for the inappropriate charging of personal expenses to the public account? Secondly, how much have these practices and slack management cost the Territory taxpayer? Finally, what action do you, Chief Minister, have it in mind to take to correct this cavalier attitude towards public moneys and the slack management that allows it to occur?
MS FOLLETT: Madam Speaker, it is difficult for me to accept responsibility for actions which never came near me. I accept that there is a broad ministerial accountability and responsibility; but the payments of individual allowances are not made by me, they are not approved by me and they are not calculated by me. So, Madam Speaker, as individual items, I do not believe that it is appropriate that I should be involved in that level of detail. As I say, I do take responsibility for the correct administration of the rules.
I have already said in answer to previous questions that the Department of Public Administration will be having a very hard look at the payment of these kinds of allowances and at the acquittal of them. I think members should be aware that the kinds of errors that the Auditor-General has picked up may have been picked up at the time of payment but more likely were picked up at the time that they were acquitted. I regard that as a rather more serious matter because it is that acquittal of expenditure of public money that is usually the final check on whether that money was expended in the public interest. So, where there are errors in acquittal, I do think that is a serious matter. As I have said, I have asked the Department of Public Administration to address this problem.
The Auditor-General has made a number of worthwhile recommendations, including simplification of the processes, and I think that is a worthwhile recommendation because these processes are very complex. So, simplification, appropriate training for the officers involved, and appropriate dissemination of guidelines are clearly matters which need to be addressed, and I would expect the Public Accounts Committee, when it examines the Auditor-General's report, to endorse those kinds of recommendations very fully, as I do myself.
MR KAINE: I have a supplementary question, Madam Speaker. Of course, there is no complexity about the points which I am making which have to do with personal expenditure and tips. The directions are quite clear. So, the Chief Minister cannot hide behind the proposition of complexity. Since the Chief Minister only within the last month or so issued the standards, one of which is a standard that covers travelling allowances and the like, has she already issued a directive, in light of this Auditor-General's report and without waiting for the Public Accounts Committee to look at the matter, to have any gaps of this kind, in terms of specifying management responsibility, fixed immediately? If not, why not?
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