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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 9 Hansard (23 November) . . Page.. 2463 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

Mr Speaker, then there is the big cut to library services. Access to information is a basic right and forms the foundation of a democracy. The ACT public library system is not a gold plated Rolls Royce version of a public library system. In fact, according to figures provided to my office by the Government, the ACT is about average when it comes to per capita funding of libraries. Others argue that the ACT is among the lowest spenders. The Government is arguing that use of the library system has decreased in recent years and that this is the reason why funding of libraries can be cut back to the level it was at in 1991. Perhaps the Government should have asked themselves why fewer people have been using public libraries. Is it a reflection of poor staff morale after several years of restructuring, cost cutting and reductions in the number of professional staff? Last financial year the public library system employed 34 professional full-time equivalents. Despite Government statements of a blow-out in staffing in the libraries, this did not represent an increase in the figure from previous years. It was a decrease by 15 per cent over the previous year. What is the cut going to be this year? The Government will not say, or, rather, it says it cannot say, because it does not know. How can the Government say, as was said during the Estimates Committee, that service to the public will not be affected if it cannot answer such a basic question?

The budget papers indicate that the cut to library materials purchasing will be 5 per cent, but this includes the government library which is affected hardly at all. If you separate out the government library, the cut becomes 7.5 per cent. The Government may argue that this is not a serious cut as there will be an unspecified investment in new information technology for the library system coming out of the central budget. However, the cut in the previous year was 8.5 per cent over the previous year. You could hardly call a cut in funding of 15 per cent over two years keeping up with inflation. Mr Speaker, I would like it noted that these figures are not those which have been bandied around by the unions. These figures are based on material provided by the Government to my office. The figures provided by the unions paint a much grimmer picture, and also pose many questions which I have yet to get satisfactory answers to from the Government.

Mr Speaker, if the Government and the Opposition had not decided jointly to stifle democratic debate in the Assembly, the Greens would have sought an amendment to the budget to ensure that the Government could not reduce the level of services, staff or materials in our public library system - a library system which is already stretched and has seen substantial cuts over the last few years. It is because access to information is one of the most important pillars of democracy that the ACT Greens wished to move an amendment to this budget. For democracy to work, people must have the ability to be well informed, and not only if they can afford it.

As elected representatives, it is up to us to do all we can to ensure that the community has free and open access to the information, ideas or entertainment that is stored in our libraries. These are materials that can be shared by all, so they not only serve the community but also save resources. We are very disappointed that the Labor Party, which has spoken out very loudly in support of libraries, decided not to take action to prevent lowering the standard of library services in the ACT. It was a disappointing display by the ALP, after standing here, putting up motions including censure motions,

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