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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 5 Hansard (14 May) . . Page.. 1162 ..

MS McRAE (continuing):

What the committee could not ascertain was exactly where this $14.2m was coming from. We were told that there were unexpended moneys in a central redundancy fund, in public works and in the Treasurer's Advance. We were told that due to industrial unrest the Estimates Committee could not be provided with revenue figures to date. Therefore, we did not know, because of the fact that the Fiscal system was down, what the financial situation was here and now. But we were assured that we could feel secure that, out of those three separate funds, there was sufficient money to cover this shortfall. Audit Act will be used. The committee questioned again the use of the Appropriation Bill because, no matter how it is dressed up, it is purely and simply a request from the Government to spend another $14.2m - $14.2m more than was appropriated in Appropriation Bill (No. 1). This was fundamentally why the committee reached its first conclusion.

Despite the Government's aversion to the Audit Act provision, it carries a clear advantage over this new Bill. I remind members that the first conclusion was:

The committee remains to be convinced that Appropriation Bill (No. 2) is necessary.

The committee is concerned that an appropriation over and above that authorised by the ACT budget, rather than the transfer of funds by the normal and tested mechanisms available to the Government which are themselves subject to proper scrutiny by the Assembly, carries the prospect that the Government could spend the additional funds up to the limit of the additional appropriation. This was characterised during the hearings as virtually an open chequebook. The Government, under the current provisions of the Audit Act, can transfer only money that has already been appropriated; so, the bottom line does not change. The appropriation of $14.2m does change the bottom line.

The new procedure that the Estimates Committee was asked to scrutinise puts no restrictions on that expenditure or controls on the overall spending - up to that limit, of course. When it questioned why such a precedent was being set, the committee was assured that it is done in other parliaments. Further questioning revealed that it is done in other parliaments. In Tasmania, it happens after the budget is brought down and is a sort of tidy-up process, in exactly the same way as our scrutiny of the Audit Act. In the Federal Parliament we all know about Appropriation Bills (No. 3) and (No. 4). But we did not take much comfort from that because in the Federal Parliament there is simply no provision, as there is under our current Audit Act, to move money from one appropriation to another. The circumscription of the additional estimates that is done in the Federal Parliament is clearly spelt out. The budget, as formulated by the Federal Government at the beginning of the process, clearly spells out at what point and why extra appropriations may be had. It is not easily given, and by no means does it follow the model here, which is virtually given without a clear tag.

Yes, we were told that it will go to health and community care, but we were not told where it had come from and we were not told clearly and categorically that it is simply an appropriation of $14.2m more; nor were we told what effect it would have on other line items in the budget. We were told about three areas that would be affected by the budget,

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