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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 9 Hansard (27 August) . . Page.. 2648 ..

MR WHITECROSS (continuing):

was to put on a recruitment freeze to drive down the number of public servants in the Territory. Mr Speaker, she has her Minister for Urban Services, Mr De Domenico, going through area after area of his department, trying to shave 10 per cent here and 15 per cent there off the numbers.

Mr De Domenico: You mean to make it more efficient?

MR WHITECROSS: Mr De Domenico confirms my comments. He says "make it more efficient". Mr Speaker, the point is not whether we can make it more efficient; the point is that, with every job he sheds, there are fewer employment opportunities for people in Canberra and fewer employment opportunities for young people leaving school. That is the reality, Mr Speaker. Mrs Carnell cannot criticise Mr Howard for it, because it is her reality, and her words ring very hollow in the ears of Canberrans when she herself is such an enemy of the public sector in Canberra.

But the similarities between Howard and Carnell do not just end with their lack of commitment to the Public Service, public sector employment or investment in capital works. They also extend to the services that we expect to receive from government. There is $620m out of road funding, Mr Speaker - a broken election promise. But you would not expect these people to criticise reductions in road funding. You have only to look around Canberra to know what their attitude is to reductions in road funding. Mr Speaker, there are the dental services. We have less money being spent on dental services by the Commonwealth. But Mrs Carnell herself has been busy winding back the school dental services. So, she cannot criticise other people.

Mr Speaker, her own actions demonstrate her lack of commitment to the community. While Mr Howard is slashing funding for child care and increasing the cost of pharmaceuticals, there is less money for public hospitals, higher education - it will cost more to go to university - and research and development. These are all things that Australians expect from their Government. Mr Speaker, this Government has the same policies of not spending money on community services, whether it is reductions in ACTION bus services or whatever else. These people are committed to smaller government. We can talk about services for the unemployed. We can talk about services for young kids on the street. We can talk about services for children. Mr Speaker, these people are not committed to maintaining funding for those services; so their protestations about cuts by the Federal Government ring very hollow indeed.

Mrs Carnell got the government that she asked for. She went out and campaigned for this Government. She said that this Government would be good for Canberra. How wrong she was! This Federal Government is implementing the same policies as Mrs Carnell has been implementing in the ACT. So, Mrs Carnell campaigned for them; Mrs Carnell got them. They are doing the same things as Mrs Carnell did in her budget last year. Mr Speaker, she cannot complain. If people think that the Liberal agenda is going to be good for the ACT, they are sadly mistaken. Neither Mr Howard nor those opposite have any real vision for Canberra. They offer no hope. There is one thing that is plain to see: The Howard and Costello budget, like Mrs Carnell's budget, shows that Liberals do not care about Canberra and that Liberals are not good for Canberra.

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