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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 11 Hansard (26 September) . . Page.. 3490 ..

Ms McRae: It is a cop-out. You are not taking responsibility.

MRS CARNELL: I think Ms McRae is quite right. Mr Whitecross today did go down the path of a cop-out. I think Ms McRae has really hit the nail on the head. If those opposite do not want to tell either this Assembly or the community the approach that they would take, that is fine.

I would like to finish off with a very interesting statement. Mr Whitecross made the point that we should not be blaming the Federal Government for the problems that the ACT is experiencing right now. He said that it is all our fault. I would like to quote from a document called The State of Australia, published by that right-wing think-tank, the Evatt Foundation. I would like to put two quotes on the record, just to show who the Evatt Foundation believe is causing the problems in the ACT economy. They say on page 247 of this year's State of Australia:

The scaling back of Commonwealth employment growth since 1991 has taken the wind out of the ACT's growth.

On page 253, after a quite significant preamble, they say:

In the medium term, the ACT's economic fate rests with the depth of cuts made by the Howard Government.

Mr Whitecross: Where is the bit about your Government?

MRS CARNELL: What it said about my Government was that we were doing the same as you. I was very disappointed really. I think the comments they made were that we were following on the history of the Follett Government. I thought they were really wrong on that one, but that is by the by.

The fact is that the cuts that the Federal Government have made in ACT employment have caused some very real problems here. That is the reason why we believe strongly that the approach that we have taken - certainly, as I have said, a somewhat risky approach - to really stimulate this economy, to try to drive it back into growth, is the appropriate approach. The other approaches - of borrowing, of cutting the public sector, of increasing taxes significantly - I do not believe, on their own, would work.

It is important that we address such issues as making sure that our taxes are in line with those in New South Wales or that they are in line with what the Commonwealth Grants Commission believe we should be doing. I am sure those opposite realise that if we do not do that the Commonwealth Grants Commission will penalise us. We have addressed a number of things such as the BAD tax simply because the Commonwealth Grants Commission made it very clear to us, as it did to the previous Government, that if we did not introduce a tax they would continue to penalise the ACT for underperforming in the taxation area. What we have now is a taxation system in the FID and BAD area that is in line with the systems in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia.

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