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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 12 Hansard (21 November) . . Page.. 4127 ..

Mr Hird: Did you ring the police?

MS TUCKER: Did I ring the police? That is a typical law and order response to a social problem. It is unbelievable.

Mr Hird: Did you ring the police? You are a responsible person.

MS TUCKER: Mr Hird asks did I ring the police because a 12-year-old boy has got upset sitting at a bus stop for an hour, in the cold, in the dark, with his young brother, and engraves a little bit on the bus seat. I would be very impressed if I saw this Minister, who says over and over again in this place, "We want to get more people on the buses", using the bus service himself. He is not too grand; he is not too important. If he really believes that people should use the buses, why does he not set an example?

Proposed expenditure agreed to.

Part 13 - ACT Forests

Proposed expenditure - ACT Forests, $960,000 - agreed to.

Part 14 - Attorney-General's Department

Proposed expenditure - Attorney-General's, $57,187,000

MR WHITECROSS (Leader of the Opposition) (2.51 am): Mr Speaker, it would be remiss of me not to point out under this appropriation that $1m of the $57,187,000 that is being appropriated to Attorney-General's is to pay debt servicing charges on the sale and lease-back of the Magistrates Court, which, of course, is part of the financing arrangement for the $100m budget deficit Mrs Carnell has. Next financial year, when we are debating next year's budget, there will be $2.6m in the Attorney-General's budget to pay the debt servicing costs of Mrs Carnell's sale and lease-back arrangement, which is really borrowings to pay for Mrs Carnell's budget deficit, plus some extra sales of whatever assets Mrs Carnell can lay her hands on next year to make up next year's $100m budget deficit. When we are voting on this, it is worth considering that a full $1m of this money is debt servicing costs associated with plugging Mrs Carnell's budget deficit, which has been disguised and buried in the Attorney-General's appropriation rather than being put where it should be, namely, in the appropriation of the Central Financing Unit.

MS TUCKER (2.52 am): I would like to commend the Government at this point.

Mrs Carnell: Don't. Just sit down. That is what we want you to do.

MS TUCKER: The issue of legal aid funding was of great concern to the Estimates Committee, and I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Attorney-General, Mr Humphries - - -

Mr Whitecross: If you are tired we can adjourn.

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