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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 3 Hansard (8 April) . . Page.. 722 ..

MR KAINE (continuing):

In this first phase, which will take place starting from the day the Government puts its Appropriation Bill on the table early in May, if the Estimates Committee focuses on those estimates and examines what the Government intends to do next year, it will do so without being confused by last year's results. It will be able to identify what it is that the Government intends to do and pursue questions associated with that. That will allow the process to be much clearer than it has been in the past in terms of the review of the Appropriation Bill. So, I submit that the problem put forward by Ms Tucker will go away, by virtue of the fact that the two functions are being separated now, irrespective of who performs them. One function will be performed now and the other in some months' time, when the annual reports are on the table and available for review. I think that it will clarify the issues and make each of the two processes simpler, because they are divorced from each other.

On this question of when the budget should be brought down, I have to support the argument put forward by Mr Humphries that, if you bring your budget down in May and you do not take up the debate on it until August and maybe complete it in September, then you have immediately undermined the fundamental basis on which the budget was established in the first place. It has been established on the basis of a full year's income, in terms of all of the items of revenue that the Government has specified. If you do not complete your budget debate until August or September, it is not then possible for the Government to collect the revenue that it has forecast. You will get only nine months, at best - and probably something less than nine months - of the revenue that is forecast. Therefore, the whole basis for the budget has been destroyed. Your revenue estimates which support the expenditure side of the budget for which we are asked to make an appropriation are immediately destroyed.

So, I do not see how anybody in their right senses could take a budget brought down in May and say, "We will not pass it until August or September", and then expect the Government to live with its revenue projections. It cannot do it, as a matter of practicality - - -

Ms McRae: Why did you not give us enough time?

MR KAINE: I hear Ms McRae muttering away over there. I do not know whether she has some foresight as to how she is going to achieve this; but it simply cannot be done. What the Opposition is saying to the Government, in effect, if they are insisting that we bring down the budget in May and do not debate it until August, is, "Take your budget away and recast it to show only a nine, seven or six months revenue projection instead of a 12 months projection". You cannot have it both ways.

In simple terms of practicality, what is inherent in Mr Berry's amendment is simply not feasible. It simply cannot be done. If he wants to move a motion that says, "Bring down your budget in August and we will debate it in September", that is a different thing altogether. He is trying to achieve that by changing a conclusion date, and it simply will not work. It cannot be done. I urge people to use their intelligence and not pass the amendments that Mr Berry has put forward, because it simply cannot be achieved. Mr Humphries's amendment puts it into the right perspective, in my view.

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