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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 5 Hansard (13 May) . . Page.. 1261 ..

MR CORBELL (12.23): Mr Speaker, this budget is both irresponsible and ignorant. It is irresponsible because this Government chose to bring down the budget before we knew what the Federal Government was doing.

Mrs Carnell: So did every State but South Australia.

MR CORBELL: Every State except South Australia may have done it; but every State, apart from South Australia, is unlike Canberra, unlike the Australian Capital Territory. The Australian Capital Territory is suffering from the enormous brunt of the ideological zealousness of John Howard. Enormous cutbacks in jobs and enormous cutbacks in funding to the Territory are hurting our city, and this Government should have had the foresight and the vision to say, "We will put ourselves in a position where we can respond to what John Howard does to us tonight". Instead, Kate Carnell and the Liberal Government have chosen to bring the budget down early. By bringing the budget down early, before the Federal budget, they have abrogated their responsibility to respond to the impact that the Federal budget will have on our city. That is both irresponsible and ignorant.

Mrs Carnell, in her budget, has outlined a major $4.5m program on jobs, the so-called Jobs Fund. But what is this Jobs Fund really all about? Look at how much money the ACT Government is spending on redundancies. We estimate, and the Chief Minister has confirmed this, that nearly $13.5m will be spent on redundancies in the ACT Public Service. They are spending only $4.5m on creating jobs. Where are this Government's priorities? This Government's priorities are completely wrong. It is reducing the size of the Public Service at a time when our economy can least afford it, when there is an enormous demand for services to be delivered in the community, when there is an enormous demand for community services and public services. Quite clearly, this Government's priorities are wrong. They are spending $4.5m on jobs, so they claim - we will get to that in a moment - but $13.5m on getting people out of jobs. Wrong direction, ignorant, misguided, again a failure of direction!

Mrs Carnell: They are different years. The $13.5m is this year, the $7.5m is next year, and the redundancies next year will be $5m.

MR SPEAKER: Order!

MR CORBELL: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Obviously, I am hitting a bit of a raw nerve with the Chief Minister. There is $4.5m in the so-called Jobs Fund. Let us have a look at what that $4.5m is all about. First of all, the Chief Minister has proudly announced that there will be $350,000 for a Canberra Events Fund. This will be used to attract events to Canberra. We are really doing a Jeff Kennett here, are we not? It is very similar, except that if Jeff Kennett decides that he is going to attract events he at least puts real money into them. What will $350,000 attract? What will that bring to Canberra? As an alternative, why did this Government not decide to support the events that are already here? Let us build them; let us make them better. The Government did not think about that. They just want to throw money at events to come to Canberra. What about the events that are here?

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