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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 7 Hansard (24 June) . . Page.. 2009 ..

MRS CARNELL (Chief Minister and Treasurer) (5.35): Mr Speaker, I think it is important to make some things clear. The Government has not put on the table a new scheme at this stage. We have put on the table a number of options.

Mr Whitecross: You weasel. Go on; weasel away.

MRS CARNELL: No. Mr Speaker, we know that we cannot afford a scheme that costs us 14 per cent - not 11 per cent, but 11 per cent plus the 3 per cent - of wages as our emerging costs. Those opposite could not afford it and we cannot afford it. This Assembly, this Government, cannot afford it. It is that simple. We need to look at a system that we can afford.

Mr Osborne has brought up some very important issues. Those opposite, though, are saying that the Government's record on this is not acceptable. We agree that we need to address this issue. We know that we need to address this issue, Mr Speaker. Those opposite did not. They spent all of the money in the Consolidated Fund but did not fully fund their superannuation scheme. They allowed the unfunded superannuation liability to increase the whole time they were there. Mr Speaker, those opposite cannot afford a scheme that costs 14 per cent of salaries. Nobody in this Government can anyway.

MR BERRY (5.36): Mr Speaker, $170m was invested in superannuation by Labor. I will read to you a passage from Mrs Carnell's own budget paper which blows out of the water her proposition that the Government has not made up its mind on this issue. I quote:

The introduction of a scheme at the Superannuation Guarantee level, as in most states and the private sector, would be a means of containing the longer term annual costs and accruing liabilities.

That is the Government's intention, and our record is clear and clean.

MR OSBORNE (5.37): I did not stand up here earlier and say that Mrs Carnell's Government had been the saviour when it comes to superannuation. Mr Speaker, Mr Berry stood up earlier and said to me that because I supported the budget I agreed with everything they did. When I stood for election back in 1995 I said that I would support the budget of the party which got the most votes. Unfortunately for Mr Berry, that was not the Labor Party. You were smashed, Mr Berry.

Mr Berry: I was all right.

MR OSBORNE: You were all right; but your party, as a whole, was defeated quite convincingly. I make no apologies for supporting the budget of the Government because I believe in having some stability here in the Territory.

Mr Berry: At any cost.

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