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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 7 Hansard (25 June) . . Page.. 2139 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

Mr Speaker, Ms Reilly also talked about the waiting lists. She knows that there are two types of waiting lists. There is the emergency waiting list, where people who desperately need public housing are accommodated as quickly as possible, and there is the general waiting list. Ms Reilly, have a look at when you lot were in government and see how long some of those general waiting lists were, in terms of getting a certain type of house. You talk about 4,500 people being on the waiting list now, and that is a few hundred up from what it was in January. But, Ms Reilly, it is a hell of a lot better than the 7,000 people who were on the waiting list in 1994, when the Labor Party was in government. That is a considerable improvement on that situation. I think that particular fact needs to be put in perspective.

There are a number of initiatives in the budget in relation to public housing, Mr Speaker. I do not want to read them out at any great length. They are there for members to see. There is the continued emphasis on trying to get a better mix of housing, especially APUs and unit-type accommodation, and also, as I think even Ms Reilly would concede, there are the innovative COOOL project units, which she has now had a look at, which provide some excellent housing for the disabled in our community. With our public works, they are spread throughout Canberra. Mr Speaker, we have finally, in this last year, completed a 10-year refurbishment of Ainslie Village. The Condamine Court project, with the success that has had and the satisfaction level of the tenants there, simply speaks for itself. (Extension of time granted) We live in very difficult financial times. Despite that, when you have a budget of some $34m for your capital works, when you have some $27.2m to spend on maintenance - the highest it has been for some four years - I think that is pretty good.

Finally, Mr Speaker, Ms Reilly made some comments in relation to the current budget being underspent in terms of maintenance. I can tell Ms Reilly that the budget for repairs and maintenance is not low or underspent. Contracts for the vast majority of the projects have been let, and most will be completed by the end of this financial year. Some of the larger contracts will not be completed until early in the new financial year. As Ms Reilly might appreciate, the 1996-97 budget was late last year. It was in September, and the Commonwealth funding was not certain for some time. Also, there are lengthy lead times for some of the maintenance. Also - surprising as it might seem to Ms Reilly - there was less tenant demand for repairs work. The number of work orders was down by between 13 and 20 per cent - - -

Ms Reilly: Discouraged.

MR STEFANIAK: No. Just shut up and listen, and you might learn something. It was down 13 to 20 per cent on last year's figures - that is, for 1995-96 - depending on the repair type. You might appreciate, Ms Reilly, that we have better control of repair expenditure as a result of new arrangements we introduced at Belconnen and Tuggeranong. Would you believe that that has actually resulted in a significant saving on repairs because of those arrangements? Those arrangements include a housing manager being responsible for a certain number of properties.

Indeed, in some instances people have been doing some small things themselves, and there has been better targeting. That has led to some savings. Guess what happens with those savings. They are going to be ploughed back into more maintenance, Ms Reilly.

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