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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 1 Hansard (30 April) . . Page.. 227 ..

MS CARNELL (continuing):

youth unemployment. They did that, Mr Speaker. I think it is important right now to mention particularly the contributions of John Gregg and David Matthews from the youth sector. They really were the driving forces behind that seminar, and they have continued to be very supportive of this whole approach. I think it is important also to thank the staff of the CES, particularly taking into account that the CES finishes in its old guise today. So, this is a good opportunity, I think, to say thank you to all of those staff that committed themselves absolutely to this program. Also, the Vocational Education and Training Authority and the ACT Public Service were involved and really made this scheme work.

Mr Speaker, I think the real credit for Youth1000 should go to the 680 Canberra businesses and other organisations that took part in it. That is right, Mr Speaker: 680 organisations helped us to achieve our aim of creating jobs for 1,000 young people in less than nine months. Mr Berry has been interjecting, as usual. I assume he has been saying - I did not quite hear because I tend not to listen - all the way through that they are only public sector jobs. He has regularly made that comment. The reality is that 90 per cent of those 680 organisations were private sector firms. Mr Speaker, without the support of local businesses, this program could not have worked. For the record, only two organisations in the whole of the ACT opposed Youth1000 - and that includes the youth sector, the community sector and the business sector. The two organisations, Mr Speaker, were the ACT Labor Party and the Trades and Labour Council. Do I need to say any more?

MR HIRD: I have a supplementary question, Mr Speaker. Could the Chief Minister identify those two groups again, for the benefit of the people opposite?

MS CARNELL: Mr Speaker, the ACT Labor Party and the Trades and Labour Council opposed getting jobs for 1,000 young people under the age of 21, predominantly in long-term training positions. Forty per cent of the 1,000 were young people who had been unemployed for longer than six months, and those opposite opposed it, Mr Speaker.

MR QUINLAN: My question is to the Chief Minister and Treasurer. The Fay Richwhite report on ACTEW states that 3 per cent of the value of ACTEW is at risk from market or regulatory forces. Given that only 3 per cent of the value of that business - a business worth $11/2 billion - is subject to real risk, will the Chief Minister concede that any scoping study done on the privatisation of ACTEW should focus primarily, if not solely, on that area?

MS CARNELL: Unfortunately, it seems that Mr Quinlan does not understand the figures. He certainly does not understand the Fay Richwhite report. It seems that Mr Quinlan does not understand the difference between economic value and such important things as profit and revenue.

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