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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 1 Hansard (28 April) . . Page.. 56 ..

Motion (by Mr Corbell, by leave) agreed to:

That Mr Corbell, Mr Hird, Mr Osborne and Ms Tucker be appointed to the Standing Committee on Administration and Procedure, in addition to Mr Speaker.

QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE

MR STANHOPE: Mr Speaker, my question is to the Chief Minister. In the Canberra Times of 19 April a spokesman for the Chief Minister claimed that there had been a significant shift in jobs in the ACT from the public sector to the private sector - from an estimated 75,000 in each sector two years ago to a ratio now of 90,000 private sector jobs to 60,000 jobs in the public sector. Does the Chief Minister agree with the statement attributed to her spokesman? Can the Chief Minister indicate where in the private sector these jobs have been created and the proportions that are full time, part time, permanent or casual?

MS CARNELL: Off the top of my head I can just roll those figures off! Actually, of course, I can, Mr Speaker. I am really pleased to be asked a question on jobs, and I am actually very surprised that the Labor Party would ask such a question, particularly as the first cab off the rank. It is a great change. Jobs are, without doubt, one of the most important issues in front of this Assembly. I think I would be right in saying that in the last Assembly we had virtually no questions on jobs or business or anything terribly important at all. So, maybe this really does mean that there is a change.

Mr Speaker, as those opposite may have noticed, the number of jobs currently in the ACT, as of the last ABS statistics, I think, is 157,100. Mr Speaker, that is really interesting, when you take into account that when we came to government in 1995 there were 153,800. So, that has gone from 153,800 to 157,100 since the time of the last Government and up to the last set of ABS statistics. That is an increase of 3,300 jobs. I think that is a fairly good outcome, Mr Speaker, taking into account the huge Federal Government downsizing that occurred during that time.

Mr Speaker, where could those jobs be? We know that there are fewer Commonwealth Government jobs. We know that there are fewer ACT Government jobs. So, where could they be? Guess where they are, Mr Speaker. They are in the private sector, because they cannot be anywhere else. They are not in the Federal Public Service.

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