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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 5 Hansard (6 May) . . Page.. 1471 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

Let us look behind the jargon. What that statement means is that, in the face of the sustained and deliberate attack on Canberra by the ACT and Federal governments, Canberrans sold up and left town. In the years of the Howard Government until 1998, 10,000 jobs went. In the 12 months to March 1998, 4,000 people left town to look for work. In the 12 months since, how many more have gone? For those who remained, the value of their homes crashed. The signs were there that the Government would have trouble paying its way.

Mrs Carnell cannot claim it was the strength of her arguments that won the extra funding from the Commonwealth. In truth, the Grants Commission bailed her out when her so-called expertise in economic management failed and her mates on the hill would not relent. No-one denies the need for an increase in Commonwealth funding, but the worry is that the only prospect the Government foresees for sustaining the somewhat restored levels the Territory now enjoys is the application of a regressive goods and services tax. Mrs Carnell's bottom line will profit from those who can least afford to pay.

And while the general economic conditions ahead look fair, there are some clouds on the horizon. Access Economics, for instance, thinks the Government might be a little optimistic in predicting a balanced budget in two years. Access Economics, we know, are not exactly friends of the Left in this town. The latest Morgan and Banks survey has only 18 per cent of local employers intending to increase jobs in the coming quarter - the country's worst result.

Labor does not decry the government strategy of working towards getting the Territory back in the black. As I said earlier, in government the Labor Party planned such a move. But an operating surplus should be accompanied by a more visionary aim than the ability to fully fund public sector capital works without the need for borrowing, admirable though that aim might be. At the least it should mean an end to fiascos like the Bruce Stadium development.

Mr Speaker, the budget contains a range of measures that add to the Government's investment in services and facilities for health and community care. It provides significant additional funds, for instance, to attack the waiting lists for elective surgery. But it begs the question: What has the Government achieved with its injection of funds over the past four budgets? In this current year, buoyed by more than $16m in bonus payments from the Commonwealth for the Territory's signing of the Medicare agreement ahead of other jurisdictions, the Government applied $3m towards the waiting lists, but in the past year the waiting list has grown by 21 per cent. One of Mr Moore's legacies to the people of Canberra is a 21 per cent growth in the waiting list.

One then has to ask the question: If this Government applies another $3m to the waiting list, what do we expect? A 40 per cent increase in the waiting list, perhaps? Whatever the reason for the continued increase - and the issue is obviously complex - the fact remains that this Government has not worked out the strategy to combat it, even with the benefit of the Commonwealth's bonus money. This Government has been content to let the money sit in the bank while the waiting list grows and grows and grows.

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