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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 8 Hansard (25 August) . . Page.. 2343 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

The commissioner will make copies of the master sheets provided by candidates to produce folders containing each page of how-to-vote material in electorate and then column order. The commissioner is required to make a folder available in all voting compartments in all polling places from the fifth day before the election in a manner that minimises the risk of defacement or removal. While it is recognised that earlier pre-polling voters will not be able to access the folders, there are practical issues in getting the folders ready in time for pre-polling.

I should point out that parties or independent candidates will still bear the cost of producing the how-to-vote material as the commissioner will be able to charge candidates for the display of how-to-vote material. Obviously, though, the overall costs will be much reduced as candidates will not need to print hundreds of thousands of how-to-vote cards. Instead, the commissioner will only need to produce about 2,300 folders to cover all the voting compartments used in the election.

In conclusion, I believe that my Bill provides a sensible, fair, cost-effective and environmentally sound way of providing how-to-vote material in polling places to those people who want it without there being any imposition on people who do not want to look at this material. I commend this Bill to the Assembly.

Debate (on motion by Mr Smyth ) adjourned.

MR QUINLAN (10.40): Mr Speaker, I present the Financial Management Amendment Bill (No.2) 1999, together with its explanatory memorandum.

Title read by Clerk.

MR QUINLAN: I move:

Mr Speaker, this amendment to the Financial Management Act arises from recommendation No. 5, unanimously accepted, I think, during the Estimates Committee hearings. It seeks to provide within the budget process base information to allow the Assembly members to consider the budget with the fullest possible intelligence that might be available.

In recent times, in one way and another, the Government has tried to set the scene or at least create the outward appearance that it wants the total involvement of the Assembly in budget preparation and pre-budget deliberations. This Bill will require the inclusion in the budget document of estimated outcomes for the current year as the budget for the next financial year is presented. If you examine the budget papers you will see that the budgets do include, in financial terms, estimated outcomes for the following year. This, of course, implies that analysis has been carried out and that there has been some examination of the year in total when we are well into the second half of that particular year. I have to say that the inclusion of monetary estimates in the budget paper without

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