Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 3 Hansard (7 March) . . Page.. 620 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

the guise of AGL's partnership with ACTEW. Talk about scaremongering! That is a good example of it. We have not heard anything of substance from those opposite, only scares about what would happen if we went down this path. Theses scares have been met by clear guarantees from the Government, from ACTEW and, by implication, from AGL. That is a reasonable deal for the ACT, and I ask members to consider supporting the arrangement, because it does offer that certainty of outcome, that security of outcome. The alternatives do not.

Mr Speaker, a great many issues have been raised about this proposal which I do not have the time to answer in detail now. Now doubt they will be raised in the course of the debate on the detail of the Bill before the Assembly. I simply want to repeat the comments I have made before about the need for the ACT to engage in a process of considering its position. It would be politically much more comfortable for the ACT Government not to have to take steps of this kind. (Further extension of time granted) The political gain for the ACT Government from the joint venture between ACTEW and AGL is that if there is a benefit to be obtained it will be in the form of an equalisation payment, which the Government has already indicated it is going to devote to the superannuation liability of the Territory.

I daresay that very few members on this side of the house will still be in office when 5, 10, 15 or 20 years down the track the benefits of that payment start to be reaped by ACT employees who retire and need the benefit of that superannuation provision at that stage. We will not be around then to say, "We took care of that matter for you back in the year 2000". The question needs to be asked: What benefit is there for the Government in offering this arrangement now? There is no political benefit particularly for this Government. The benefit is for the people of the ACT - for ACT taxpayers, for ACT customers of ACTEW. They will be the beneficiaries of this arrangement. I ask the Assembly to support this proposed joint venture on that basis.

MR QUINLAN (3.58): Mr Speaker, I foreshadow that I will move an amendment to this motion. However, as it may cut across the amendment moved by Ms Tucker, I will hold back on that until later. After listening to the first half of Mr Humphries' speech I thought, "I agree with some of what this bloke is saying". I think he has identified some of the problems. Certainly he has misused them in justifying what is to be done. I did find it quite incredible to hear the term "smokescreens" raised.

I think it is worth while to reflect on how we got to this point in the first place. The Government claimed at the previous election that privatisation of ACTEW was not on the agenda. That claim has well and truly been discredited, along with the Government in many of its other activities. The privatisation debate commenced and we had misleading information as to the extent of the risk. The risk, we have all agreed from day one, focuses on, or is confined to, the retail arm of ACTEW. But the Government and Mrs Carnell kept attempting to infect the rest of the organisation with this risk.

We then had a statement of doom and gloom. The superannuation liability figures were quoted. Again the claim was discredited. The figures turned out to be overstated. In fact, the Government today is dining out on claims that it has achieved good financial management because it is getting the benefit of write-backs of overstatement of superannuation.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .