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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 3 Hansard (9 March) . . Page.. 764 ..

Mr Quinlan: Just give me a signal when he starts an actual answer, Mr Speaker.

MR HUMPHRIES: Well, Mr Speaker, I have given an actual answer - - -

MR SPEAKER: Sit down, Mr Minister.

ACTEW - Job Losses

MR BERRY: My question is to the Treasurer without numbers. In answer to a question from Mr Corbell yesterday the Treasurer said, "ACTEW continues to shed jobs. That is why it has lost 200 jobs in the last year". I dare say he boasted about the two-year moratorium on job losses at the same time. Will the Treasurer deny that the number of jobs lost from ACTEW last year was in fact 189, and that the majority of those were the result of the sale of Ecowise Services, the sale of ACTEW fleet and a reduction in network activities because of the lack of land development in the Territory?

MR HUMPHRIES: The answer to the second question is, no. And what I have said in the house is that, in the last year to year and a half, ACTEW has shed 200 jobs. You go back and check the Hansard.

MR BERRY: Has the two-year guarantee of ACTEW jobs been discussed with unions or, indeed, with ACTEW's personnel department? Does the Treasurer agree that the proffered two-year guarantee for ACTEW jobs is nothing more than a mere convenience designed to simply take the issue beyond the next election, after which workers will be abandoned?

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Speaker, I do not agree with the latter assertion by Mr Berry, needless to say. I would probably disagree with anything Mr Berry says. I do not know whether it has been discussed with the unions. Mr Speaker, you would have to ask ACTEW about that. That was a guarantee provided by ACTEW - - -

Mr Berry: Thank you. That is enough. I am happy. "I don't know" - that will do me.

MR SPEAKER: Sit down.

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Berry can ask the ACTEW board if he wishes to. I hardly think it is likely, though, that any union worth its salt would disagree with the idea of a two-year guarantee on the maintenance of jobs.

ACTEW/AGL - Proposed Joint Venture

MR CORBELL: Can the Treasurer explain to the Assembly the logic of asking members to approve the ACTEW/AGL joint venture, a deal involving hundreds of millions of dollars, before it has access to essential financial information in regard to valuations, assets, profit and risk projections, and before any cost-benefit analysis has even been attempted?

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