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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 6 Hansard (23 May) . . Page.. 1602 ..

MS CARNELL (continuing):

This is despite the fact that, as the committee understands by now, the Auditor-General considers the accounting treatments fall within existing or proposed accounting standards and concepts.

The committee also recommends that the government develop a system to measure the effects of the payroll tax initiative on jobs in the territory. While we agree with the intent of this recommendation, it is very difficult to separate out any single influence on employment, such as payroll tax, from the broad range of influences on employment, such as wages, market development, interest rates, general economic outlook and business confidence.

There is a further recommendation that the government, wherever possible, avoid the use of cash grants in business incentive packages. The use of cash grants is not mentioned in the report other than in this recommendation, so it is a bit hard to know where the committee is coming from. This is essentially what the government is doing now. Although cash grants certainly are not our favoured approach to industry support packages, sometimes they are important in attracting jobs. The Impulse Airlines deal is a very good example of that.

It is important to remember that information technology is increasingly allowing business to satisfy many elements of IT related service contracts from remote locations. This is particularly important for those businesses contributing to Canberra's status as the clever capital. It is unrealistic to expect that an information-based economy will simply happen without the government working to both get the overall employment environment right as well as attracting key flagship employers.

The ACTBIS agreement to support EDS, for example, has created over 400 direct and indirect jobs. Apart from these employment opportunities themselves, the effect that these jobs will have on the ACT's skill base is important in attracting further smaller employers.

Nor does the government agree to refer the trial green-waste bin services to the Independent Competition and Regulatory Commission to ensure that there are no major competition policy issues. After consultation with the industry and some clarification of the government's intention, I understand that the trash pack industry is now supporting the government's approach.

The government supports, at least in principle or in part, most of the committees other recommendations. The 2000-01 draft budget process has been extremely interesting, if not only because we have learnt how members will accept the opportunity to get involved in the budget process, if they are invited.

The 2000-01 budget is a milestone for a number of reasons. For a start, we have turned around the budget, from a significant operating loss of in excess of $344 million in 1995 to a balanced budget today. We have also attempted to bring the community and the Assembly closer in to the budget development process. Despite the work that the committees have put into meeting the Assembly's resolution, this government remains committed to greater community and Assembly participation in the budget development processes in the future.

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