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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 7 Hansard (27 June) . . Page.. 1993 ..

Mr Quinlan: Swept them off their feet.

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Speaker, I am finding it difficult to deliver an answer to this question.

MR SPEAKER: Order! If members are concerned about the length of the answer, they are only lengthening it by constant interjections.

MR HUMPHRIES: The argument we put to the Grants Commission was based on our belief that there need to be changes in the parameters on which the allocation to the ACT occurred. The improvement in our relativities was due mostly to that exercise, not to a downturn over the preceding five years that had led to the ACT being relatively in greater need than other parts of Australia. That hard work will endure beyond the period of the next five-year cycle. The changes in the parameters of the calculations will endure beyond that period.

Mr Quinlan: For all states?

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Quinlan does not understand. The arguments are about national capital-

Mr Quinlan: The Grants Commission parameters will change.

MR SPEAKER: Order, please! I am not entertaining a debate across the chamber, thank you.

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Speaker, the arguments were based in large part on national capital influences. It is very hard to see how Sydney, Melbourne, Wagga or Darwin can argue national capital influences-the thing that can only be argued in the ACT, in Canberra. We argued those things and we achieved a great deal.

Do not take my word for the exercise we have engaged in here. We do not usually get many accolades from Access Economics. We have had plenty of run-ins with commentators of that kind, but the headline last week in the newspaper really says it all: "ACT rated nation's top budgeter".

Mr Stanhope: Was it by Crispin Hull?

MR HUMPHRIES: The article was written by one Kirsten Lawson, not by Crispin Hull. Kirsten Lawson could not be accused of being a lackey of the government. That is the evidence that the work that has been put into this budget is hard work and has paid off. It is not just good luck. I quote Alan Tregilgas, the Access Economics senior economist:

The evidence is there. It is ironic that, despite having inherited such a large operating loss from the Labor Party, $344 million-

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