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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 3 Hansard (7 March) . . Page.. 739 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Mr Berry tried to make play of the fact that we promised in the last budget not to have any redundancies. We did not promise in the last budget not to have any redundancies. Mr Berry, as usual, has twisted and distorted what was said. We promised not to have any centrally funded redundancy program and the-

Mr Berry: And this is coming from Treasury?

MR HUMPHRIES: No, this money is coming from the forests, another little tarradiddle from Mr Berry.

Mr Berry: That is not what the workers are being told.

MR HUMPHRIES: We never said that our program would mean that there would be no redundancies anywhere in the government. No government could ever make that promise.

MR HUMPHRIES: The fact is, and Mr Kaine brought this out very appropriately, that ACT Forests has never been a profitable part of the operations of the ACT government. It has never been a business that we have been able to make operate effectively. It has always entailed significant losses to the ACT taxpayer.

Mr Osborne: So have the buses.

MR HUMPHRIES: I think there is a community service in having a good bus system in the ACT. I do not know that there is such a large case to be made for having a work force of forestry workers of the size we now have in operation in the ACT. Of course there is value in having people there as de facto volunteer back-up bushfire fighters. Of course there is a value in that and we have to make sure that in this program of reducing the number of people in the work force of ACT Forests we do have people who are able to fight forest fires in the ACT. But the losses in forests each year are substantial. We have worked very hard in the last six years in an attempt to address that. Indeed, we have reduced the extent of those losses, but we cannot put an end to the organisation's loss for the ACT taxpayers without making some other changes. That includes reducing the number of people on the work force.

Mr Speaker, a question I would pose about this motion is: if we believe that forestry workers deserve not to be ever put in the position where they are involuntarily retired from the public service, why do we not believe the same entitlements should flow to any other workers in the ACT?

Mr Berry: We do.

MR HUMPHRIES: That is not what your motion says. At the moment it is possible-I must say, quite rarely, but it is possible infrequently-to make redundant someone for whom a job cannot be found within the public service. It does happen occasionally. You have not moved a motion previously to prevent that from happening. The question is: why are you not doing so now?

Mr Berry: Because I believe in it.

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