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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 4 Hansard (11 April) . . Page.. 1055 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Recommendation 7 calls for work on the policy framework for the Office of Sustainability to be accelerated to allow it to operate for the 2002-2003 budget. It was put to the committee that the government would be unable to have that policy framework in place in time to allow it to operate for the 2002-2003 budget. The committee called for that to be accelerated, to allow that to happen.

The government's response is interesting. The Treasurer says, "The Office of Sustainability cannot be formally established until the Legislative Assembly has approved the Appropriation." With great respect, Mr Treasurer, that is hogwash. You do not need an appropriation in order to establish a new administrative unit in the government. Governments can and do create new administrative units all the time. Indeed, on the change of government last November, a number of new administrative units were created, and no appropriation was made specifically for those.

The Financial Management Act specifically provides that money can be moved backwards and forwards to deal with the restructuring of government departments. Of course, we do not appropriate money for line agencies, units or offices within particular departments of the ACT government: we appropriate for the department as a whole. If the government of the day wants to fund a single office from that bucket, or 55 different offices, it may do either. It is simply disingenuous to say that the Office of Sustainability cannot be formally established until the Assembly has approved the appropriation. It is not true.

The Treasurer might want that to be the case for the sake of cleanness, but that goes back to the question of why this policy framework cannot be established in time for the 2002-2003 budget. It can be, if the government chooses to give it that focus and that priority, but it obviously does not wish to give it that focus and priority.

The committee has also made reference to the late tabling of documents, and to the delay in answering questions. I would have thought that there would be a more fulsome response to those questions, but there is not. The committee has also raised the question of amendments to section 17 of the Financial Management Act. I have asked a question of Mr Quinlan's officers about that, and I understand that they are preparing an answer for me or preparing an answer for Mr Quinlan to provide. However, I have to say that the tenor of this entire response is extremely unfortunate.

I think that there are serious problems with the process that the government has used. I again say to this Assembly that I believe it is a mistake for the Assembly to approve appropriations within the short time frame that the government has chosen to allow for this matter. It was the government's intention, originally, that this bill be passed last month. The Assembly prevailed upon the government to extend the time frame by that month to allow an estimates committee hearing to occur.

It was also our view that it would have been more appropriate to have an estimates committee look at the second appropriation bill as well. However, we accepted the argument that that bill contained urgent items, and that it was not possible to do have a hearing and to meet the appropriations that could not be dealt with in any other way, for particular areas of government that needed immediate funding.

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