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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 14 Hansard (10 December) . . Page.. 4079 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

public service, and they don't miss an opportunity to put the boot in if they think there is a political point to be scored by attacking the public service.

To suggest that the creation of a single senior executive position within the department of health and of a chief nurse position is the public service reacting with wild abandonment to the abolition of purchaser/provider really is extreme, and really shows a total lack of understanding of the needs of the health system and indeed of the operations of the ACT public service. It is offensive to the public service, despite Mr Smyth's attempts at seeking to distance himself from being just a public-service basher.

Question put:

That this bill be agreed to in principle.

 	Ayes 10  				Noes 5
 
 Mr Berry  	Mr Hargreaves    		Mr Cornwell  
 Mr Corbell  	Ms MacDonald    		Mr Humphries  
 Mrs Cross  	Mr Quinlan    			Mr Pratt  
 Ms Dundas  	Mr Stanhope    			Mr Smyth
 Ms Gallagher    Ms Tucker    			Mr Stefaniak  

Bill agreed to in principle.

Detail stage

Clause 1 agreed to.

Clause 2.

MR STANHOPE (Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for Health, Minister for Community Affairs and Minister for Women) (11.47): I move amendment No 1 circulated in my name [see schedule 1 at page 4185].

Mr Speaker, the ACT Auditor-General advised that it will be necessary for the production of full accrual financial statements for the statutory authority for the period from 1 July 2002 up until its cessation date of 31 December. These will be subject to the same level of audit scrutiny as the full-year financial statements that appear in the annual report.

The financial system used within the health portfolio is designed to facilitate monthly reporting. There is a regular end-of-month cut-off which enables the easy identification of the accounting period to which transactions relate. It is therefore desirable to have the commencement date specified as at the end of the month, in this case December 2002. So clause 2 substitutes the commencement provision from the day after its notification to 5 pm on 31 December 2002.

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