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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 14 Hansard (11 December) . . Page.. 4292 ..

MR SMYTH: Now we go to the $200 million. It is really funny the way these figures inflate when Mr Stanhope gets hold of them. I heard him giving interviews at lunchtime and then heard a report on the ABC that the figure was maybe $10 million or $20 million. Yet, by 2.30, it must have been up to $100 million and, by the time he got his dixer at about 3.30, it had blown out to $200 million. This is really good work. He has put out a press release that says the proposals would cost approximately $200 million. However, if you actually add up his list, it comes to $121.4 million, so I do not really see where the other $78 million is.

Mr Stanhope: That is a year, Brendan. That is in the first year. We are talking about-

MR SMYTH: But you were saying $200 million. You are going to qualify your statement. Jon I-will-qualify-my-statement Stanhope gets caught out. Yet again, here is the part-time health minister, who shoots from the hip-or in his case, shoots from the lip-when somebody dares to criticise him. When somebody actually says, "Perhaps we could have done this better,"Jon Stanhope, who prides himself on listening-obviously with closed ears-goes ballistic.

The question is: how can the money be in the budget when the plan was only launched two weeks ago? The money is in the budget because he was not listening to the people of the ACT. He had already made up his mind and he listens with closed ears.

The issue of how to fund this action plan comes down to what the plan now costs. Mr Stanhope has raised the matter of the computer system required across the ACT. He says it is worth $25 million. Okay, part-time health minister, what are you cutting to the tune of $25 million to fund that particular proposal? What are you cutting to fund the other bits of your action plan that we now understand, from what you said, not to be an action plan, but a broad overarching document? If it is a broad overarching document, why did you call it your action plan? Because it is indicative of your definition of action.

What can I say? When I came to be the Opposition Leader, I said that we would try to be constructive and positive. I had no idea that I would hit a sore nerve in the Stanhope government. In a few hours yesterday, in response to my motion, we saw that the minister got his facts wrong, he produced ludicrous figures that still grow and he disseminated absurd misrepresentations of my position.

Let's go to Mr Stanhope's facts. In his first press release yesterday, Mr Stanhope said I had not attended any of the public meetings. That is patently untrue. I attended the summit, the summit reconvened, and the launch of the action plan. Indeed, at the launch I sat behind none other than the CEO of the Canberra Hospital. Perhaps Mr Stanhope should have checked with his department before issuing his media release.

Then we had the claims that the targets in this motion would cost $200 million. It is insane, it is bizarre, it is downright weird. Where would you get figures such as this? As has been pointed out, each of my targets, bar one, is based on the goals set by his action plan. These are your goals. This is your action plan. This is the cost of it. Even in the advanced fairyland that Mr Stanhope seems to be inhabiting today, I do not believe that more than a couple of million dollars would have to be added to the cost of the budget to pay for this, and I think that is being generous.

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