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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 4 Hansard (2 April) . . Page.. 1252 ..

MR QUINLAN (continuing):

that to $10.2 million. So there is a $10.2 million reduction in what we should have otherwise expected, based on the growth in incomes within the ACT, and therefore an assumed capacity to generate more revenue in land conveyancing, payroll tax, and from gambling.

More worrying is the fact that the federal Treasurer held back a $15 million payment for special fiscal needs, which is examined by the Grants Commission and recommended as a genuine cost to the territory of catering for the existence of the federal government in the ACT. That was held back under the concerning statement that, "We would like to review that, along with your request for additional funding for bushfires."

I said yesterday, and I repeat, that I hope that at least the Prime Minister is an honourable man, to the extent that he will honour his commitment to provide additional funds to the ACT, as he did in the days immediately after the fires of 18 January. I hope we do not get a double shuffle of the funding that would normally come to the territory, so that some money still comes but in fact it boils down to nothing.

Further external pressures are the returns on superannuation investments. This is a problem faced by virtually all superannuation funds, a problem that might otherwise be redressed by different forms of accounting. Both the Auditor-General and the Estimates Committee of this place believe that we should continue to account for our superannuation investments and their operation, along with our normal operations. That is rather confusing in light of what we are actually trying to measure.

This government faces wages pressures on a number of fronts-wages pressures that were, I think, manifestly obvious for some time but were not included in the forward estimates of previous governments. They were ignored, to give what I would say is not quite an accurate picture of the future from budgets brought down in years past. That would have to be either one of those monumental oversights or a little bit of manipulation.

Of course, we have the impact of the bushfire disaster. Beyond insurance and beyond the natural disaster relief arrangements, the latest figure I have-I am not going to be held to it precisely, because there are a number of puts and takes, depending on what the Prime Minister does, and depending on what the Department of Finance does, in relation to accepting or not accepting matters to be included under the natural disaster relief arrangements-is about $30 million net.

There may be some cash flowing from the insurance claim on the pine forests themselves, which might shore-up our cash position. However, our operating position is still under that pressure, and therefore under that pressure which would go through to our credit rating on our long-term bottom line under the accounting regime we now employ. That is an accounting regime that I have in other ways, at other meetings, questioned in forums within my profession.

I am pleased to note that, of recent times, I have had some support from Professor Alan Barton. Maybe we could revisit the absolute application of accrual accounting in government. I think it does go over the top and probably does create a picture which is a little misleading-a little harsher picture than ought be created-as to the position of governments.

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