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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 10 Hansard (Wednesday, 25 August 2004) . . Page.. 4170 ..

all they would do—what was required to get Commonwealth funding—no more than that.

We put additional money—again I say “additional money”; new money—into the system: money that does not come in routinely. That is something that—

Mr Smyth: You haven’t spent it. Fire safety money. Half of it’s not been spent.

MR WOOD: Get out of it. I will tell you what has been happening if you just hold on a minute.

Mr Smyth: It’s not been spent. What’s going to happen in a few years?

MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

MR WOOD: We have done something that has been lacking for a long time: we have established a strategic approach to ensuring our system is managed. Every time a property has been inspected during the last year, it has been carefully noted and recorded. The needs of that property are now based on a data system. We have an understanding of what each property needs. It will make life much more efficient and effective.

Let me tell you what we have done in terms of spending. In just one year we spent $86 million on acquisitions and improvements—a record level since self-government. That is a 44 per cent increase on the previous year. The money we have been putting into the system is showing. In 2003-04, 264 units were acquired, resulting in an overall increase of stockholding of 127 properties. Bear this in mind: over a period of three years, you knocked off about 700 properties. That was a reduction—that was a planned programmed reduction of the former government.

Mr Smyth: What was the usage rate? What was the usage rate? We used more. Yours are idle and empty.

MR WOOD: You do not think that was very good?

Mr Smyth: You ought to be ashamed of yourself.

MR WOOD: You should be ashamed of yourself, Mr Smyth. Total public housing stock, as of today, is 11,500. That is in stark contrast to your system of selling off. The only way to handle the issue—and there are issues around housing and maintenance—was to cannibalise it: sell it off. That is not what we are doing. There are significant issues around housing in the ACT—as there are in Australia—but we are committed to it.

Mrs Burke does not like my talking about that $33 million. There is a lot of other money—we have been putting extra money into community housing, Aboriginal housing—money that never appeared from that side of the house.

We have done other things in terms of practical administration. We have reduced rental payments for tenants who go into a rehabilitation program. They do not have to pay two

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