Page 3605 - Week 11 - Thursday, 22 September 2005
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pressure to provide the information required on time. Rather, it should be to take what action is required to ensure that they do their job properly and in a timely fashion.
The opposition cannot see how six-monthly reporting on outputs is going to improve accountability. In fact, it is more likely to have the opposite effect. Accordingly, we will be proposing amendments to require ministers to present to the Assembly quarterly performance reports for the departments and agencies for which they are responsible within 30 days of the end of each of the first three quarters of the financial year.
We see this as necessary to keep members of the Assembly well informed in a time frame relevant to emerging trends. By contrast, the delay inherent in six-monthly reporting would mean that key events and measures of performance had passed more into history and disclosure of them would be less likely to lead to public interest. I do not believe that that is a desirable outcome.
Turning to other aspects of the bill, the opposition supports the amendment to section 31 (2) (b) and the deletion of sections 12 (1) (d) and 19E to focus on meeting financial and output targets of departmental budgets for the year, rather than giving technical accounting reports of little interest to members or the community. We are also supportive of providing for direct appropriations to territory authorities and corporations, along with the corresponding responsibility of those authorities to account to the Assembly for their operations and performance in much the same way as is required of departments.
A related improvement is for clearer and more demanding governance responsibilities for territory authorities akin to those of a corporation, although understandably the proposed rules for advisory boards are not as strict as for governing boards. The capacity for territory authorities to borrow from the territory banking account with the Treasurer’s approval is also, in my view, an improvement. Although this facility would be outside the annual appropriation process, it would be a disallowable instrument and the Assembly would be informed of the purpose and amount of the borrowing as well as the total financial exposure of the authority.
The opposition supports the bill in principle and I will move amendments at the detail stage to ensure timeliness of presentation of reports to the Assembly.
DR FOSKEY (Molonglo) (5.45): I will support the Financial Management Legislation Amendment Bill, since it seeks to improve some of the territory’s fiscal operations regulatory framework, but I foreshadow that I will move an amendment at the detail stage to the new governments arrangements for territory authorities.
The bill proposes a number of changes to government financial reporting operations. I specifically support those proposals that improve the accountability and transparency of the government’s financial management. These changes include allowing appropriations to be made directly to territory authorities and territory-owned corporations, requiring most territory authorities and territory-owned corporations to report on these appropriations, and including an original budget column in government annual financial statements in accordance with the Australian Accounting Standards Board’s proposed changes to public sector financial accounting.
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