Page 1923 - Week 06 - Thursday, 8 June 2006
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different overheads and structures here. When you get behind a lot of the rhetoric you realise that, in fact, even to be on an equal footing we should be taxed at a lower level, given the changed level of administrative structures that have to be met by the ACT taxpayer.
The fact of the matter, and the reason behind this bill being rushed in, is that the Treasurer is crying poor because the government has run the ACT budget into the ground over the past four years and finally this has caught up with him. I love the way we are told, “Oh, shadow Treasurer, we are now going to GFS.” There would not be a person in this Assembly who has not heard me advocate that for 18 months.
My fellow members on the public accounts committee, Ms MacDonald and Dr Foskey, chuckled because I have been on and on about it. Now it is done. It is like the conversion on the road to Damascus: it has come like a bolt out of the blue. We do not hear an acknowledgement that this approach is something that should have been done. We hear “let’s go back to Trevor Kaine, Kate Carnell, Gary Humphries or whoever you can think of, back years ago in this place, and say that this is what happened then.”
Mr Stanhope: What, 2001? Seven years of Liberal government.
MR MULCAHY: Yes, that is right; and it has certainly never been a position I have advocated.
Mr Stanhope: AAS through nine years of Liberal government.
MR MULCAHY: While the rest of the world moved on, the Chief Minister clung to this accounting standard because, gee, it looks good. You read that figure and you go to bed at night saying, “We’re really making money. Just don’t go further into budget paper No 3, though, and look at that GFS,” because that is the one that gives you the chilling figure. That is the one that people like Standard and Poor’s shook their heads on when I met with them.
Mr Stanhope: What? In New York?
MR MULCAHY: Absolutely. It is interesting that the Chief Minister has not spoken to them. I am very pleased with it, unlike you, who have not even picked up the phone to speak to them. They told me what they thought about your wedded relationship with AAS.
Mr Stanhope: Is that right?
MR MULCAHY: Absolutely. They made very clear what they thought about your accounting standard, and they have expressed that in a written form. They have talked about the ACT government’s poor accounting standard and their incapacity to balance the books. Whilst credit will never be given—the former Treasurer echoed the same comment, because all his predictions are pretty well coming true—I am pleased that we are gradually getting our messages through. Sadly, the people of Canberra are now paying the price through new levies. I am just hoping that their memories do not fade in the next two-and-a-bit years because, I can tell you, I will be doing all within my power to make sure the people of Canberra know who has damaged
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