Page 2176 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 15 August 2006
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If we do not see a substantial and sustained improvement in net migration and immigration intake, then we will not be able to see the territory’s economy strengthen. We will become completely dependent on the commonwealth for future growth. If they cannot attract skilled labour we run a very real risk of the problem we had back around the time of the Whitlam government: government departments packing up and moving to Melbourne and elsewhere.
MR STANHOPE (Ginninderra—Chief Minister, Treasurer, Minister for Business and Economic Development, Minister for Indigenous Affairs and Minister for the Arts) (4.46): I am very happy to contribute to this debate today on the strength of the ACT economy and the ACT job market. We have had evidence just in this last week, in the context of the unemployment figures, of the strength of the economy. As I indicated earlier in question time, there are a whole raft of indicators that give an indication, I guess, of the strength of the boom which the ACT economy is currently experiencing.
Mr Mulcahy, the shadow Treasurer, beseeches us to give due recognition to the commonwealth while failing to give any recognition to the ACT government at all. Is this not an interesting aspect of politics? We are in a boom; we have the record highest surplus under the Australian accounting standard ever; we have had five consecutive surpluses under my government. People tend to forget that the Liberal Party, when it came to power, delivered four consecutive deficits. Mr Mulcahy would never concede the history of the Liberal Party, his party, in government—four consecutive deficits under the Australian accounting standard. That is the legacy. This is the strength, the capacity and the history—
Mr Gentleman: Would that not have been under GFS?
MR STANHOPE: Yes, that is right. We see this amazing turnaround today. Four consecutive deficits were the Liberal Party’s introduction to the Australian accounting standard—its history and the legacy that it bequeathed—as against five consecutive surpluses under my government, including the highest surplus of $176 million delivered in the last financial year and the second highest surplus of $153 million delivered in 2003.
It is quaint that Mr Mulcahy today beseeches us, almost painfully in a sense, to give credit to John Howard and Peter Costello—that this is essentially about them. A couple of those early deficits, those four consecutive deficits, were also under John Howard and Peter Costello. There is the rub, of course. We are today beseeched to give credit to the federal government for these incredibly good times we are experiencing in the territory, but we were not asked to reflect at all on the contribution of the federal government to the four consecutive deficits which the Liberal Party delivered in government.
It is an interesting contrast, but it is part of the argy-bargy and is what we would expect and what we have come to expect. They are pleased to give all the credit to the federal Liberal government for the enormously successful economy and environment here in the territory but they give absolutely no credit to the ACT government. They give the Liberal government, when it was the ACT government, credit for every good indicator. That is what he is doing. That was not the result of decisions taken by the commonwealth. That
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