Page 1409 - Week 06 - Tuesday, 5 June 2007
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We have shaped our bureaucracy to focus our resources more sharply on what matters most—the delivery of priority services to Canberrans.
We have embarked on the creation of a health system that is more affordable, without compromising our great quality and great outcomes. We have embarked on a reinvigoration of our government schools, so that they will, in time, again become the first choice of Canberra families. We have aligned taxes and fees so that they better reflect the real costs of delivering services.
Today I can announce that the budget is in GFS surplus. A surplus one year ahead of schedule. A surplus that maintains Labor’s unbroken record of consecutive surpluses.
Mr Speaker, the budget I present today provides a net operating surplus of $103 million in 2007-08, $51.6 million in 2008-09, $64.3 million in 2009-10 and $101.5 million in 2010-11.
In part, the significant turnaround in the operating balance in 2007-08 is due to some one-off effects. It also reflects increased returns from land development and releases as part of the Government’s affordable housing strategy.
Across the forward years from 2008-09, however, the budget broadly maintains the forward estimates position.
Mr Speaker, a surplus is not a virtue in itself. But it is certainly something governments strive for, particularly at the state and territory level. So much of the revenue-raising capacity of governments has been concentrated in commonwealth hands, particularly over the past decade. For states and territories, surpluses, particularly surpluses over the life of a budget cycle, are evidence of prudence. In the ACT, the results announced today reward a community that has accepted change and absorbed some pain, in return for long-term sustainability.
And, of course, once pain has been endured, it would be folly to squander the gain.
That is why today I announce a budget that takes the territory forward, not backwards. A budget that maintains fiscal restraint while ensuring that the social outcomes this community most desires are heightened, and that spending is maintained in priority areas and the areas that will prove the greatest challenges in the future.
Across the forward estimates period, the government now forecasts a surplus of $320 million. This represents an average of $80 million a year—approximately 2.5 per cent of the annual budget.
These are modest surpluses, but surpluses that provide some buffer against fiscal shocks, unforeseen circumstances and emerging pressures.
They are also surpluses which allow the government to return to the community some of the dividend of the restructures undertaken in last year’s budget.
Today’s budget provides for new recurrent spending of $91.3 million over the next
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