Page 3822 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 4 December 2007
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appropriations for pension payments to ACT judges. We do not have an issue with the payment of pensions or long serivce leave to judges, but it is strange indeed that funding for eventual pension payments, which are well known in advance, are not provided for as part of the budgeted costs of employment.
The government is currently attempting to work its way out of the mess created by an unfunded super scheme for ACT public servants; so you would think that this would be an issue which was on its radar. This was an issue of particular concern in the estimates hearings before the public accounts committee. The Attorney-General sought to explain this appropriation to the committee on the basis that the retirement of a judge is a rare event.
How would you go—Mr Speaker, you know from your background in the union movement—if you went about your business, any business around Canberra, any small shop, and said, “I have only got four or five staff. Why do you want me to budget for annual holidays? Why do you want me to provide for long service leave? Yes, I know that is the law. I know that it says there are punitive measures, but what does it matter? I do not have the money at the moment.” That is what the Attorney-General of this territory wants this parliament to believe. Extraordinary double standards! Every organisation in the private sector provides for long service leave and all other benefits. Yes, everything is provided for.
Mr Stanhope: How does the AHA provide for separation payments?
MR SPEAKER: Order!
MR MULCAHY: Mr Speaker, this is not relevant to this bill.
MR SPEAKER: Members of the government, there is a debate and you will have your chance to contribute to the debate later. Meanwhile, Mr Mulcahy has the floor. I have called you to order several times. Maintain order, please.
MR MULCAHY: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I always know that I am hitting the raw nerve when the Chief Minister has to restort to personal abuse. That is his forte—personal abuse when he is under pressure. It does not work with me, as he knows. I do not know why he wastes his time.
Going back to the issue in question—judges pensions and long service leave—this was an issue of concern to our commitee. As I said, the Attorney-General’s way of digging himself out was to say, “It is a rare event. It does not matter if you break a few rules of accounting standards.” This can handly be an explanation for a failure to fully fund the cost of employment in the first place. We know that, when we employ a judge, the employment will eventually end and that money will be payable at that time. Surely this is something that the government should provide for at the time of employment. It is particularly outrageous that the minister responsible for overseeing law in this territory has another set of standards in relation to the application of law and the attitude towards employment practices when his agency would be the first to rush out and want to persue prosecutions in relation to people who break the law.
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