Page 3828 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 4 December 2007
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
But this government’s refusal to release the Costello report, the report that was the premise for last year’s horror budget, is the act for which its infamy will live on in the minds of the people of the ACT for many years to come. The report still has not been released. We are still seeing the effects of it despite the government’s horribly incorrect forecasting of actual revenue into the territory.
It is painfully obvious. This second appropriation bears testimony to what we were talking about in estimates earlier this year when we were quizzing the government on why its estimates were so wrong. The government was denying some of that. It denied and tried to make fools of the Property Council and certain other groups who were saying, “You are going to end up with about an extra $200 million more than you have budgeted for.” Guess what: that is exactly what happened. The horror budget of 2006-07 was horribly wrong. Is there any relief in sight for the people of Canberra? No, there is not, because this government’s horribly wrong budget for 2006-07 and its revenue forecasting failures have done little more than just feed what is an indulgent spending frenzy in some instances.
There are some good points in this budget.
Mr Corbell: You supported them all.
MR STEFANIAK: I will come to that soon. Mr Corbell, there are some good initiatives in your portfolio which I will come to. I will give credit where credit is due. But let us go to page 4 of the estimates report. I thank the public accounts committee for a pretty thorough report in a very quick series of hearings. I say well done to that committee. There are some good recommendations.
On page 4, at 1.8, the committee makes the obvious note that the bill was introduced approximately 2½ months after the first appropriation bill was passed. The Treasurer stated that this bill was possible because of changes to revenue that became apparent after the budget process had been finalised. For about the last five years we have said that the budget constantly underestimates how much it gets. Even if you are conservative—and I do not mind that at all—you are still grossly underestimating what you get. I do not know if you will ever get it right. The report goes on to say:
This revenue included an estimated $20.1 million in additional GST revenue due to population increases and an increase in the overall size of the GST pool.
Further, it says in relation to additional revenue from conveyancing fees that the June year-to-date actual revenue was $231 million compared to the estimated outcome of $198 million, and that that was also available due to a buoyant housing market. We have had a buoyant housing market for several years. It looks as though it may continue. Watch out for the Rudd government cuts to the public service, but it still looks as though it could continue. It is not rocket science to listen to groups like the Property Council—people who are in the business, who know what they are doing and who can make these estimates a lot more accurately than the ACT government can.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .