Page 608 - Week 02 - Thursday, 6 March 2008
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
This was a record in investment, which was previously in, I think 1986, at the height of the construction of the new Parliament House.
It took 20 years for the territory to exceed the level of investment in the territory that had represented the previous high. We came off such a height. We had an exceptional year in terms of investment and economic activity—a year that at one level was an aberration, and it is an aberration. It took from 1986 to 2006 to again achieve the sorts of levels of expenditure and state final demand that had been achieved in 1986. It took from 1986 to 2006 to achieve a similar or comparative level of state final demand as had been achieved in 1986. Through that entire period, there had been a decline in that particular statistic or indicator.
The ACT economy is enormously strong. One of the regrets is the way in which this issue has been portrayed or reported as to convey a suggestion that the ACT economy is staggering, that it has hit the wall or is a basket case—some of the emotive language used by others in relation to the state of our economy.
Our economy is strong. You can go to any other indicator of all the economic indicators available. One would have thought that, if one wanted a balanced view of the precise state of an economy—whether it be the ACT economy or any other economy—one would look at the full range of economic indicators available, compare them all across the board and then draw conclusions about the state of the economy.
In terms of economies over the last year, some of them represent—to the extent that they represent growth—growth from a negative; others—as in the case of the ACT—illustrate a change from a record position to a lesser position. That is the case for the ACT. Some other jurisdictions such as Tasmania have gone from a negative a year ago and are now showing four per cent. But they are coming from a long way behind. That is the case with most economies in Australia compared to the ACT’s economy.
Over the last two to three years, the three strongest economies in Australia have been Western Australia, Queensland and the ACT. That remains the case. The boom states of Western Australia and Queensland have been driven by the rapacious China market commodities. In fact, state final demand in Western Australia was just under 10 per cent. State final demand in Queensland was just over seven per cent.
But—accepting that in the December quarter the ACT had the lowest level of increase in growth—the statistic reveals that, even in the December quarter, state final demand continued to grow. The economy was continuing to grow. Year on year, it grew by 3.5 per cent. That is against a national average of five per cent state final demand, affected significantly by the 9.9 per cent achieved by Western Australia and the 7.4 per cent achieved by Queensland.
When you look at what other jurisdictions achieved as against the ACT over the year, you see that the ACT achieved 3.5, the Northern Territory achieved 1.1, Tasmania achieved 4.2, South Australia achieved 2.3, Victoria—the Canberra Times and Access Economics analysis of the state of a stalled ACT budget would have to apply equally to any other jurisdiction that achieved exactly the same result as us—(Time expired.)
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .