Page 1735 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 1 April 2009
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the Treasurer stands up and makes the budget speech. That timing is very much in the hands of the executive and it really comes down to a judgement as to what is reasonable. And governments of both persuasions, for many years, have asserted that around a couple of hours before question time, a couple of hours before the Treasurer makes the budget speech, is a reasonable period of time. The Treasurer has outlined what I think is a very reasonable approach, consistent with the practice of governments, past and present, to provide the information before the Treasurer stands up.
But it is important to remember that straight after the Treasurer gives the budget speech the Assembly adjourns. And why does the Assembly adjourn? The Assembly adjourns to allow members to more comprehensively digest what has just been said in the budget speech. I think we have to have regard to those issues.
I absolutely agree that it is important that non-executive members, in particular opposition and crossbench members, get a copy of the budget papers and the other information before the Treasurer stands up. That is important. But I think it is a bit of mythmaking on the part of the Leader of the Opposition to assert that there was previously an incredibly generous regime and then that has changed under the Labor government. That is not the case. That is simply not the case.
The practice of the Carnell government was exactly the approach that was proposed by the Treasurer in her comments earlier in this debate—provision of those papers during the luncheon break on budget day on an embargo basis. There is nothing dramatic about that. I think we need to have a little less myth and a little more accurate understanding of what has been the practice in this place in the past.
MR SMYTH (Brindabella) (6.32), in reply: It is probably most worrying when Simon the reasonable appears to dispel the evil of the opposition and to reweave the fabric of the Treasurer’s speech so that he could cast the blanket of doubt over everything and say, “Just be calm and trust me.” We know Mr Corbell very well. He is the only member of this place to be admonished four times by the Assembly and people should look at his record before they take anything he says as the truth.
As happens so often, out comes the spin and the misrepresentation. At no stage, for instance, did Mr Seselja say there used to be very generous access to the budget. But it was better than it was last year. Last year there was no briefing and the budget boxes turned up incredibly late because the government forgot to send them out. Their excuse was “we forgot”. We rang every half hour to find out where they were but the government forgot to send them out. Mr Corbell can write his own minutes but that is all they are; they are illusions in Mr Corbell’s mind.
I go back to what I said earlier. No-one has said what is unreasonable about it being given to us at 11 o’clock. What is unreasonable about that? No-one has said that. Ms Gallagher starts with, “Nobody gets it early,” yet we have a full day’s briefing, a full day lockup in the federal parliament, a full day to come to grips with it, a full day to understand it. New South Wales gets it relatively early. South Australia gets it an hour and a half before it is delivered. Ms Gallagher said, “You will be surprised.” I was surprised.
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