Page 3036 - Week 08 - Thursday, 25 June 2009
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was not convinced about it. Mr Smyth touched on the issue in relation to the changed attitude now to the encouragement of the private sector. There is now a marked shift between the approach of this Treasurer and previous Labor treasurers, in particular Ted Quinlan. He had a very limited record of success but Ted Quinlan actually did believe that it was a good thing to try and encourage private sector growth in the territory.
Will we always be reliant on the commonwealth? Yes, I think the commonwealth will always play a significant role in the ACT and that comes with a lot of positives for the ACT. But do we want to see a thriving private sector that grows, flourishes, creates jobs, creates diversity of opportunity for our children and creates an expansion of our revenue base? I say yes. The opposition says yes. Most commentators, I think, would say yes. Previous Labor treasurers have said yes. This Treasurer says no.
It is a short-sighted attitude to the economy. It is a short-sighted attitude to management of the budget and the economy when we see the kind of attitude that is displayed by the Treasurer. I think that that kind of attitude will not do a lot for business confidence—essentially downplaying the importance of trying to grow the private sector. I think all governments should look to have settings in place that encourage business, that encourage job creation, that encourage diversity of opportunity. This budget fails that test. It fails the test of having a clear and credible plan and that is why it is a budget that we simply cannot support.
MR COE (Ginninderra) (5.54): I rise to talk on what really is the pretty sorry state of our budget. Let us look at the operating balance that we have here in the ACT: $135 million in 2009-10, $159 million in 2010-11, $211 million in 2011-12 and $205 million in 2012-13. We actually heard today what we already knew: we are actually not going to get into surplus until 2015-16. Isn’t it funny that that ties into another electoral cycle?
Maybe there is a bit of credibility in what the Treasurer has said, that in actual fact an economic cycle is the same as an electoral cycle. It is very interesting that things start to look rosy around election time again, just like they did last year in September. In spite of Lehman Brothers collapsing in early September, we still had spending announcements, we still had the ignorance from the Treasurer and the government about the world’s situation.
However, now they keep recalling how early it struck, how it has been affecting the ACT for the last six months or so and it has brought us into this terrible situation. Yet, at the time when it was all happening, at the time when we were getting all the early indicators, the government did nothing at all.
In contrast, look at Western Australia and at what the coalition government is doing there. In actual fact they are doing things to stimulate the economy, especially in the business sense. They are cutting payroll tax. They are actually creating an incentive for businesses to employ people, not to lay people off. Do we have that kind of initiative here in the ACT? What has the Treasurer put down? What tangible, structural changes has the Treasurer put in place to make it easier to do business in the ACT, to make it better in the ACT to do business?
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