Page 4342 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 13 October 2009
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actually do that, we then look at the viability of a particular type of hot-water system and try to match the most energy-efficient one we can for that particular building. We cannot move a building on its block to face the thing north. Sometimes buildings can take solar hot water; then that is an option for us. Sometimes it is instantaneous gas hot water and sometimes the option is to replace an electric or gas system on the outside of the premises. It is a site-specific decision that I leave to the experts within the department.
MR SPEAKER: Ms Hunter, a supplementary question?
MS HUNTER: Thank you. Have any bulk purchases of solar hot-water heaters been made for ACT Housing properties?
MR HARGREAVES: We do not have a warehouse full of heaters, if that is what Ms Hunter might feel. What we actually do have is a series of contracts in place where we can pick a particular product to suit a particular solution for a particular problem within one of the dwellings.
For example, if there is an electric heater that has turned its toes up and we want to get another one, we have a contract we then invoke and then replace that heater with an upgraded one at the moment. It may be that we then decide that to replace that electric heater with another electric heater is not a crash-hot idea altogether, but we then look at the other appliances within the household and see how we can match that with a gas appliance, for example. We have a contract that we can access that then purchases that particular product. So we do not have a contract which says, “You will buy X units.” This is my understanding, and I believe that I am right. It enables us to buy a particular unit to match a particular problem.
Taxation—GST payments
MR HANSON: My question is to the Treasurer. Treasurer, following the release of the draft report from the Commonwealth Grants Commission on the methodology by which GST revenue is allocated between the states, some estimates have been prepared that show that the ACT could lose up to $60 million in annual revenue. Treasurer, what analysis have you made of the commission’s proposals and what are the outcomes from that analysis?
MS GALLAGHER: I see the opposition have just blindly accepted a media statement from the New South Wales Treasurer as being the potential loss to the GST. I think it is important that we deal with the facts here. The facts that I accept on this one are the facts coming from the ACT Treasury, which has been involved in this review for the past five years.
Mr Hanson: That is the question, yes.
MS GALLAGHER: Well, if you had listened to my answer to the previous question, you would have heard that the estimate of potential losses to the ACT is in the order of $40 million to $50 million. Submissions have closed in terms of final submissions from state and territory jurisdictions; they closed on about 2 October. You will find those submissions on the Commonwealth Grants Commission website, if you are at
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