Page 875 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 16 March 2010
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with the Green members of the Assembly to talk through the budget and priority items for this year, and indeed individual ministers are identifying priority items for this year’s budget, and that will mean potentially that some of those things that we would have liked to have done this year will not be being done this year. That is just in the context of the envelope that we have got available to us for a new spend in this budget.
Discussions are underway. But I would not rate—I do not think there has been any talk of a ranking of who is more important than whom. It has just been a generally mature discussion at this point in time. You guys were not involved—that is why it is mature.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Smyth, a supplementary?
MR SMYTH: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Treasurer, how long will the promises that you delay be delayed for?
MS GALLAGHER: I cannot answer that at this point in time as none of those decisions have been made. But if we do make decisions about putting some commitments on hold, we will be very clear about when we believe we will be able to implement them. That would be part of the announcement.
MR HARGREAVES: A supplementary question.
MR SPEAKER: Yes, Mr Hargreaves.
MR HARGREAVES: Thank you very much. In the context of the budget promises and outcomes, has the Treasurer invited the opposition to give a list of savings options they may consider appropriate?
MS GALLAGHER: Thank you, Mr Hargreaves. We certainly invited—and indeed in this place I have invited them a number of times—the opposition to be involved in the budget, in putting forward a budget submission or indeed in having any briefings they would like about the budget. But at this point in time the opposition have declined, or have not pursued, any of those offers to get involved. Every time we talk about savings, the Liberal Party go, “But we had all these savings identified before the election two years ago.” But the problem that they do not go on to state is that those savings were to pay for their outrageous spending in the election. It was not actually to pay for anything new; it was just to cover the drunken spending routine that went on as part of the Liberals’ failed—remember that—election campaign.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Seselja, a supplementary?
MR SESELJA: Minister, given your track record of breaking election promises, what confidence can the people have in any promises that you might make in future?
MS GALLAGHER: I am not sure what election promises were broken but the people of Canberra have elected this government a number of times now. I believe some of that has to do with the fact that they believe in us more than they believe in you. And
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