Page 1517 - Week 04 - Thursday, 25 March 2010
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
Mrs Dunne: And after a minute or more, there has been no reference to the payroll or the increase in payroll.
MR SPEAKER: On the contrary, Mrs Dunne, I think the question was about public service staff costs and the Treasurer is speaking to public service staff costs.
MS GALLAGHER: I have gone to superannuation costs, which are directly linked to staff costs, which have had an impact on the budget. The budget plan of last year indicated that the budget would grow, and would need to grow, because of the demand for growth in particular services. If you look at where the staffing impacts have grown the most, they have been in key areas of government service delivery—in health, in education, this year in relation to JACS, in relation to the Alexander Maconochie Centre. They are all key areas of government service delivery.
The flipside of the question to the opposition would be: of the additional staff in ACT Health, which ones do they not support the employment of? Of the 190 additional staff in the Department of Education and Training, how many of those did they not support the employment of?
We have acknowledged from the beginning—indeed, it is one of the reasons why we have a seven-year plan—that it is unreasonable to expect that the ACT budget will not grow. It will, because of demand for services and because of key government policy decisions from implementing our election commitments. All of those will contribute to growth in the budget. The challenge for the government is to balance that growth in terms of guiding the overall sustainability of the budget into the long term, which is exactly what the seven-year plan is about.
If the opposition do not support the seven-year plan, and I have heard them say a number of times that they do not, and they want to see the budget return to surplus as soon as possible, I suggest they come up with an idea about when they would like to see that, and then they could outline the cuts they would like to see the government deliver.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Seselja, a supplementary question?
MR SESELJA: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Treasurer, under your staff recruitment freeze, the document that you tabled on 16 March says it is preferable that staff numbers fall. How much of the $120 million are you aiming to recoup as a result of the staff freeze?
MS GALLAGHER: As members would be aware, under the budget plan the government has outlined an unallocated savings task in the order of $20 million—$24 million. That is the money that we will be seeking to allocate in savings this year.
MR SPEAKER: Supplementary question, Mr Smyth?
MR SMYTH: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Treasurer, do you stand by your $10 million a month strategy for the last 12 months?
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video