Page 1777 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 4 May 2011
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We do accept, of course, that the road has had its moments. There has been the odd controversy or two that has beset the project. We acknowledge that. But at the end of the day it is a magnificent road. It is a magnificent piece of infrastructure. It serves now, and it will serve into the future, the people of the ACT extremely well.
There is something of an irony, though, about a Liberal member of this Assembly putting forward a motion on the GDE the day after budget day. Of course, this coincides with the events of exactly 11 years ago when Gary Humphries, I think as Treasurer, first tabled a budget bid or a budget intention in relation to the GDE and outlined the Liberal Party’s proposals for the GDE.
I did interject, inappropriately of course, a minute ago that the Liberals intended that the GDE in its passage through Bruce Ridge be accompanied by a couple of tunnels. I do not know whether Mr Coe or any other members of the Liberal Party have actually costed tunnels. There were to be tunnels straight through Bruce Ridge. The GDE, as envisaged by the then Liberal Treasurer, replete with tunnels through Bruce Ridge, was to cost $35 million. What a joke!
It was a cost or an estimate that the Liberal Party Treasurer at the time knew was nonsensical, knew was absurd. It actually, I think, is consistent with that other quite incredible omission that was contained within that last Liberal budget. It was a budget that was delivered by a party that knew it would not have to implement—
Mr Smyth interjecting—
MR STANHOPE: That it would not have to implement the budget—
Mr Smyth: We had another one after that.
MR STANHOPE: No, no, you did not. No, you did not.
Mr Smyth interjecting—
MR SPEAKER: Order, members!
MR STANHOPE: Of course, in that particular budget, in their last budget, the Liberal Party actually made absolutely no provision for wages. I think the most significant of the budget shocks we received on coming into government was that within the bottom line absolutely no provision was made for salaries. You can imagine that the most dodgy budgeting and dodgy budget lines related most particularly to nurses. There were negotiations proceeding at the time for a 14 per cent increase, and the negotiations were quite extended. I think the bid that was on the table that was being negotiated around was 14 per cent. When we came to look at the negotiating position that the then government adopted in relation to nurses, I think they were negotiating a pay rise probably over three years—
Mr Smyth: Relevance, Mr Speaker.
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