Page 3170 - Week 07 - Thursday, 30 June 2011
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MS HUNTER (Ginninderra—Parliamentary Convenor, ACT Greens) (2.22 am): I will only make a couple of very brief observations on the Treasurer’s advance. The budget maintains the Treasurer’s advance at 0.75 per cent of total expenditure, a quarter of a per cent lower than the one per cent maximum permitted under the FMA. From the instruments the minister tabled this morning, $21.7 million of the $29 million appropriated for the advance was used this year, and this represents about a $1.5 million reduction from what was spent the year before.
Broadly speaking, that means we are appropriating about $10 million more than we needed in the past couple of years. The Greens can certainly see the logic in having a buffer in the Treasurer’s advance, provided that the Treasurer is frugal in its use. So we are happy to appropriate this amount.
I would like to finish with a couple of final comments just to sum up the Greens’ views on the 2011-12 budget. Certainly it would be different if it was a Greens’ budget. There would be some different priorities, as we wanted to achieve some different outcomes. I hope that throughout the debate we have clearly outlined where those differences lie and what our policy differences are. We would place a greater emphasis on social and environment outcomes, on delivering better transport options with a much longer term view of how Canberrans can sustainably traverse this city.
We are concerned that the budget does not do enough to push us along the path to the legislated greenhouse gas emissions reduction target and prepare our economy for that challenge. We are also concerned that it does not do enough to plan and hopefully prevent the social challenges that are before us.
Those issues noted, there are many positives in the budget and the Greens are very pleased to be responsible for some of those initiatives. We believe these are very tangible initiatives that deliver real value for money. More public housing properties will receive much-needed energy efficiency upgrades, new services will be provided to people with mental illness. There will now be street level recycling in Civic, new and improved cycling and walking paths, better bus services, particularly for people in west Belconnen, and more Canberra kids will now have access to swimming lessons. The Greens are pleased to have secured these outcomes for the community.
Much of the debate has been dominated by the government office building, and our position on that is clear. There are issues that need to be resolved before we commit to the proposed building.
I would like to finish by acknowledging the hard work of all the very dedicated public servants in preparing the budget and for all the information they provided us during the estimates process.
This is a reasonable and prudent budget and we support the overall fiscal position and the plan to return to a balanced budget in 2013-14. We do have some concerns. However, on balance, for the reasons that have been outlined throughout the debate, as I said, we will be supporting this appropriation bill.
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