Page 317 - Week 01 - Thursday, 16 February 2012
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The challenge for Mr Barr when he gets up—and I do not think he addressed this when we debated this on Tuesday—is to have any credibility on this issue. Mr Barr has sought to distance himself from this decision. He has sought to blame Katy Gallagher, and fair enough; I think it is primarily Katy Gallagher’s fault. I think she bears a greater share of the responsibility for this debacle than does Mr Barr. But Mr Barr is part of that cabinet. He is one of the ministers who has been responsible at various times and he has to now take responsibility for these falsehoods. But the challenge for Mr Barr when he gets up is to say whether he still believes that if they were to go ahead and build that building they would save $34 million a year. Does he believe that or not? If he does believe it, you would have to ask the question: why are you walking away from it if you are going to get this amazing saving of $34 million a year? If he does not believe it, why did they tell porky pies to the electorate? Why did they come and mislead the community time and time again with this fictitious figure?
That is the question for Mr Barr, and we know the answer. He will not answer it—because he is condemned either way, isn’t he? And that is the problem when you make things up as you go along. You are condemned either for telling falsehoods before or you are condemned now for walking away from a too-good-to-be-true project that would make taxpayers millions of dollars.
In fact they haven’t they told us that the reason they cannot do it is that they need the money for other things? But if you were making money from it, you could use it to subsidise all sorts of other services—$34 million a year extra to spend on all sorts of services. Wouldn’t that be wonderful? If only it were true, but it is not. That is the credibility problem the government has.
There are some other quotes from the previous Treasurer and the current Treasurer. Ms Gallagher said:
I think this is perhaps the most scrutinised infrastructure project that I have had anything to do with.
And:
Treasury have been very involved in this project, particularly around the financial analysis of the project and being a part of the work that was done about determining the best way forward in terms of the decisions taken around the financing of this project. So, yes, Treasury have been very involved.
But she is now saying Treasury was wrong. Otherwise you would not be walking away. So she is saying that Treasury got it wrong. Why did they get it so wrong? Is it because they were directed to by the government? Who was actually making these judgements that you should put out these false numbers to justify your position?
Mr Barr said that the government office block was the best value for money for ACT taxpayers and the proposed strategy was the best way to provide ACT public servants with appropriate and safe workplaces. Do you still believe that? Does he still believe that? Mr Barr said, “The government office block is the best value for money for ACT taxpayers,” and now he is saying that it is not. So either he was not telling the truth
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