Page 2841 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 13 August 2013
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made to the people of the ACT in October last year, and for those commitments to start rolling out.
That is what the people of the ACT expect. They do not expect this parliament to sit around and navel-gaze about whether the opposition is ready or not to debate the most important bill on the sitting calendar. We all know—and thank you, Mr Coe, for enlightening us again today—that the Liberals do not like capital metro. We know that, so thanks again for that contribution. But that is not a reason to delay the budget: Mr Coe does not like capital metro and Mr Smyth does not like tax reform; therefore the budget should not proceed. We have had those debates, and that is why we are on this side of the chamber and you are on the other side of the chamber.
The debate has been had in October, and more than 50 per cent of the population voted for capital metro and tax reform, and that hurts. We know you have not really come to grips with it, but those are the facts. We are here ready to make the appropriation debate occur, have the budget pass, and deliver on what we need to deliver on to the people of the ACT.
Mr Smyth will also say, “But it has no material impact at all because supply keeps going. You can keep doing what you need to do.” Well, no; it does not allow us to do that. It allows for a continuation of some appropriation, as detailed in the Financial Management Act, up to a certain point, but it does not allow us to implement the new initiatives that are contained in the budget—important new initiatives like seven per cent growth in health funding to allow us to open extra beds, staff those beds and create new services; extra money going to government and non-government schools; extra support for people with a disability to actually get the care that they need. These are the priorities that we have put.
A significant capital spend to allow confidence in our local economy at a time when we have businesses letting us know that they want the ACT government to continue to invest in the local economy and ensure that confidence is maintained: that is what this budget does. And that is what the spoilers, the wreckers, delayers and the distracters over there do not want to see happen.
We know why you do not want to see it happen, because you do not actually want us to get on with our agenda. We understand that. That is the game we play in this house. But we are ready to get on with it. There is no reason to delay, and there is absolutely no reason for the Assembly to support this no-confidence motion today.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (11.42): I will not be supporting this motion today. I think what this motion really speaks to is the fact that the Liberal Party disagree with the budget and the policies contained in it. That is their position. That is fair enough and that will be discussed in the course of the next few days as we debate the appropriation bills. I think it is fair to say that the budget has a considerable process of scrutiny already in place. We had the in-principle debate back in June when the budget was tabled. We had considerable media discussion. We have, of course, had the estimates process and we have had some reflection on that in the past week as well. We have now got the 16 hours of debate set aside over the coming days for the scrutiny of the budget. I think that those are matters that are to be debated.
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