Page 1274 - Week 04 - Thursday, 8 May 2014
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Regarding the validity of the terms of reference, clause 6 of the bill aims to fix the problem with the following:
To remove any doubt, the terms of reference have effect, and are taken always to have had effect, for all purposes as if a period was specified in the terms of reference.
“I got it wrong, I now have to legislate to make it right.”
Regarding the validity of the water and sewerage price direction, clause 7 of the bill aims to fix the problem with the following:
To remove any doubt, the water and sewerage price direction has effect, and is taken always to have had effect, for all purposes as if a period was specified in the terms of reference.
Of course the Treasurer got this wrong.
Regarding the validity of the period set out by the ICRC for determination, clause 8 of the bill offers the following:
To remove any doubt, an industry panel review of the water and sewerage price direction may determine the regulatory period in which the direction, or a new price direction substituted for the direction, is effective.
Would it not have been simpler if the Treasurer had put the period in?
This is the gist of it: the price determination is valid because the Treasurer says it is so. End of discussion. So if there is a disagreement, pass laws to make your version right, instead of following the time-honoured process of, if necessary, taking it through the courts.
You can be a bit cynical about this. Perhaps soon the government will be moving legislation in this chamber to validate their pet projects, like light rail, to be good because they say it is so. Maybe Mr Corbell will introduce a bill to make it legally valid that there is no bullying in the ESA because he says so. In fact, there is almost a cynical exercise in the priority projects bill. “We will make these projects priority and we will do them anyway because we simply want to.”
The truth is, this price determination, as handled by the Treasurer, has thus far been nothing short of a fiasco, another train wreck from Andrew Barr in the long tradition of land rent, which we have now had to attempt to fix several times, extension of time, which we have now had to legislate for because they got it wrong in the first place—and I have no doubt that we will be back—and of course now the ICRC price determination train wreck.
The government’s poor management of ACTEW, even with the Treasurer and Chief Minister as key shareholders, has led to dividends to the territory being revised downwards by approximately $121 million over four years, and income tax
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