Page 1724 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 4 June 2014
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extraordinary claim that she wanted honest debate on the big issues. We used to have an honest debate on the big issues; it used to be the breakfast that the Canberra Business Council ran. But the Treasurer went to the council and said: “I am not coming if they are coming. If you want me there for an honest debate, I want an honest debate with myself.” He is afraid of the public criticism, because he knows that, in most years, the day after the budget, the budget died when it was put under critical analysis by the opposition. If you want to have a debate with yourself, go for your life, but you are not being honest with the people of the ACT.
Let me go to Mr Corbell again. If he blew the GDE out by about four times, what will he blow out capital metro by? Those opposite are letting Mr Corbell run this project. He has never delivered a project on time. I saw an email yesterday that spoke about Edinburgh, which is relatively the same size as the ACT. It just did a light rail; it is about half the size of what they promised and it is about double the cost.
On Mr Corbell’s record alone, people should be very wary of things like capital metro. He has never delivered anything on time. I asked him in estimates to name a project he had delivered on time, on budget, on scope. There was silence. He later gave me a list—most of which were projects that I had started, but such is life. With capital metro and with this budget, who will be left holding the debt? Who will be left holding the liabilities? It is the taxpayer of the ACT. At the Tuggeranong Community Council meeting last night, people were not particularly impressed about the sorts of numbers that were being thrown around; they wanted to know how it was going to be paid off.
We talk about a transformational budget, but the government does not tell us what they are transforming the ACT from and to. The problem that we have, for those of us who sat here for many years and listened to Ted Quinlan’s lecture on the budget cycle, is that yes, there is boom and there is bust. We all know that that is what happens in economies. Sometimes it is our fault; sometimes it is the fault of external circumstances.
The problem here is that I get a sense that this is a government waiting for the public sector to pick up again. They have said, for instance, that, for the 6½ thousand jobs that are going, they have a $150,000 fund for all of those public servants that want to go from the public sector into the private sector. What does that work out to be with 6½ thousand jobs?
Mr Wall: I think it is about $18 a head.
MR SMYTH: It is about $18 a head. Altogether, it is $18 a head. That is a coffee and a croissant with your career adviser. That is all it is.
Mr Barr: So all 6½ thousand jobs are coming next year, are they?
MR SMYTH: I do not know.
Members interjecting—
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