Page 4057 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 26 November 2014
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supported, are not left in the dark and know they can count on this government to help them through these very hard times. The ACT government believes the buyback and demolition scheme is the only way to conquer the Mr Fluffy issue once and for all.
Unfortunately, this scheme means there will be a minimum cost to the ACT budget in the order of $300 million to $400 million because the commonwealth did not take responsibility, given it was a commonwealth designed scheme. The ACT government will have to bear the costs and bring the community together to help share the expense for those affected by this tragedy. I make it clear to the Assembly that the ACT government will not profit from the buyback scheme. We all need to come together as a community to assist affected families.
The ACT government will continue to do whatever it can to support the ACT economy during hard times and will remain dedicated to the task of ensuring individuals and families are supported and that we continue to have a strong economy and a strong community.
I mentioned the four areas we will be continuing to concentrate on: health, education, public transport and the Mr Fluffy issue. Other members, I am sure, will want to emphasise different aspects of those four areas. I have not had time this morning to go through them all because there is so much this government is doing in all of these areas to maintain a strong economy and to make sure this city remains the most livable city in the whole world. It would take me quite a long time to list them, and I hope my colleagues will add to the list of the great initiatives of this government as we debate this issue this morning and this afternoon.
This government cannot and should not try to do everything by itself. We need to engage with the private sector, with business and construction sectors, to help them maximise opportunities for growth, to help them have vision, to help them make the opportunities we all know this city needs. We need to work with the community sector as well, another large employer of people in the ACT and a partner in many programs that support the most vulnerable in our community.
This is why our investment in the human services blueprint is so important. It enables the ACT government to work together with the community sector to make sure people are receiving the right service at the right time in the right place. I commend all those who have been involved in the directorate to bring this blueprint together. I believe the trial of the blueprint in west Belconnen will be extremely successful, and I am hopeful the blueprint will be run out across the ACT.
It is only by working together as a whole community that we can meet the challenges the commonwealth has thrown up for all of us. Therefore, I call on the ACT government to continue to make strong representations to the commonwealth to ask them to resist any other attempts to make further direct funding cuts to the territory or to transfer commonwealth public sector jobs from the ACT to other places. I think we would all agree that what they have been doing to this point has been a retrograde step, and I call on the government to make every attempt to ensure the damage being done to the territory by the commonwealth ceases. I commend the government for everything it is doing to make sure we continue to grow jobs in the ACT and to ensure our economy remains strong.
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