Page 398 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 14 February 2017
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area. We will continue to care for the vulnerable, we will continue to be the most inclusive community in Australia and we will act decisively in response to issues of immediate need.
Like previous budgets, the 2016-17 budget focused on the themes of health and education, economic growth and diversification, suburban renewal and transport, and livability and social inclusion. The government is already delivering a range of new initiatives announced in that budget, and taken to the election. We will continue these significant investments in order to create jobs, diversify the territory’s economy and support the growth of our community right across the city of Canberra.
The 2016-17 budget review which I have tabled in the Assembly today shows the government is continuing this momentum, and delivering on the services and projects that Canberrans voted so overwhelmingly for. The budget review shows an $85.7 million improvement in the headline operating balance. I note that in the documents I have just tabled for the first six months of the year the government is operating a surplus of $139.7 million. This is a $58.5 million improvement on the year-to-date budget.
We are seeing through the budget review an $85.7 million improvement in the headline operating balance. Economic growth, as measured by gross state product, was 3.4 per cent in the 2015-16 financial year. That was well above the two per cent forecast, and it is representing a continuing trend. The one thing that has been tripling in this economy is the rate of economic growth, and that is something that we on this side of the chamber are very proud of.
It reflects a very strong economic outlook for the territory. Importantly, it shows that the government’s fiscal strategy is working. We are very proud of that fiscal strategy, and we are very proud of the contrast in approaches between what we have delivered in the past three years and what the alternative would have been under a Hanson administration. When we look to the future, a Coe administration would be even more conservative than a Hanson administration, if that is possible—but it is. Mr Coe, in his comments already on economic policy, has demonstrated a very sharp shift to the right as far as the local Liberal Party’s position is concerned.
Further proof of the success of our strategy came from international ratings agency Standard & Poor’s, which reaffirmed the ACT’s AAA long-term and A1+ short-term local currency credit ratings in August last year. I can advise the Assembly that as we progress towards the 2017-18 ACT budget, Canberrans can be assured that we will continue to provide vital funding for health, education, transport and community services. We will continue with our taxation reform plan. We will continue to build a fairer, more sustainable and more equitable revenue base for the territory’s future, one that is based on good public policy principles of moving to the most efficient tax base possible for this jurisdiction.
Building a strong and growing economy that creates jobs is one of the government’s highest priorities, and we will continue to focus on this in this parliamentary term, as well as delivering the infrastructure agenda that we took to the election, the social policy agenda that we took to the election and the progressive agenda for this city that
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