Page 2913 - Week 08 - Thursday, 17 August 2017
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the Assembly exactly how the triple bottom line assessment takes into account the impact of policies on women?
MR BARR: The government in the budget deliberation process seeks from directorates and ministers detailed business cases for the preparation of budget bids. The usual process in for the full budget year—that is, a year that is not interrupted by an election—is for there to be a two-stage process of assessment of budget bids. Obviously with the territory election occurring in October last year and the new government not being formed until November, work on the 2017-18 budget was necessarily truncated. That meant a single-pass process for assessment of business cases.
In many instances the cabinet-level discussion also focused on the impact of policies on women, on other groups and minorities within the territory population, particularly as it related to polices and measures in support, for example, of Indigenous Canberrans, LGBTI Canberrans, Canberrans from a multicultural background, recently arrived migrants, for example. There is a range of filters that cabinet considers in addition to what would traditionally be a two-stage business case assessment process.
MS LE COUTEUR: Treasurer, given the broad answer you have given to my question, were other groups’ impact statements, not necessarily minority groups, provided for any budget measures? If so, for those budget measures—only that were successful, obviously—would you be able to table them for the benefit of the Assembly?
MR BARR: No, I cannot table matters associated with cabinet decisions. They would ultimately be tabled in the context of freedom of information or the release of cabinet documents after a certain period of time. Clearly, the public communication of such initiatives, their descriptors within the budget papers, the examination of particular initiatives in the context of estimates and other processes would certainly bring forward those issues for public debate.
Often a ministerial media release or detail behind a policy that would then be found on a directorate website or associated with public communication of an initiative would, I am sure, reveal some of the information that the member is seeking. But I would not make it a practice to release budget business cases in the context of the request from the member.
Government—building materials policy
MS LAWDER: My question is to the Minister for Planning and Land Management. On 12 August 2015 you advised the Assembly that the CMFEU was helping to raise industry awareness regarding the use of cladding on ACT government buildings, a product you described a “defective” and “not fit for purpose”. You also noted a 2014 fire in Melbourne in which:
…a not fit for purpose cladding material was used on the side of a building and something like 15 storeys of fire raced up the side of the building, because of the improper use of the material …
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