Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Water Resources) Share this | Hansard source

No, this is an estimate. As you know, in any set of forward estimates there are some unders and overs throughout. But we are not limiting ourselves to those items. I have to say—and you see this with the Australian Government Water Fund projects—that there are projects for which we committed the money several years ago now where the full funds have not been drawn down. That is not due to any lack of preparedness to write the cheque; it is simply that the project has not advanced. These big water projects are long and laborious and they invariably take time. That is why, inevitably in a program of this kind, the expenditure will ramp up from low levels in the earlier years to higher levels in the later years.

In terms of the freedom of information request, that has been answered comprehensively elsewhere. The decision was taken, as you know, Mr Deputy Speaker, by a senior official in the department. It was not a political decision. The answers to the honourable member’s questions are set out in the response from the department.

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