Gary Humphries (ACT, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The debate on the Governor-General’s speech has centred, quite appropriately, on measures that the new government is taking to manage the economy. It has also touched on the question of how it intends to fight inflation. Putting to one side the scepticism which many in this chamber and elsewhere would no doubt feel about the Labor Party’s ability to follow through on a policy such as this, it is important for us to focus on one omission from those plans that were outlined to this chamber. What we did not hear about was the government’s two per cent increase in the efficiency dividend. When we consider the way in which that efficiency dividend is impacting on programs all over Australia and all across the spending programs of the Commonwealth government, it is not surprising to find a lack of transparency evident about that particular issue.

The two per cent efficiency dividend is applied to almost all Commonwealth government departments. It will strip away Public Service jobs, gut public programs and research at our valuable national institutions and bin dozens of major projects already approved and funded—I emphasise that they are already funded—by the former coalition government. What the government’s program did not tell us about was how the government’s ‘slash first and ask questions later’ approach would damage communities around Australia, and nowhere more so, may I say, than here in the Australian Capital Territory. They were light on detail, I suspect, because they were unclear themselves as to how these initiatives would impact on individual programs and services delivered to the Australian people.

We saw some evidence of that in the fiasco last week and earlier this week surrounding the mooted cancellation of carer payments and seniors bonuses, one way of saving money which turned out to be a bit of a disaster. So back to the drawing board they go. Let us see what else they can find to meet these very impressive savings targets and think subsequently about how they will impact on the Australian people.

I want to put on the record some of the effects of the government’s scorched earth approach to savings. Let us start with Australia’s national institutions—the great collecting and research facilities which protect, preserve and promote Australian culture and history. The work of these institutions is absolutely invaluable, for without them we would have no collective record of our past achievements, no way of furthering our understanding of Australia’s past and present, and no way of encouraging culture, arts and learning in the future. Despite this, it was revealed in recent budget estimates hearings that every major institution in Australia will see its budget cut back by this government’s razor gang—no regard for their capacity to sustain such cuts and no allowance made for their needs to see through the important programs that each operates.

The National Gallery of Australia, which is responsible for preserving and promoting the largest art collection in Australia, not to mention the largest and most comprehensive collection of Aboriginal art anywhere in the world, will see over $2.8 million hacked from its budget over the next four years. The National Library of Australia, that great treasure trove of Australian literature, research and knowledge, will suffer a cut of over $3.8 million. The National Museum of Australia, the brainchild of Paul Keating and something of a cause celebre for Labor over the past 15 years, will see its budget slashed by over $2.6 million. Isn’t it funny? They talked at length about how we needed a national museum but failed to deliver it when in government. It was the coalition government that delivered the National Museum, yet when the Labor Party returned to office one of their first acts is to cut its budget—disgraceful.

Despite what the government seems to think, these institutions already run a very tight ship in terms of their funding. None would say, privately or publicly, that they have money sloshing around, unused, in their budgets. I doubt that there would be a single inch of ‘bureaucratic fat’ to be found among them. This means that the government’s budget cuts will actually be carving into the flesh and blood of these institutions—their public programs, research and collecting capabilities, and their touring programs. Never mind that cutting these programs and capabilities will affect Australia’s cultural life well into the future. Never mind that this decision will probably cost the government more in the long run when eventually it realises that these institutions are worthy of support and has to spend a fortune bringing them back up to scratch. Apparently making a big show of fiscal restraint is far more important than the long-term wellbeing of Australia’s cultural institutions.

It would be bad enough if these were the only damaging cuts the government planned to make, but they have not stopped there. Let us look also at what is in store for the Australian National Botanic Gardens—our living, breathing museum of Australian flora. As any member who has visited this oasis of green in the middle of Canberra would know, the gardens are home to hundreds of plant species which do not exist outside of Australia, as well as some which do not now exist anywhere outside of the gardens themselves. This facility is one of the key resources used to further our understanding of how climate change will affect Australia’s native plant species, as well as ensuring that threatened and protected species are preserved for the future.

During the election campaign last year, Labor lambasted the former Howard government for supposedly neglecting the gardens. Apparently we had not done enough to preserve their future. Indeed, Labor promised an additional $1.5 million to install urgently needed new pumping and recycling systems to secure its water supply—a very important asset for any gardens, I would have thought.

The reality is that we had not neglected the gardens. We increased their budget year in, year out. The nature of the problem facing the gardens was rising water costs and other expenses, some of them imposed by the ACT government. The gardens saw their utilities bill rise to over $600,000 per year. Nonetheless, it was our responsibility that the gardens were in trouble and we had to fix it. Labor promised $1½ million.

Next we see the phenomenon which Senator Birmingham has already described with respect to, ironically, the national water plan. As was revealed in February’s budget estimates, there was to be a savings measure imposed on the gardens—$2.6 million imposed on the national parks agency, which is responsible for the gardens, and an indeterminate amount to be sustained by the gardens themselves over the next four years—to satisfy the government’s increased efficiency dividend, which, incidentally, they severely criticised at 1¼ per cent in the hands of the Howard government but which now becomes acceptable at 3¼ per cent under the Rudd government. So $1½ million was promised but $2.6 million is taken out the back door. Worse, the $1½ million which we were expecting to be delivered almost immediately we have now been told will not be delivered until at least next year. This is, frankly, despicable.

During the election Labor would have had us believe that the gardens were under imminent threat of extinction without new water infrastructure. Now it seems that not only can the gardens wait indefinitely for that new infrastructure to be delivered but they can also wear big budget cuts when it suits the government’s agenda. In executing this sleight of hand, the Labor Party also went out to a large proportion of the Canberra community, which is very concerned about institutions like the gardens, and no doubt reaped the votes of the people who believed that the representative was going to secure the garden’s future but, instead, has delivered a net reduction in funding to the gardens. I wonder what those people think about that today.

The efficiency dividend is one type of cut this government will be making. In their so-called ‘war on inflation’, they have also deemed it necessary to slash over $643 million in spending for projects already approved and funded by the former coalition government using its budget surplus. We are not talking about election promises here; we are talking about funding which was allocated in the 2007-08 budget or earlier budgets that provide a range of important infrastructure, community and welfare programs, which the community deserves and I think supports.

The prime example of this is some $70 million allocated in May last year for the next stage of capital works to complete Walter Burley Griffin’s vision for our national capital. This money was handed to the National Capital Authority for major works on the Russell roundabout joining Kings Avenue and Parkes Way—a road most members of this house would be familiar with as it ferries them directly to the Canberra airport. This money was also intended to complete major works on Constitution Avenue, in keeping with Griffin’s plan to make it the third arm of the Parliamentary Triangle. Griffin envisioned Constitution Avenue as a wide, European style boulevard where people would live, work and meet and which would finally link the Parliamentary Zone to Canberra’s civic heart. But this will not happen now for at least some time because on 8 February the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, Lindsay Tanner, announced that $46,500,000 would be slashed from the Griffin Legacy works. Just enough funding will be left to complete the works on the Russell roundabout, no doubt making Mr Tanner’s trip to and from the Canberra airport quicker and more comfortable. But the plans for Constitution Avenue’s grand development will be shelved completely.

If Labor had opposed those plans and thought they were a bad idea or a waste of money, I could understand these cuts. But, of course, they did not. They supported the plans when they were announced. Now, apparently, they are dispensable. This is one case where the razor gang has not just pruned back spending a bit; it has cut this project right off at the root and ensured that it will not come to fruition at any time in the foreseeable future.

In a sense, the government has also scattered lime on the remains of the Constitution Avenue project by significantly reducing funding for the agency which was supposed to carry it out—the National Capital Authority. I do not want to bore the house with item after item from the government’s hit list, but the NCA really has been cut off at the knees by this government. Almost immediately upon taking office, the government announced that the NCA would have to shed 33 of its staff and $1.6 million from its budget in this financial year alone. You might think, ‘This is just another government agency; what does it matter if it has to shed a few staff and cut a few dollars?’ Anybody who lives in or visits this city and walks around the Parliamentary Triangle sees the product of the work of the National Capital Authority. That is what is at risk today by virtue of this cut of a third of the entire agency’s staff. It is impossible for cuts of that kind to be sustained without ordinary Australians seeing the legacy of that in the nature, shape and future planning of the Parliamentary Triangle. I dread to think what that will mean for the shape and appearance of our national capital into the future. The ACT Labor government and their federal Labor colleagues have long had a very serious antipathy for the National Capital Authority and this has no doubt precipitated the decision to cut back its budget. But the long-term sustainability of such cuts needs to be understood.

Nor should the cuts already made at the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Australian Bureau of Statistics and Centrelink in Canberra go unremarked, or those at any other agency which is getting the chop in the May budget. It has been indicated to me that some of those opposite think it is a bit hypocritical for my party to criticise Public Service cuts given the cutting that was engaged in after the coalition took office in 1996. But those who try to make that argument tend to overlook the fact that there was a very different environment in 1996 to the one that operates today. In 1996 we faced almost $100 billion in national debt, a budget that was $10 billion in deficit and an economy staggering from a recent major recession. We had to find savings in the budget simply to put ourselves back into economic control. After 12 years in government, we have left Labor with exactly the reverse situation. They have inherited a multibillion dollar budget surplus and an economy which has been stimulated by more than a decade of strong economic management. There is just no need for this government to make cuts on the scale being talked about in the media and foreshadowed for the May budget.

I suspect that the government are attempting to show what a strong, fiscally conservative government they are and that the things they will spend money on into the future will be their own work and not the legacy of the former government. A bit of insulation from the budget surpluses of the Howard government is what they are after. It is very clever politics, but it is not clever policy. It is not clever to cut back spending on our national institutions at a time when we have budget surpluses just begging to be reinvested in ways that will benefit the nation. It is not clever to slash Public Service jobs when, according to this government, they have a range of new reforms they want to carry out which will need an experienced, well-resourced Public Service. Cutting of the kind they are talking about now will be counterproductive in that regard. It is certainly not clever to curtail the long-term planning and development of our unique national capital, which just about every previous Australian government has seen fit to invest in, all for the sake of short-term political gain on the part of this government.

This is a government which, despite the legacy it has received from its predecessor, feels the need to slash and burn its way through the federal budget. Balancing budgets is a perfectly honourable thing to do and a perfectly acceptable exercise to engage in, but to do so in a way which damages the fabric of the Australian Public Service and the great national institutions, most of which reside here in the national capital, is a serious mistake. It is particularly dangerous to do so in a way which is indiscriminate. I recall very well the words used by the Labor opposition to describe the 1¼ per cent efficiency dividend that was used by the Howard government. It said the dividend was indiscriminate, unfocused and took out good programs and bad. Now we discover that apparently our mistake was not in having an efficiency dividend but in not having one that was large enough.

I would remind those opposite when they talk about how fiscally conservative they now are that every time we announced a new spending program, every time we put money into new areas in health, education, national institutions, bonuses for seniors or carers et cetera, they welcomed that spending. They said it was a good thing. Often they said it came too late or, in fact, it was not enough. That was the general criticism that was made. But we are now told, almost in the same breath, that we were spending too much. Well, that is an issue and a challenge for the government to face. It can face it any way it wants. But I say to the government: if you want to make cuts which impact on the fabric of the Australian Public Service and the integrity of Australia’s national institutions, you will have this senator to deal with and this issue will not be let rest until those cuts and that damage are made good.