Mr MALEY - 2002-08-22
In Budget Paper No 3, it says that your department’s staffing is currently 659. How many of these people do you intend to get rid of, given that at page 160 of the same budget paper, it reveals payment to your employees is being cut from $43m in 2001-02, to $41m in 2002-03, a cut of 4.5%?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the honourable member for his question and I will try not to injure him in my response.
There are no plans. I do not know how many times the opposition needs to be told that. Coming into government, we made a succinct and specific promise to public servants that there would be no forced redundancies, and we have kept that promise. Ever since the election - and, again, it does the opposition no credit to keep rumourmongering that we are going to sack hundreds and thousands of public servants. This is absolutely not the case.
All government agencies have had to secure savings since we came to office, specifically in terms of our deficit reduction strategy, to bring the budget back into surplus in 2004-05.
Mr REED: A point of order, Madam Speaker. The question was very specific, nothing to do with forced redundancies: last year he had X amount and this year he has X amount less for salaries. How many people are not going to have a job?
Madam SPEAKER: There is no point of order. You know the minister can address the answer to the question as he feels fit. Minister, make it relevant to the question.
Mr HENDERSON: Madam Speaker, I can give an absolute, categorical assurance, again, for the people who are suffering from deafness opposite, that there will be no forced redundancies.
Members interjecting.
Mr HENDERSON: I will say it again: there will be no forced redundancies. Unlike the CLP, who went to the infamous ERC cuts, when public servants came to work – and I was a public servant at the time and the instruction was: ‘There is your chart, see if you can find your number on it. If you cannot find your number on it, start planning your future’. That is the way they treated public servants.
We will continue to work with our public service to deliver services for Territorians. This is a great budget. There are no forced redundancies. If this is the only issue that they can pick up on in the budget, to scare public servants that there is some conspiracy to sack and get rid of public servants, well, they have not provided one shred of evidence to that effect, and cannot point to a single public servant who has lost their job as a result of forced redundancy.
Mr Elferink: I can point to 65 vacant positions in one department alone.
Mr HENDERSON: Forced redundancies – not one.
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the honourable member for his question and I will try not to injure him in my response.
There are no plans. I do not know how many times the opposition needs to be told that. Coming into government, we made a succinct and specific promise to public servants that there would be no forced redundancies, and we have kept that promise. Ever since the election - and, again, it does the opposition no credit to keep rumourmongering that we are going to sack hundreds and thousands of public servants. This is absolutely not the case.
All government agencies have had to secure savings since we came to office, specifically in terms of our deficit reduction strategy, to bring the budget back into surplus in 2004-05.
Mr REED: A point of order, Madam Speaker. The question was very specific, nothing to do with forced redundancies: last year he had X amount and this year he has X amount less for salaries. How many people are not going to have a job?
Madam SPEAKER: There is no point of order. You know the minister can address the answer to the question as he feels fit. Minister, make it relevant to the question.
Mr HENDERSON: Madam Speaker, I can give an absolute, categorical assurance, again, for the people who are suffering from deafness opposite, that there will be no forced redundancies.
Members interjecting.
Mr HENDERSON: I will say it again: there will be no forced redundancies. Unlike the CLP, who went to the infamous ERC cuts, when public servants came to work – and I was a public servant at the time and the instruction was: ‘There is your chart, see if you can find your number on it. If you cannot find your number on it, start planning your future’. That is the way they treated public servants.
We will continue to work with our public service to deliver services for Territorians. This is a great budget. There are no forced redundancies. If this is the only issue that they can pick up on in the budget, to scare public servants that there is some conspiracy to sack and get rid of public servants, well, they have not provided one shred of evidence to that effect, and cannot point to a single public servant who has lost their job as a result of forced redundancy.
Mr Elferink: I can point to 65 vacant positions in one department alone.
Mr HENDERSON: Forced redundancies – not one.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016