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The Hon. M.J. ELLIOTT: I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Treasurer a question about services and supplies.
Leave granted.
The Hon. M.J. ELLIOTT: Yesterday I asked a question of the Treasurer on this matter, and in particular I brought to his attention the services and supplies line within the Estimates Statement which indicated an increase last year from the budget estimate to the final estimated result of some $328 million in expenses. In his reply to me the Treasurer said:
I am advised that almost two-thirds of this increase—$190 million—is a reclassification of expenditure and accounting treatment which is different from 1998-99. I point out that it related to the accounting treatment of administering the sale of Cooper Basin gas and that it was there as both expenditure and revenue lines. When one examines the 1999-2000 budget portfolio statements under `Administered items' for the Department of Primary Industries and Resources, the $190 million appears there, and I note that it also appears for 1998-99 both within the original budget estimates and the estimated results. If one goes back to the same documentation for the previous year, one sees that that $190 million appears again. Certainly it has not suddenly emerged as a new treatment within the portfolio statements. I ask the Treasurer: what is it about the treatment of the budget that has led to his claim that there has been a differential treatment and therefore the $190 million was not shown in the original budget estimates for 1998-99? I did telephone his department to get an explanation of this.The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: I know that a member of your staff did. I am delighted that the honourable member is showing continuing interest in this. As I indicated yesterday, my officers and I are only too happy to assist staff working for the honourable member in their understanding of not only this provision of the budget papers but also any other provision on which we can reasonably assist. I will willingly take up the issue with senior Treasury officers and bring back a reply for the honourable member as soon as I can.
Read the Government's Reply: 7 July 1999