Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

I share the member for Lalor's disappointment about her important school library which is not being funded. I might add that last Friday in The Area News, the Griffith newspaper, there was a report headed 'Costly Griffith theatre upgrade moved forward'. It said:

COUNCIL has been forced to outlay hundreds of thousands of dollars to refurbish dilapidated seats and unsafe carpet being held together with tape at the Griffith Regional Theatre

Council has been forced to find the refurbishment costs of $321,368, which would revitalise the theatre. That was part of the round 5 RDAF funding, which did not materialise. I could go through the 13 local government areas that I represent—Bland, Carrathool, Coolamon, Griffith, Gundagai, Junee, Leeton, Murrumbidgee, Narrandera, Temora, Tumbarumba, Tumut and Wagga Wagga local government areas—all of which were going to be receiving some $3,225,981 in funding under the Regional Development Australia Fund round 5. Then I could mention the half a million dollars going to Griffith Post School Options as part of round 5B, which also promised half a million dollars to an outreach service at Narrandera. These are all really worthwhile funds. I must admit that I agree with the member for Lalor: I am really disappointed that they are not going to be funded.

But at the start of the member for Lalor's speech she talked about the responsible minister, and that is the difference. I am not quite sure what context she meant, but certainly the minister is very responsible. The reason he is responsible is that you cannot fund things that you do not have the money for, and the whole premise of RDAF rounds 5 and 5B was based on the minerals resource rent tax, which only retrieved a fraction of the money that underpinned Labor's last budget. You cannot just find money that is not there, Member for Lalor.

Ms Ryan interjecting—

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