SHARED SERVICES

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite—Leader of the Opposition) (14:21): Will the Treasurer assure the house that his shared services savings targets will be met? The Auditor-General has expressed concern about the government's ability to deliver its shared services savings in his report. He states:

Lack of clarity in roles and responsibilities and outcomes leads to failure to control systems, and the potential for non-achievement of benefits realisation.

The Auditor-General goes on to observe that each year since coming to office the government has exceeded its expenses budget by amounts ranging from $184 million to $487 million per annum, an overspend of $2.5 billion on budgeted expenses since the Rann government came to office. The Auditor-General further observes that the integrity of the budget over the next two years depends completely on the government meeting its savings targets and expense control measures.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY (Port Adelaide—Deputy Premier, Treasurer, Minister for Industry and Trade, Minister for Federal/State Relations) (14:22): Mr Speaker, the—

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Out of control, okay. Coming from this lot that has never balanced a budget in their life. We have done six.

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: They never did. The Libs have never balanced a budget in the state's recorded history. But Labor delivers six balanced budgets. Labor delivers a AAA credit rating. Labor is the clear party of choice for South Australians when it comes to financial management. Let me repeat that: the Labor Party in South Australia is the party of choice for South Australians for financial and economic management.

Mr Williams interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: The member for MacKillop, who somehow thinks borrowings are revenue, is waving a bit of paper to say we borrowed to balance our budgets. That is nonsense.

Mr Williams interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: I do not know what you are referring to. Are you referring to net lending, or net operating balance? Anyway, I do not know why I am bothering with the member for MacKillop. He does not understand the terminology. The budget is in balance—strong balance—with a surplus.

Mr Williams interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: For goodness sake! This government does not borrow to meet its recurrent expenditure. It never has, and never will as long as we are in government. It does not borrow to meet its recurrent expenditure. It borrows to invest in capital. And, if you cannot understand that from reading the budget papers, member for MacKillop, you do not know how to read a budget paper.

Mr Williams interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: I do not know why I am bothering, sir. Someone said last night that apparently I let the opposition get under my skin when they question my budget. The shared—

The Hon. I.F. Evans: Take the Paris option.

The SPEAKER: Order!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! That is enough. Members will not interject and the Treasurer will not respond to interjections.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Thank you, sir. The shared services reform program (being very well managed by Treasury and the Minister for Finance) is a bold reform of this government in public administration. There has been and will be no more significant reform of a public administration in this state than our shared services reform agenda. No, it will not be easy. Yes, it will be a program that will have its problems. You cannot reform an entire way a government is administered without its being a difficult task.

I do not have the exact numbers—the Minister for Finance may have a better brief than me—but there may be 150 various centres where we have payroll, procurement, human resources and various other corporate functions. They will all be rolled into one centre where we will have at least 2,000 (probably more) public servants who are in scope. We have already said that we will be seeing a significant reduction in the number of FTEs who are responsible for these functions. This is reform on a grand scale. We have learnt much from mistakes made by other governments. We are not investing upfront heavily in an IT program, which I think the WA government did and got itself into serious trouble. To start with, we are going after the lower hanging fruit, and then we will roll out a more intensive program to achieve these savings. We have set ourselves a very hard task. Am I—

Mr Hamilton-Smith interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Sorry?

The SPEAKER: Order! The Leader of the Opposition will not interject and—

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: The leader says that I had better make it. Yes, you are right, I had better make it.

The SPEAKER: —and the Treasurer will not respond.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Thank you; sorry, sir. We have set ourselves a very hard task. Can I guarantee that we will get there? No, I cannot. Am I confident that we will get there? Yes, I am. The whole idea is to achieve significant efficiences, reform and savings within the government sector. It is a sort of bold reform that Labor governments have been able to do in years gone by. That is why, as I said, we are the party of choice when it comes to financial management because—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: —we are prepared to take the hard decisions to reform the way we administer public services and deliver more money to be able to provide better services in this state.