Ministerial Statement

CONSULTANTS AND CONTRACTORS

The Hon. J.D. LOMAX-SMITH (Adelaide—Minister for Education and Children's Services, Minister for Tourism, Minister for the City of Adelaide) (16:32): I seek leave to make a ministerial statement.

Leave granted.

The Hon. J.D. LOMAX-SMITH: As I indicated earlier, I believe there was an error on page 336 of the Auditor-General's Report. I have been informed by DECS that the reported consultancy expenditure for 2007 of $257,000 is the total of two separate consultant contracts, not one as indicated in the note to the financial statements. The number of consultants recorded in the DECS financial statements should have been two, not one.

The first was $244,000 for the provision of advice and assistance for the public-private partnerships associated with the six new schools. The consultant is Connell Wagner. A further smaller amount of $13,000 was expensed on completing a consultancy from the SA Centre for Economic Studies. There is a printing error on page 336 of the report. The columns labelled 'DECS' and 'Consolidated' should, in fact, read '2006' and '2007', respectively.