Institute of Chartered Accountants leadership and quality general manager Yasser El-Ansary ...

Maqqa wrote on May 7^th, 2012 at 10:11am:


This is very true.
I think the criticism of this Government, on this point and on a lot of points where it has been accounting based changes - is that they do rush things and also they don't seem to listen to industry.

They just press ahead.


I

Labor's problem is they seem to think that being seen to be doing anything is better than being seen to be doing nothing, no matter how little thought goes into their (usually) half-baked ideas. We saw it with Rudd's response to the GFC - just throw billions of dollars at it and hope it goes away. All we got was a debt that is fast approaching $200 billion. Keating's debt of $96bn took Howard and Costello just over a decade to pay off, so going by that timeline I doubt we'll see the Rudd/Gillard debt paid off for at least 20-25 years at the earliest.

EACH of the 1550 Diggers on the ground in Afghanistan is costing Australian taxpayers $1 million.

That was the figure for Australia's war effort last financial year - and it is only going to get bigger, The Daily Telegraph reported.

Taxpayers will be hit with a new bill of more than $1 billion next year to fund the war in Afghanistan as the government struggles to conjure up a promised May budget surplus.

The cost of the war hit $1.6 billion for the past financial year. By June 2013, the overall outlay for the Afghanistan campaign will reach more than $7.4 billion, including $1 billion for enhanced measures to better protect soldiers from roadside bombs and rocket attacks.

In its budget forward estimates, the government only costed the Afghanistan war at $299 million for 2012-13, but the true cost will be at least $1.2 billion plus another $200 million in budgeted force protection costs.

The government is also halfway through a five-year $200 million program of donations to the Afghan National Army Trust Fund.

That money is being used to "develop and sustain" the Afghan National Army.

"Australia's contribution has also been used to assist the installation of the Afghan National Defence University's information technology infrastructure ... used by the Afghan National Army, including academic and staff offices, classrooms, laboratories and student barracks," Defence said.

Since the war resumed in earnest in 2006, the lowest cost year for Australia was 2007-08 at $400 million.

That figure grew to $1.125 billion in 2009-10, $1.4 billion in 2010-11 and $1.6 billion last financial year.

The last two years include more than $800 million for enhanced force protection measures, including tougher vehicles, better body armour and early warning radars.

Australian forces are due out of Afghanistan by the end of 2014, but senior officers have hinted that the withdrawal could be completed by late 2013, possibly saving taxpayers more than $1 billion.

Budget expert at ASPI Mark Thomson said the cost of the war was not a big issue because people were more concerned about the lives of Australian soldiers than with money.

"What is interesting is that the government will need to find another $1 billion for the war in 2013, when they are due to deliver a surplus," he said.

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/money/money-matters/each-soldier-in-afghanistan-costs-tax...

Maqqa wrote on May 7^th, 2012 at 10:11am:



I think the criticism of this Government, on this point and on a lot of points where it has been accounting based changes - is that they do rush things and also they don't seem to listen to industry.

They just press ahead.