Chasing the bucks down the burrows

Incredibly, the spending on family and children's services was actually $43 million instead of the assessed level of $179 million. Expenditure on roads was $123 million instead of the assessed level of $250 million.

Guess which group of people in the NT suffers disproportionately from this incredible neglect. Hint: it's the mob that always misses out.

“Waffle and Bluster” is not a firm of solicitors. They are simply the names of the techniques that the NT government spin-doctors have chosen in their attempt to ride out the storm. But the CGC figures are there in stark black and white. They will take a lot of explaining away.

The rules of this game are governed by what the bean-counters call a “uniform presentation framework” which is designed to keep the skulduggery to a minimum. The capacity to generate rubbery figures is apparently very limited.

Nevertheless, it seems that the government believes that these numbers are most easily consumed by the delicate diner after an entrée of obfuscation.

"It wasn't me" cries Bart - who, after all, has only three fingers on each hand, and thus can't be expected to be a sultan of the spreadsheets.

However ministers and treasury bureaucrats have no obvious digit-deficit, so hopefully they can explain to the taxpayers how the dough disappeared. Explain, that is, without recourse to exotic teaching aids like peas, thimbles, smoke and mirrors.

Because there is more than a touch of the Bartian blather about the unconvincing word storm being generated by the government. They are saying there is basically almost no problem at all, really. Particularly when you look at things in the broader context, at the end of the day, in light of key additional data, and with regards to the government's superbly executed complementary initiatives.

Let's be clear. The GST dollars are untied, so the NT Government has done nothing illegal in finding other ways to let the funds slip through their fingers.

But we ask more of our pollies than to simply avoid criminal prosecution. It would be nice to think that they might also turn their attention to making life a little better for those most disadvantaged in the community.

It will be interesting to see what the Senate inquiry comes up with. Perhaps they will adopt the language of the Great Inquisitor, Pauline Hanson, and invite NT Chief Minister, Paul Henderson, to “please explain”.

Somebody should.