CHAIR --I declare open this public meeting of the Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee. On 10 November 1994 the committee was charged by the Senate to examine and report on the additional estimates for 1994-95 in respect of the Prime Minister's portfolio, the finance portfolio and the parliamentary departments. The committee has to report to the Senate on or before 8 December 1994. The committee will fix a date for the submission of written answers to questions taken on notice and the date for any supplementary hearing that may be required.

The committee concluded its consideration of the Prime Minister's portfolio at its previous hearing on 17 November. The hearing today will commence with the parliamentary departments and be followed by the departments and agencies in the finance portfolio. The hearing is scheduled to conclude at 4 p.m.

Under the new arrangements, the annual reports of departments and budget-dependant agencies are available for consideration by the legislation committee during the course of the estimates hearings. Senators will have the opportunity under each subprogram to raise questions concerning both the departmental or agency annual report for 1993-94 and the portfolio additional estimates statements for 1994-95.

I propose to proceed by calling on programs or, where relevant, subprograms as they are listed in the portfolio overview which appears at the beginning of both of those documents. I understand that there are unlikely to be any oral questions on this occasion for the parliamentary departments, but there may be questions to be placed on notice and for that purpose I will call on for consideration each department in turn.