Foreword

Budget Paper No. 2, Budget Measures 2003-04 ensures that the Budget Papers provide comprehensive information on all Government decisions announced in the Budget that involve changes to its revenue, expense and investing activities.

Budget Paper No. 2 comprises three parts:

• Part 1: Revenue Measures

• Part 2: Expense Measures

• Part 3: Capital Measures

Revenue measures are defined as those measures that affect taxation or non-taxation revenues (on a Government Finance Statistics (GFS) basis).

Expense measures are defined as those measures that affect expenses (on a GFS basis).

Capital measures are defined as those measures that affect net capital investment, defined as the change in non-financial assets. Capital measures that fall outside of this definition, such as equity injections or loans used for purposes other than investment in non-financial assets, are shown as having a zero impact on the fiscal balance.

A summary of all measures introduced since 2002-03 Budget is included in each part. Measures introduced since the Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook 2002-03 (MYEFO) including measures in this Budget, are described in detail. Detailed descriptions of measures up to the time of the MYEFO are contained in that document.

Notes

(a) The following definitions are used in this Budget Paper:

• 'real' means adjusted for the effect of inflation;

• real growth in expenses is measured by the non-farm Gross Domestic Product deflator;

• Budget year refers to 2003-04, while the forward years refer to 2004-05, 2005-06 and 2006-07; and

• one billion is equal to one thousand million.

(b) Figures in tables and generally in the text have been rounded. Discrepancies in tables between totals and sums of components are due to rounding:

• estimates under $100,000 are rounded to the nearest thousand;

• estimates $100,000 and over are generally rounded to the nearest tenth of a million;

• estimates midway between rounding points are rounded up; and

• the percentage changes in statistical tables are calculated using unrounded data.

(c) For the budget balance, a negative sign indicates a deficit while no sign indicates a surplus.

(d) The following notations are used:

(e) The Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory are referred to as 'the Territories'. References to the 'States' or 'each State' include the Territories. The following abbreviations are used for the names of the States, where appropriate:

Budget Paper No. 2, Budget Measures 2003-04 is one of a series of Budget Papers that provides information to supplement the Budget Speech. A full list of the series is printed on the inside cover of this paper.

---