Page 104 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 9 December 2008
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Of course, we were proud to lead the way on that, and we were humbled when the Labor Party backed our policy to reduce class sizes, because there actually is benefit in that. So now that we have got some bipartisanship on reducing class sizes in the later years, it is now up to the government to deliver on that, and actually to tell us what their time frame will be for delivery on that. Rather than vague assertions, rather than talking in generalities, we want a time frame as to when and how they will achieve this and how much it will cost. Will it cost the $90 million they estimated that our years 4 to 6 policy would cost, or will it cost the roughly $22 million that they assigned to their own policy? We wait with bated breath to find out what will happen then.
The Chief Minister also talked about the territory’s balance sheet and how it will take a hit. There is no doubt that it will take a hit. It will take a hit from slowing revenues and it will take a hit from the fact that the Stanhope-Gallagher government has not prepared us for the downturn. They had, I think at last estimate—or “guesstimate” as it is now known—$1.6 billion over and above the revenue forecasts in a period of six or seven years. And that is with revenue forecast to increase each year. So each year they were budgeting on getting more money and each year they exceeded it, to a total of $1.6 billion.
Of course, they did not properly invest that $1.6 billion. They brought us to a situation in the absolute height of the boom where they could barely balance the budget, and they brought us to a situation where even the slightest downturn had the potential to put us into deficit. And now, as we are seeing that downturn, we are seeing the inevitable consequences of a government that did not take the time, in the good times, to invest in the future. They did not take the time to budget responsibly during the good times.
We need to make this point because we sat through Jon Stanhope telling us what a wonderful economic manager he was, because he could deliver budget surpluses at the top of a boom, with stamp duty revenue and GST revenue flowing in—and with the money coming in from our superannuation investments which was the result of the brilliant economic management of Jon Stanhope!
We saw that they took the credit for that, but now, as we see the reverse, with stamp duty slowing, GST slowing and superannuation investments going backwards, it is totally outside their control. These are factors outside their control. If that is true now, that was true before, when they were barely able to deliver budget surpluses at the top of a boom. And that is the fundamental problem. That is why we are going to be facing harder times than we should, because the government did not properly manage this. They did not diversify the economy in the good times and now they have urgent roundtables to discuss getting rid of red tape in the planning system as a way forward. This government’s economic record will count against them very strongly, and people will see the impacts of that mismanagement as we face the inevitable downturn as a result of the global financial crisis.
It is also worth talking about public transport systems, which the Chief Minister referred to in his speech. In fact, we have seen the bus system go backwards. We saw
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