Page 1996 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 15 May 2013
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MR SMYTH: So this budget, apparently, is toxic. That is very funny. But the cat is out of the bag there. We stumble sometimes, but that is okay.
The Chief Minister reveals now the $49 million in GST revenue loss. It is important that we learn what the full impacts are. Some of them are not disaggregated in the documents; they are hidden. That financial analysis is important.
But we really need to also keep our eye on the social and the environmental impacts. Katy wistfully said, “There are significant social reforms in this budget.” Yes, there are. People of all persuasions politically have said that the NDIS is a good thing, but it is only a reform if you can pay for it. Holding out false hope to people that, potentially, all 450,000 people with a disability, and eligible, will get something by the 2018-19 budget is predicated on the budget being able to fund it. We know that in Wayne’s world that ain’t possible. It may well be worth saying that these are good things, and I have not heard anybody disagree with that sentiment, but somebody has to pay for it.
So I have not asked for a critique; I have asked for analysis that shows the impacts. That is why the amendments should be resisted.
When I drafted the motion I thought you could look at the last six years and wonder what might have happened and what advice somebody should have given Wayne Swan. Indeed, compare the Howard-Costello budgets that delivered strong surpluses. Nobody ever got sacked through the surplus; you get sacked when there are huge deficits. Your job disappears when the government cannot pay its way. The Labor Party looks at Canberra and says: “We’ve got three safe seats. She’ll be right. We’ll just slash some public servants and use them as the balancing item on our budget.” But these are Canberra families; these are Canberra individuals. These are people who live here; these are our neighbours. It is very important that we understand what the full impacts are.
Commentary made this morning was that this is a first year of a first term sort of budget. I happened across a speech that Peter Costello put together for Wayne Swan and said, “This is what he should have said.” It is worth a read. It is typical Costello: it is a bit tongue in cheek; it is a bit funny. But think about what he says. This is a speech Peter Costello has written for Wayne Swan:
Mr Speaker,
I guess by now you have all figured out that I don’t know what I’m doing. That awful truth has finally dawned on me as well. I hadn’t been too good before, but last year’s Budget was the one where I totally blew myself up—you remember? It was May 8 … I thought I needed a dramatic opening … So I began by saying, ‘The four years of surpluses I announce tonight …’
No one heard the rest of the sentence because of the guffaws from the other side. That smart alec Costello called it some of the best stand-up comedy ever delivered in the House of Representatives. But the thing is I really believed it. I’m not good at numbers—of the financial kind. As state secretary of the Queensland ALP I used to run numbers for party ballots. But the outcome was always fixed in advance. I thought that’s how you did Budgets.
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