Page 2407 - Week 08 - Thursday, 6 June 2013
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years ago across health, like a secure mental health facility and the bush healing farm are still just empty promises, but with a bigger price tag and reduced scope. ACTION is falling further behind on almost every measure, except how much it is costing us. And basic local services like parking that have been appallingly managed are going to cost us significantly more. Services are being cut and fees and charges are going up, but the quality of services is going down.
For any other government this would be a list of shame, but for this government it is business as usual. And it points to the real failure of this budget and this government. As well as the failures on debt, failures on just deficits and failures on delivery, its most marked failure is that of honesty. That promise we saw from this government of delivery of budget surpluses left the building with Jon Stanhope. That promise has been replaced by a pattern of deceit that is now undeniable.
This government simply does not tell the truth. This government has a track record of dishonesty. The truth is that before the 2004 election Katy Gallagher’s office issued a statement saying there will be no school closures, and within weeks of being re-elected they started making plans to close dozens of schools. What does Katy Gallagher say now to the teachers, the parents and the children who were told by her there would be no school closures?
The truth is that before the 2008 election Katy Gallagher said all of her health plans were on the table, but at the same time she was holding secret meetings to stitch up a deal that would result in the biggest shake up in health in territory history. What does this government now say to the staff at Calvary and Clare Holland House who were misled into thinking there were no plans to sell the hospice or to buy the hospital? What does this government say to the patients in our emergency departments who are still waiting the longest times in the nation for treatment after the results were fabricated on a massive scale to make them look better because of the political imperative? What does this government say to the obstetricians who complained about being bullied at Canberra Hospital in 2010 then were falsely told by Katy Gallagher that no complaints had been made, that this was an incident of mudslinging and then instigated or threatened to instigate, a witch-hunt?
We hear a lot from this Chief Minister about honesty. Where was the honesty during the 2012 election campaign about the $142 million of job cuts, cuts to services and increased fees and charges that are in this budget? I remember expressions during the campaign like “fully funded” and “fully costed”. But the people who are most deceived are those Canberrans who this Chief Minister stared straight in the eye and said their rates would not triple under the tax reforms promised by her Treasurer. The mathematics of the tax reforms are undeniable and inescapable. This government claims and has always claimed that they were removing stamp duty and a range of other taxes and charges and replacing them with increased rates, and we accept that. The rates paid before the reforms were $173 million. Labor are removing $347 million in taxes and charges and putting it all on to rates—that is triple. There is no way out of it. The only matter in question now is how long it will take.
Now, Andrew Barr talks about it as if it is going to happen in the distant future as part of natural growth. It is not. In this budget alone rates are openly increasing by
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