Hockey to detail policy costings
The federal Coalition’s election policy costings are expected to show it can deliver a $6 billion improvement to the budget bottom line, if it wins government.
The costing details will be released today, most likely after Prime Minister Kevin Rudd delivers his final major public address before Saturday’s poll.
Check InDaily this afternoon for details.
Since the campaign began the Labor government has been accusing the Opposition of softening up Australians for “savage” cuts that will hurt jobs and growth.
But the Coalition insists there will be no cuts to health or education, or changes to the GST.
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Instead, shadow treasurer Joe Hockey and finance spokesman Andrew Robb are expected to unveil a $6 billion improvement to the budget bottom line over the next four years.
They are expected to say the improvement will be achieved after $40 billion of savings and $34 billion worth of spending measures over the budget forward estimates.
However, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott won’t say when the budget would be returned to surplus although it will happen “at least as quickly as the Labor party”. The government has forecast the budget will be about $4 billion in the black by 2016/17.
“We can’t tell you precisely when things might happen because they’re subject to all the downside risks which the Treasury talked about when the very comprehensive pre-election fiscal outlook was published a couple of weeks back,” Abbott told reporters in Sydney on Thursday.
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The Coalition has submitted about 200 policies to the Parliamentary Budget Office and says its figures have been examined by three public finance experts.
These are Geoff Carmody, co-founder of Access Economics; Len Scanlan, a former Queensland auditor-general; and Professor Peter Shergold, a former secretary of the department of Prime Minister and Cabinet.
The trio will hand over their assessments to Mr Hockey and Mr Robb at 11am (AEST) in Melbourne ahead of an official announcement later on Thursday.
Treasurer Chris Bowen doubts the mooted savings will fill the “very big black hole” of budget cuts planned by the coalition.
“What I fear here is that on Thursday, before the election, we’re going to see a dodgied-up spreadsheet issued with no detail,” he told ABC radio.
“And then after the election they’re going to say ‘Well, here are the cuts we’re going to have to make based on our commission of audit’.”
Finance Minister Penny Wong said Abbott had gone to “extraordinary lengths” to hide planned cuts to public services.
“If you wrote about it in a novel, you’d think it was some sort of joke,” she told ABC radio.
Shadow assistant treasurer Mathias Cormann denied voters would not have enough time to digest the coalition’s numbers before the election.
“You can only release the full tally of your policy costings after you have released all your policies,” he told ABC television.
Rudd will address the National Press Club at 12.30pm.
