Tasmanian Times publishes this Liberal Media Release manifesto of Labor sins in the interests of informing its readers of Liberal perception of Labor failure …

RENE HIDDING, MHA
Leader of the State Opposition
Monday November 28, 2005

The list of the Lennon Labor Government’s failures in 2005 could not be longer.

As we head into the last week of Parliament for the year, and of perhaps the Lennon Labor Government, Opposition Leader Rene Hidding said any analysis of the Premier Paul Lennon and his Labor Government’s performance would deliver the verdict: utter failure, and give the Tasmanian community momentum for booting Labor out of office at the next State election.

One of the greatest failures of the Lennon Labor Government in 2005 has been its complete inability to grasp the need for a vision and a plan for Securing Tasmania’s Future, meanwhile Labor’s warped priorities which continued unabated during the year made for absolutely scandalous reading.

“Recently, Tasmania has experienced a period of economic sunshine, and the Lennon Labor Government has not only squandered it, it has done nothing whatsoever to consolidate on the gains of a booming national economy and record GST and state taxation receipts to secure Tasmania’s future,” Mr Hidding said.

“Paul Lennon and Labor have become arrogant, incompetent and complacent. They have no vision and no plan for Tasmania’s future at this critical time. Labor is more interested in short term fixes than long term solutions, and in secret deals with its mates at the big end of town than the interests of all Tasmanians, and because of this the things that make Tasmania special are now under threat.

“A telling indicator of how arrogant and incompetent the Lennon Labor Government has become is its disgraceful, warped priorities.

“Last year, Premier Paul Lennon poured $20 million of taxpayers money into building his Taj Mahal at Elwick, and gave our failed former Governor $650,000 he was not entitled to, while the health system crumbled to its knees.

“This year, Paul Lennon decided to stash the windfall GST and tax receipts he collected into an election warchest, to spend on sweeteners to try to buy his way back into office next year, while the health system got even worse.

“And adding insult to injury, while Tasmanians are given tents to sleep in because the housing crisis has reached epidemic proportions, while Tasmanians cannot get hospital beds, while our education standards are slipping and drug use has emerged as a major social and health issue, Paul Lennon demonstrated that his priorities were renovating Minister’s offices, spending taxpayers money on a wasteful political advertising rort, and gallivanting around the PBL tent for Melbourne Cup, even staying in the PBL-owned Crown Casino, just days before he made Tasmania the pariah of the racing industry and the mecca for gambling, by licensing the PBL part-owned Betfair.”

Massive failures

Other massive failures of the Lennon Labor Government in 2005 — and this list could run for page after page — include:

•Allowing our crucially important Tourism Industry to suffer because Labor has been complacent about branding and marketing;

•Reneging on its 1998 election policy to upgrade the Lyell Highway, despite even more deaths on this horror road;

•Being so complacent about securing Tasmania’s future that it allowed our rail crisis to develop to the extent that it could soon be lost altogether;

•Refusing to adopt the State Liberal policy of dramatically reducing class sizes, despite worsening education standards;

•Being unable, after all this time, to ensure that the Meander Dam will be built;

•Allowing the crisis at the Royal Hobart Hospital to worsen, even though this notion was not thought possible, and then making the CEO a scapegoat for the Minister’s incompetence;

•Failing to heed repeated calls to appropriately resource Children and Family Services in the wake of an escalation in child abuse and neglect, instead responding with half-hearted announcements designed to put out bushfires, not solve the actual problem, and for example, allowing a service like the Hobart Sexual Assault and Support Service to be so run down that waiting times for counselling a sexual abuse victim have blown out to three months;

•Allowing the crisis in disability services to reach the horrific extent that it did, as highlighted in the damning KPMG report;

•Refusing to heed calls for there to be appropriate drug, alcohol and other rehabilitation programs to be implemented inside Risdon prison, to help get to the root of an offender’s behaviour and prevent it from happening again;

Bungling the gas rollout

•Refusing to heed calls for the urgent creation of sex offender rehabilitation programs outside prison for parolees, to prevent them ever preying on innocent women, children and men again;

•Refusing to accept the wealth of information that short-term prison sentences do far more harm to society than they do good and refusing to adopt the State Liberal policy of replacing sentences of three months or less with intensive rehabilitation orders;

•Bungling the natural gas project so badly that Stage 2b is now in doubt, and despite some $50 million of taxpayer subsidies, and despite the fact natural gas now flows past 12,000 homes and business, just 150 customers have signed on;

•Shafting farmers during the Tasmanian Community Forestry Agreement negotiations that placed new controls on native vegetation management, and telling farmers while these negotiations were happening that no such controls were on the agenda;

•Instructing a Cabinet Minister to withhold information from the Parliament – otherwise known as the Ken Bacon affair;

•Suffering two hugely damaging Cabinet leaks but never uncovering the source;

•Refusing to recognise the massive benefits that would flow to the State by making it the first State in Australia to be land-tax free — which a Hidding Liberal Government will do;

•Refusing to sign a pledge ruling out a minority government with the Greens;

•Arrogantly ignoring the concerns of social welfare groups and the racing industry around Australia and the world, by licensing Betfair;

•Allowing hospital and housing waiting lists to blow out even further — and then dumping the second stage of the much-vaunted Affordable Housing Strategy;

•Refusing to explain Mark Latham’s allegations that Paul Lennon sacked Richard Butler, which would make the $650,000 payout look even more dodgy;

•Spending taxpayers money on promoting the Lennon Labor Government to Tasmanians — rather than promoting Tasmanian business, tourism and lifestyle interstate or overseas;

•Having no long term plan whatsoever for future infrastructure needs. The State Liberals have committed that a Hidding Liberal Government will develop a blueprint to ensure these needs are planned for and funded;

•Maintaining the wasteful Canberra Office while refusing to support the Liberal policy of establishing a Tasmanian Business Development Office in the massive and growing China market, despite the fact that most other States have at least one, if not more, in this market and are reaping massive rewards;

•Being exposed as being all rhetoric and no action on the issue of food labelling laws. Labor has actually admitted that enforcing country of origin labelling, which is its responsibility, rates as a low priority, despite all its talk;

Spin doctors

•Allowing the recruitment of spin doctors to reach unprecedented proportions;

•Refusing to support the State Liberal policy of massively boosting resources for Early Learning Centres and Primary Schools by employing 54 new early learning specialist teachers; as well as an additional 15 child psychologists to deal with behavioural issues and address the growing trend of bullying;

•Refusing to implement the reforms that are needed to deal with the massive crisis in health, such as streamlining decision making, splitting up the massive and unwieldy health bureaucracy, establishing high level performance review panels, implementing regional health council, developing a health workforce recruitment strategy, using private hospitals to help reduce waiting lists, reinstating agency nurses, undertaking an aggressive nurse recruitment drive, boosting graduate nurse intakes, improving professional development for nurses, and so on — all initiatives the State Liberal Team has committed to implementing;

•Putting its head in the sand on the drugs problem — effectively condoning their importation into Tasmania by not adopting the Liberal policy of a new dedicated police squad to crack down on drugs coming into the State complete with drug sniffing dogs, and refusing to even review our drug laws, which are some of the most lax in the nation, despite new and shocking evidence about the link between drug use and mental illness. Labor won’t even support our policy of having a Drug Court, even though we are the only State in Australia not to provide this sentencing option of treatment and rehabilitation to offenders;

•Refusing to double penalties for assault, as the Liberals will, despite assaults rising 93 per cent under Labor;

•Refusing to appoint a victims of crime representative to the Parole Board;

•Taking three years to bring legislation to establish a sex offenders register to the Parliament;

•Dropping the ball completely on the need for better driver education to curb road deaths and instead proposing a blanket speed reduction on all roads!

•Continuing to allow the disgraceful situation whereby Tasmania — the natural state — has a number of rural communities, many of them also popular tourism towns — who cannot drink their own water;

•Disgracefully ignoring Seniors, refusing to appoint a Minister for seniors, refusing to extend pensioner concessions to self funded retirees and refusing to adopt the State Liberal policy of free public transport for Seniors.

“This list could continue, on and on, so appalling has this Lennon Labor Government proven to be,” Mr Hidding said.

“However, this small sample of Labor’s failures in 2005, is damning in its own right and proves beyond a doubt that Labor has its priorities wrong and has no vision and no plan for Securing Tasmania’s Future.

“Tasmania really cannot risk another four years of this sort of incompetence and arrogance, and I think that is what they will tell the Lennon Labor Government at the next state election.”

The Greens no doubt will soon roll out their own list.