Treasurer Peter Gutwein is right to demand $2.1 billion in cuts to health and education are reversed by the Federal Government.
But his first challenge is to make Joe Hockey accept that the cut is real.
A transcript on the Federal Treasurer’s own website from a press conference in Launceston on May 15 this year highlights Mr Hockey’s dismissiveness.
JOURNALIST: How will Tasmania be able to manage a $2 billion cut to health and education over the next ten years?
TREASURER: But it’s not. It’s getting a significant increase in funding in health and education, so I don’t know where those numbers are coming from, but the fact is we are massively increasing health and education funding in Tasmania over the next two years, the next four years too. So, it keeps going up and up every year. Tasmania does get – it gets plenty of money from the Commonwealth Government and also it gets a contribution from other states, but we want to see Tasmania grow, we want to see it grow and we want it to have better resources. (http://jbh.ministers.treasury.gov.au/transcript/124-2015/)
Labor Leader Bryan Green said it highlights the disconnect between the two Treasurers.
“14 months on from the 2014/15 Budget and Peter Gutwein has failed to convince Joe Hockey that there’s even a problem,” Mr Green said.
“How do the State Liberals expect to have the cuts reversed if Joe Hockey denies they exist.
“This is a prime example of the two Liberal Governments failing to engage on crucial issues.
“The Tasmanian Government’s initial reaction to this year’s Federal Budget didn’t even mention the embedded cuts to health and education.
“And when the cuts were first revealed in 2014, it took Will Hodgman days before he eventually criticised them publicly.”
Bryan Green MP Labor Leader
