The Hodgman Liberal Government is committed to fixing the budget mess left behind by Labor and the Greens.
The Government welcomes Moody’s decision to leave the State’s credit rating unchanged following a downgrade under Labor and the Greens in February 2014. After Labor and the Greens racked up record deficits we’ve stemmed the budget bleeding and we’re now turning the State’s finances around and rebuilding the budget dollar-by-dollar.
In its decision, Moody’s states that:
“The Government’s budgetary redress program…has made progress through lowering the rate of expenditure growth” and “although a planned pay pause in pay rises for public sector employees in 2014-15 did not materialise, the state offset the consequent rise in spending on salaries with a reduction in FTE levels which is an indication of its commitment to implementing savings measures. Other important initiatives include a reform of healthcare, including the merger of three health organisations into one, and close monitoring of FTE levels.”
The only way to fix the Labor-Green mess is to maintain budget discipline and that is exactly what the Government intends to do.
The Preliminary Outcomes Report shows that the deficit is reducing and we are on track to deliver a surplus three years ahead of schedule while still being able to invest record amounts in health and education and fund new initiatives like our Safe Homes, Safe Families policy.
Labor and the Greens have no idea how to manage a budget. They made that perfectly clear during their last term of Government and all the indications are that they have learnt nothing. Their only plan is to simply throw money around and take the State further and further into crippling debt.
Peter Gutwein, Treasurer
