Media Release

Peter Gutwein MP
Shadow Treasurer

Saturday 26th February 2011

Giddings Must Guarantee No More Budget Blowouts This Financial Year

The further reduction in our GST receipts by $75M over the next three years demands a strong and immediate response from the Government.

The Premier and Treasurer Lara Giddings must provide a guarantee that she will not allow the Government to overspend during the last four months of this financial year. As the Government overspent its last two budgets by almost $600M and has in the first six months of this financial year blown its budget by $112M the first step the Government must commit to in bringing our budget back into control is to ensure that the massive overspending that this Government has made a habit of comes to a halt.

The Premier must provide a guarantee that she will rein in spending this year and ensure that the Government does not blow its budget further than it has already.

In large part the reason that Ms Giddings has said that she needs to cut $200M from the budget over the next three years by sacking more than 2300 public servants is because this Government has continually overspent the budgets they have set themselves.

We believe that the Government must reign in its spending and that we need a more efficient and productive public sector, however we don't believe that the Government's position of sacking thousands of teachers, nurses and police is the way to go about it.

Surely the first step she must take is to ensure that for the remainder of this year she doesn't continue to overspend the budget the Government has set itself. If the past financial practices of this Government continue all that Ms Giddings will do is make the problem even worse.

Ms Giddings must provide a guarantee that she will not spend more than she has in the budget for the remainder of this financial year and if she won't provide this guarantee then she should resign.