The ACT Governmentโs debt is spiralling out of control, the Canberra Liberals say, and they want an independent budget audit of the Territoryโs finances by the end of this year.
Party leader Elizabeth Lee MLA will move in todayโs Legislative Assembly for a โwarts-and-all lookโ at the long-term viability of the ACTโs finances, and a recommendation of how to fix the debt and return to surplus.
Ever since Chief Minister Andrew Barr had been Treasurer, Ms Lee claimed, the budget had gone backwards. Net debt grew from negative $736 million to $5.36 billion in 2022, and was forecast to be more than $9 billion by 2024-25, she said. The budget had been in deficit every year since 2012โ13, Ms Lee said, despite Mr Barr repeatedly promising to return the budget to surplus.
โThis is not a sustainable financial position for the Territory,โ she said.
In 2020, Ms Lee noted, ACT Treasury advised Mr Barr that if there was no long-term plan to bring the budget back into the black, the ACTโs credit rating would suffer. (The ACT is the only subnational jurisdiction in the Asia Pacific region with an AAA credit rating.)
โThe Treasurerโs mismanagement of the Territoryโs finances will impose enormous costs on future generations of Canberrans,โ Ms Lee said.
In its 20 years of power, the Labor-Greens government had mismanaged health, education, and public housing, she said.
โWhat that means on the ground โฆ has been that many Canberrans are getting a raw dealโฆ
โWhat do we get for it? Less frontline staff in our police, in our hospitals, in our schools.โ
She accused the ACT Government of โspinโ, of announcements but no delivery, and of producing โopaqueโ budgets.
โEach budget, they change the outlook classes, they change the measures so that theyโre pulling the wool over the eyes of the public on actually getting an insight into whatโs promised and whatโs delivered.โ
For instance, the ACT Government allocated $699 million to public housing renewal across three budget periods from 2015โ18, but only $80.87 million was appropriated through to 2020, the Liberals said last week.
In last yearโs budget, Mr Barr announced a $5 billion pipeline would be the largest infrastructure program in the ACTโs history. By the Liberalsโ reckoning, it was only a 4 per cent increase on what was promised the year before; the Infrastructure Investment Program encompassed $914 million in 2020โ21 and $4.3 billion over the four years to 2023โ24. The government, Ms Lee said, had spread the numbers across five years, and added an extra year to make it look โbigger and betterโ on a four-year basis. Meanwhile, there was a $250 million underspend in infrastructure.
- ACT Budget: Canberra Liberals (7 October 2021)
- โFull throttleโ: Turbo-charged Budget will get Canberraโs economy moving again (6 October 2021)
The Canberra Hospital expansion was first promised a decade ago. (In 2016, the completion date was this year; now, the government expects it will be completed by 2024.)
โSince then, what we have seen is an announcement all glitzy and glamorous as they always do, and then it gets rescoped, it gets delayedโฆ Every single budget, there is some promise.โ
Other states and territories had commissioned audits (Queensland in 2011, NSW in 2012), independent reviews of state finances (Victoria in 2011), and budget repair plans (the Northern Territory in 2019), Ms Lee noted.
Mr Barr dismissed Ms Leeโs proposed audit as โsheer follyโ. It was, he said, โan exercise in identifying ways to cut the public sector and to gut the public sectorโ, as had happened in Queensland, NSW, and Victoria.
โAt least the Canberra Liberals are being honest in their fiscal approach that they favour reducing public expenditure, not building infrastructure, and sacking public servants. Thatโs what commissions of audit are used for โ and weโve seen it time and time again,โ he said.
Without debt, Mr Barr said, the ACT would not be able to build infrastructure projects like the proposed Canberra Hospital expansion.
โSo what Elizabeth Lee is arguing is that we shouldnโt be investing in Canberraโs health infrastructure, we shouldnโt be building new schools in growth areas, we shouldnโt be investing in our health workforce, because that is the outcome of her preferred policy.
โWhat they are arguing is that, at this point in the pandemic and at this point in the Territoryโs history, whatโs needed is less investment, fewer public servants, and by virtue of that, fewer services delivered to Canberrans.โ
That, Ms Lee retorted, was a typical response from the Chief Minister, because she had called him out for his failures as Treasurer of this Territory over the last decade.
โIf he had done his homework properly, he would realise that almost every other jurisdiction has undertaken this step โฆ because it is about prudent financial managementโฆ
โIf the Chief Minister and Treasurer is actually serious about getting the Territoryโs finances back into the black, then he must be open to this step.โ
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