08-June-2010
Portfolio Media Releases, Infrastructure, The Economy, Funding
Kevin Rudd’s Infrastructure Minister Anthony Albanese has been caught out telling a deliberate lie in seeking to mislead the 93,000 voters of the Corangamite electorate and councils across the country in relation to road funding.
Mr Albanese falsely claimed in a media release (26 May 2010) that when asked by the Geelong Advertiser and the Colac Herald how the opposition would fund the duplication of the Princes Highway between Winchelsea and Colac, Shadow Finance Minister Andrew Robb, “privately told the two publications that the Opposition would fund this project out of the Roads to Recovery budget.”
This is impossible because of the fact that Mr Robb has not spoken directly to either of these newspapers regarding this issue. When asked for comments from the Geelong Advertiser and the Colac Herald, the following statement was provided:
“Mr Albanese has issued a number of misleading and disingenuous media statements making completely false allegations regarding supposed Coalition commitments.
“This worthy project like many across the country is still under serious consideration by the Coalition against the backdrop of the Rudd Labor Government’s billions of dollars of waste and mismanagement, continued reckless spending and massive debt.”
Mr Albanese has been caught out lying in a bid to save Labor’s political skin and to create anxiety in the local government sector over the future of critical Roads to Recovery funding.
“This is a senior minister who is politically panic-stricken and who has resorted to saying and doing anything to mislead voters and local government,” Mr Robb said.
“Instead of engaging in gutter politics, Mr Albanese as minister for infrastructure, should have been preventing the billions that have been wasted by Labor on school halls, insulation and the like.
“If Mr Albanese had been doing his day job properly, he would now have $6-8 billion that could have been spent on road infrastructure,” Mr Robb said.
Media Contact: Cameron Hill on 0408 239 521