13-September-2010
Portfolio Media Releases, The Economy, Community, Funding
Julia Gillard today on ABC’s Insiders decided that a shrill attack on the Coalition’s election costings was the best form of defence to cover up the scandal and financial incompetence within her own Government, which is of course lacking in legitimacy.
“Ms Gillard attacks the Coalition’s costings, as well as the Australian media, claiming they were the big unreported story of the campaign, yet conveniently ignores the fact that no costings have ever been done on Labor’s $43 billion NBN white elephant,” Shadow Minister for Finance and Debt Reduction Andrew Robb said.
Ms Gillard also remains mute over the very serious concerns raised during the election campaign and again last week, with Labor’s mining tax, including the lack of modelling and the likelihood of a giant $8 billion shortfall in the projected $10.5 billion revenue, which Labor has already spent.
“I also remind Ms Gillard that the big untold story of the campaign is in fact who leaked the flawed memo that was deliberately manufactured within Treasury to imply that Coalition costings were wrong? Did Treasury leak it to the media or was it the Treasurer himself, Wayne Swan, or his office? These are questions still being considered by the Australian Federal Police,” Mr Robb said.
The big problem for Treasury and the Gillard Government is that the post-election costings process, which for the first time allowed an Opposition to strongly question Treasury and Finance officials, is that it allowed a light to be shined on the work and assumptions of the Departments.
“This opportunity, among other things, exposed that the supposed $900 million black hole in Coalition interest savings, associated with not borrowing $18 billion for the NBN, was based on the use by Treasury of a seriously flawed assumption. Inexplicably, Treasury used a forecasted interest rate of just 4.9 per cent over the next four years,” Mr Robb said.
“This implies that interest rates will fall over the next few years despite Treasury simultaneously forecasting a record spike in terms of trade, strong economic growth and a very tight world-wide credit market for years to come, due to the trillions-of-dollars of Government bonds which are dominating the world market for funds.
“The finance world can see that this post-election costings process was a ‘stitch-up’, as has been confirmed by media reports in both the News Limited and Fairfax press,” Mr Robb said.
Media Contact: Cameron Hill on 0408 239 521