❓ Treasurer Ripper provides a preview of the upcoming state budget, highlighting its focus on families, community priorities, and fiscal responsibility. He also defends the government's budget advertising spending while criticising the previous government's record.
AnsweredQoN 201Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
I refer to speculation about the state budget and ask what can Western Australians expect? Mr E.S. RIPPER
AnswerView source ↗
The budget will be delivered on Thursday but I can make a few broad comments. As the Premier has said, it will be a budget for families, because it is a good Labor budget. Once again we will focus our efforts on delivering on community priorities - more jobs, better health care, quality education, a crackdown on crime and more support for people with disabilities. It will also be Labor’s fourth balanced budget, because we know that we cannot meet the community’s needs in the future without a sustainable financial plan today. We will also be giving the community the opportunity to judge the budget for itself by making the budget available on the Internet. People can log on to the web site, ourstatebudget.wa.gov.au, where they will be able to search by postcode to find out what has been provided for their area. As is usual, we will advertise the budget, this time on television, at an estimated cost of $150 000. The advertisements will encourage Western Australians to visit the web site or to phone for more information. Before we get some sort of outcry from the Opposition, I point out that every year we have advised the Parliament what we intend to spend on budget advertising, in stark contrast to the former Government, which went to great lengths to avoid disclosing what it had spent on budget advertising. Every year, in comparison to the coalition Government, this Government has been modest in its spending. In our first four budgets we will have spent a total of $478 000 on advertising, which is 35 per cent less than the $734 000 the coalition spent in its last term. In one year the Liberals spent $214 000 distributing one pamphlet to households. That pamphlet, entitled “Budget 1998/99, Securing our Future”, included some memorable fiction. It stated that the Court Government had delivered “its fifth successive balanced Budget”. Of course, we know that its actual record was five budget deficits out of eight. I point out that the budget referred to in the pamphlet was the one in which it increased stamp duty by 12.5 per cent. Do members think that there was any reference to the stamp duty increase in the budget pamphlet that was mailed to every householder in the State? No, no, no, no! It was all about the spending; there was nothing in the pamphlet about the tax increase. This Government will deliver a balanced budget without the benefit of more than $200 million in poker machine revenue which, of course, the other States enjoy. Further, we will outline a plan for the next four years that will not be based on the privatisation of the people’s assets. We will deliver a AAA budget. What we are faced with on the other side of Parliament is a PPP Opposition; that is, an Opposition of porkies, privatisation and pokies.
Mr E.S. RIPPER replied: The budget will be delivered on Thursday but I can make a few broad comments. As the Premier has said, it will be a budget for families, because it is a good Labor budget. Once again we will focus our efforts on delivering on community priorities - more jobs, better health care, quality education, a crackdown on crime and more support for people with disabilities. It will also be Labor’s fourth balanced budget, because we know that we cannot meet the community’s needs in the future without a sustainable financial plan today. We will also be giving the community the opportunity to judge the budget for itself by making the budget available on the Internet. People can log on to the web site, ourstatebudget.wa.gov.au, where they will be able to search by postcode to find out what has been provided for their area. As is usual, we will advertise the budget, this time on television, at an estimated cost of $150 000. The advertisements will encourage Western Australians to visit the web site or to phone for more information. Before we get some sort of outcry from the Opposition, I point out that every year we have advised the Parliament what we intend to spend on budget advertising, in stark contrast to the former Government, which went to great lengths to avoid disclosing what it had spent on budget advertising. Every year, in comparison to the coalition Government, this Government has been modest in its spending. In our first four budgets we will have spent a total of $478 000 on advertising, which is 35 per cent less than the $734 000 the coalition spent in its last term. In one year the Liberals spent $214 000 distributing one pamphlet to households. That pamphlet, entitled “Budget 1998/99, Securing our Future”, included some memorable fiction. It stated that the Court Government had delivered “its fifth successive balanced Budget”. Of course, we know that its actual record was five budget deficits out of eight. I point out that the budget referred to in the pamphlet was the one in which it increased stamp duty by 12.5 per cent. Do members think that there was any reference to the stamp duty increase in the budget pamphlet that was mailed to every householder in the State? No, no, no, no! It was all about the spending; there was nothing in the pamphlet about the tax increase. This Government will deliver a balanced budget without the benefit of more than $200 million in poker machine revenue which, of course, the other States enjoy. Further, we will outline a plan for the next four years that will not be based on the privatisation of the people’s assets. We will deliver a AAA budget. What we are faced with on the other side of Parliament is a PPP Opposition; that is, an Opposition of porkies, privatisation and pokies.
The budget will be delivered on Thursday but I can make a few broad comments. As the Premier has said, it will be a budget for families, because it is a good Labor budget. Once again we will focus our efforts on delivering on community priorities - more jobs, better health care, quality education, a crackdown on crime and more support for people with disabilities. It will also be Labor’s fourth balanced budget, because we know that we cannot meet the community’s needs in the future without a sustainable financial plan today. We will also be giving the community the opportunity to judge the budget for itself by making the budget available on the Internet. People can log on to the web site, ourstatebudget.wa.gov.au, where they will be able to search by postcode to find out what has been provided for their area. As is usual, we will advertise the budget, this time on television, at an estimated cost of $150 000. The advertisements will encourage Western Australians to visit the web site or to phone for more information. Before we get some sort of outcry from the Opposition, I point out that every year we have advised the Parliament what we intend to spend on budget advertising, in stark contrast to the former Government, which went to great lengths to avoid disclosing what it had spent on budget advertising. Every year, in comparison to the coalition Government, this Government has been modest in its spending. In our first four budgets we will have spent a total of $478 000 on advertising, which is 35 per cent less than the $734 000 the coalition spent in its last term. In one year the Liberals spent $214 000 distributing one pamphlet to households. That pamphlet, entitled “Budget 1998/99, Securing our Future”, included some memorable fiction. It stated that the Court Government had delivered “its fifth successive balanced Budget”. Of course, we know that its actual record was five budget deficits out of eight. I point out that the budget referred to in the pamphlet was the one in which it increased stamp duty by 12.5 per cent. Do members think that there was any reference to the stamp duty increase in the budget pamphlet that was mailed to every householder in the State? No, no, no, no! It was all about the spending; there was nothing in the pamphlet about the tax increase. This Government will deliver a balanced budget without the benefit of more than $200 million in poker machine revenue which, of course, the other States enjoy. Further, we will outline a plan for the next four years that will not be based on the privatisation of the people’s assets. We will deliver a AAA budget. What we are faced with on the other side of Parliament is a PPP Opposition; that is, an Opposition of porkies, privatisation and pokies.
Every year, in comparison to the coalition Government, this Government has been modest in its spending. In our first four budgets we will have spent a total of $478 000 on advertising, which is 35 per cent less than the $734 000 the coalition spent in its last term. In one year the Liberals spent $214 000 distributing one pamphlet to households. That pamphlet, entitled “Budget 1998/99, Securing our Future”, included some memorable fiction. It stated that the Court Government had delivered “its fifth successive balanced Budget”. Of course, we know that its actual record was five budget deficits out of eight. I point out that the budget referred to in the pamphlet was the one in which it increased stamp duty by 12.5 per cent. Do members think that there was any reference to the stamp duty increase in the budget pamphlet that was mailed to every householder in the State? No, no, no, no! It was all about the spending; there was nothing in the pamphlet about the tax increase. This Government will deliver a balanced budget without the benefit of more than $200 million in poker machine revenue which, of course, the other States enjoy. Further, we will outline a plan for the next four years that will not be based on the privatisation of the people’s assets. We will deliver a AAA budget. What we are faced with on the other side of Parliament is a PPP Opposition; that is, an Opposition of porkies, privatisation and pokies.
Mr E.S. RIPPER replied: The budget will be delivered on Thursday but I can make a few broad comments. As the Premier has said, it will be a budget for families, because it is a good Labor budget. Once again we will focus our efforts on delivering on community priorities - more jobs, better health care, quality education, a crackdown on crime and more support for people with disabilities. It will also be Labor’s fourth balanced budget, because we know that we cannot meet the community’s needs in the future without a sustainable financial plan today. We will also be giving the community the opportunity to judge the budget for itself by making the budget available on the Internet. People can log on to the web site, ourstatebudget.wa.gov.au, where they will be able to search by postcode to find out what has been provided for their area. As is usual, we will advertise the budget, this time on television, at an estimated cost of $150 000. The advertisements will encourage Western Australians to visit the web site or to phone for more information. Before we get some sort of outcry from the Opposition, I point out that every year we have advised the Parliament what we intend to spend on budget advertising, in stark contrast to the former Government, which went to great lengths to avoid disclosing what it had spent on budget advertising. Every year, in comparison to the coalition Government, this Government has been modest in its spending. In our first four budgets we will have spent a total of $478 000 on advertising, which is 35 per cent less than the $734 000 the coalition spent in its last term. In one year the Liberals spent $214 000 distributing one pamphlet to households. That pamphlet, entitled “Budget 1998/99, Securing our Future”, included some memorable fiction. It stated that the Court Government had delivered “its fifth successive balanced Budget”. Of course, we know that its actual record was five budget deficits out of eight. I point out that the budget referred to in the pamphlet was the one in which it increased stamp duty by 12.5 per cent. Do members think that there was any reference to the stamp duty increase in the budget pamphlet that was mailed to every householder in the State? No, no, no, no! It was all about the spending; there was nothing in the pamphlet about the tax increase. This Government will deliver a balanced budget without the benefit of more than $200 million in poker machine revenue which, of course, the other States enjoy. Further, we will outline a plan for the next four years that will not be based on the privatisation of the people’s assets. We will deliver a AAA budget. What we are faced with on the other side of Parliament is a PPP Opposition; that is, an Opposition of porkies, privatisation and pokies.
The budget will be delivered on Thursday but I can make a few broad comments. As the Premier has said, it will be a budget for families, because it is a good Labor budget. Once again we will focus our efforts on delivering on community priorities - more jobs, better health care, quality education, a crackdown on crime and more support for people with disabilities. It will also be Labor’s fourth balanced budget, because we know that we cannot meet the community’s needs in the future without a sustainable financial plan today. We will also be giving the community the opportunity to judge the budget for itself by making the budget available on the Internet. People can log on to the web site, ourstatebudget.wa.gov.au, where they will be able to search by postcode to find out what has been provided for their area. As is usual, we will advertise the budget, this time on television, at an estimated cost of $150 000. The advertisements will encourage Western Australians to visit the web site or to phone for more information. Before we get some sort of outcry from the Opposition, I point out that every year we have advised the Parliament what we intend to spend on budget advertising, in stark contrast to the former Government, which went to great lengths to avoid disclosing what it had spent on budget advertising. Every year, in comparison to the coalition Government, this Government has been modest in its spending. In our first four budgets we will have spent a total of $478 000 on advertising, which is 35 per cent less than the $734 000 the coalition spent in its last term. In one year the Liberals spent $214 000 distributing one pamphlet to households. That pamphlet, entitled “Budget 1998/99, Securing our Future”, included some memorable fiction. It stated that the Court Government had delivered “its fifth successive balanced Budget”. Of course, we know that its actual record was five budget deficits out of eight. I point out that the budget referred to in the pamphlet was the one in which it increased stamp duty by 12.5 per cent. Do members think that there was any reference to the stamp duty increase in the budget pamphlet that was mailed to every householder in the State? No, no, no, no! It was all about the spending; there was nothing in the pamphlet about the tax increase. This Government will deliver a balanced budget without the benefit of more than $200 million in poker machine revenue which, of course, the other States enjoy. Further, we will outline a plan for the next four years that will not be based on the privatisation of the people’s assets. We will deliver a AAA budget. What we are faced with on the other side of Parliament is a PPP Opposition; that is, an Opposition of porkies, privatisation and pokies.
Every year, in comparison to the coalition Government, this Government has been modest in its spending. In our first four budgets we will have spent a total of $478 000 on advertising, which is 35 per cent less than the $734 000 the coalition spent in its last term. In one year the Liberals spent $214 000 distributing one pamphlet to households. That pamphlet, entitled “Budget 1998/99, Securing our Future”, included some memorable fiction. It stated that the Court Government had delivered “its fifth successive balanced Budget”. Of course, we know that its actual record was five budget deficits out of eight. I point out that the budget referred to in the pamphlet was the one in which it increased stamp duty by 12.5 per cent. Do members think that there was any reference to the stamp duty increase in the budget pamphlet that was mailed to every householder in the State? No, no, no, no! It was all about the spending; there was nothing in the pamphlet about the tax increase. This Government will deliver a balanced budget without the benefit of more than $200 million in poker machine revenue which, of course, the other States enjoy. Further, we will outline a plan for the next four years that will not be based on the privatisation of the people’s assets. We will deliver a AAA budget. What we are faced with on the other side of Parliament is a PPP Opposition; that is, an Opposition of porkies, privatisation and pokies.
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