2019-04-03
The Election Budget delivered by the Morrison Government last night will do nothing to impress Canberrans crying out for action on climate change, inequality, higher education and basic integrity in politics.
The Budget:
- does essentially nothing to tackle the climate emergency, in fact increasing subsidies to fossil fuels yet again;
- further entrenches inequality, with no increase to Newstart, cuts to the NDIS, and tax cuts favouring the wealthy;
- continues to desperately underfund public education and higher education;
- continues to attack the public service through decentralisation and so-called "efficiency dividends"; and
- moves ahead with the unpopular and unnecessary $498 million expansion of the War Memorial at the expense of other national cultural institutions.
Greens candidate for Canberra, Tim Hollo, said: "Budgets are the truest reflection of a government's priorities, and this one shows a government choosing to give yet more cash to those who are already wealthy while doing nothing to address the critical challenges we face as a nation.
"With the billions spent on tax cuts and surpluses, we could be lifting Newstart, making TAFE and uni fee free, investing in climate action and so much more.
"Everywhere I go in Canberra, in numerous conversations, people raise climate action as their absolutely top priority at this election, and the Morrison government has chosen to spend over four times as much subsidising polluting industry as it has on reducing pollution. This is desperately bad policy which must be reversed.”
Greens Senate candidate, Dr Penny Kyburz, said "Canberrans care deeply about fairness, so the tax cuts which hand ten times as much to those on $200,000 as to those on $50,000, while Newstart is still not lifted, will not go down well.
"Public servants may be breathing a sigh of relief that the threat to their employment wasn't worse, but cuts and decentralisation continue.
"With five university campuses in the electorate, higher education matters hugely to Canberrans, and this Budget does nothing to help students, academics or professional staff."
Mr Hollo added, "For our National Cultural Institutions, the scraps from the table for digitisation and much-needed repairs will be cold comfort against the backdrop of continuing so-called "efficiency dividends" and seeing the War Memorial handed half a billion dollars for unnecessary expansions. The Greens announced last week that we will oppose that expansion and rebalance the funding disparity."
Dr Kyburz concluded, "This Budget, like so much this government does, is utterly out of step with the values and priorities of Canberrans. With a change of government highly likely, it's more important than ever that we have a strong Greens presence in both Houses to work with an incoming Shorten government to repair the damage and chart a better course."