Thursday, 12 May 2022

Federal budget

Mr FOWLES (Burwood) (10:16): Speaking about the federal budget, Josh Gordon from the Age asked:

… has there ever been a greater distribution of federal taxpayers’ money away from Victoria … And has it ever been done in a more brazen manner?

Indeed. Extraordinarily, the Shadow Treasurer, Mr Davis in the other place, agrees. He said:

… Victoria hasn’t had a fair deal on many of these national programs.

He added that we need to make our

… political point, that Victoria has done very, very poorly out of the commonwealth …

That is the Shadow Treasurer, but what about his boss, the Leader of the Opposition? He had a chance to stand up for Victorians, to put the interests of the state ahead of his party. Did he rise to the task? No, emphatically no. When the Minister for Transport Infrastructure pointed out that Victoria was not getting a fair share, the member for Bulleen’s response was, ‘Now she wants more money? Grow the hell up’. That response speaks to the heart of the Liberal Party’s attitude to both the policy and the politics of government spending in this country: go for the short-term political sugar hit and to hell with the policy.

The Leader of the Opposition is all froth and no beer, all tip and no iceberg, all soundbite and no substance. The last thing Victoria needs is a Premier that will not stand up for Victoria and will not stand up for Victorians. It is bad enough that we have a Prime Minister for Sydney and a federal Treasurer for no-one. We simply cannot afford a puppet as a Premier, and the federal budget bells the cat on all three of them.