Wednesday, 19 November 2025

 Bridget VALLENCE (Evelyn) (16:01): I grieve for Victorians, who have to suffer a government that cannot manage finances. Under Labor the economy is cooked. Labor has failed to manage the economy and as a result cannot keep Victorians safe, cannot afford to fix roads, has failed to deliver housing targets and has failed to deliver healthcare services that Victorians need and deserve. That is what happens when a government has no commercial sensibility, is financially incompetent – indeed financially reckless – and cannot manage money: Victorians pay the price.

The Allan Labor government has been in power now for 11 years. By the election it will have been in for 12 years, and Victorians will absolutely dread the thought of 16 years of Labor when they go to vote in just 12 months time. So after 11 long years of the Andrews and Allan Labor government, what have we got in terms of financial management? Under Labor Victorians suffer the highest taxes in the country and the highest debt in the country. There is deficit after deficit, cost blowout after cost blowout on Labor government infrastructure projects. Not only have Labor run out of ideas, they have run out of money.

Victoria has the highest unemployment rate in the country and the worst credit rating in the country and year after year has been found to be the hardest place in the country to do business. All that does is stifle investment and stifle jobs. With skyrocketing debt soaring to nearly $200 billion under this tired Labor government, the interest bill to repay that debt is eye-watering. Speaker, frankly, it is good that you are sitting down, because these figures are quite something else. The interest bill to repay Labor’s debt is $7.6 billion. That is nearly $21 million per day, over $864,000 per hour. By the time I finish this 15-minute speech the government will have spent over $216,000 of Victorian taxpayers money on interest payments alone. Just think what could have been delivered with over 200 grand every 15 minutes – how many potholes we could fix, the community safety programs that we could implement, how many nurses we could employ and how many housing projects could be commenced. All it is doing is paying interest on Labor’s debt.

And now, because Labor has run out of money, it is coming after the money of hardworking Victorians with at least 65 new or increased taxes under this tired Labor government. Just look at the state budget that was handed down a few months ago. Despite the Treasurer saying the budget included no new taxes, nothing could be further from the truth. It included the new emergency services tax, about which we have seen protest after protest here in the city, on the steps of Parliament, out in regional communities and out in suburban communities.

It included that emergency services tax. It is going to cost Victorians $3 billion more. This is a shameful tax grab that will cost families and households 100 per cent more in this tax. It will cost businesses 100 per cent more in this tax. It is going to cost farmers 150 per cent more in this tax. Labor has no shame left. Labor’s emergency services tax is wrong, and the Liberals and Nationals will scrap this tax.

Just last week in the Parliament the government introduced legislation to hike taxes – even more taxes – doubling their tax take on pet registrations and increasing the so-called congestion levy by 73 per cent, the car park tax from which Labor plans to grab nearly $1 billion more from Victorians over the next four years. Again, Labor has no shame. Labor is addicted to tax.

Victorians are expected to pay nearly $42 billion in taxes this year. That equates to around $5900 per person – some impact in a cost-of-living crisis. Again, Labor plans to take $42 billion in taxes this year, which equates to nearly $6000 per every Victorian woman, man and child. Labor is addicted to taxes, and like any addict, it is looking for its next hit, hitting up hardworking Victorians for more taxes when they are already suffering as a result of the highest taxes in Australia. Labor’s economic policy is to tax Victorians more. It is Labor’s policies and financial mismanagement that are not only making the cost of living harder for Victorians but penalising Victorians for Labor’s mistakes.

In recent days again we have heard the Premier trying to pull the wool over Victorians’ eyes about delivering on Labor’s fiscal strategy. The fact of the matter is they are failing on every measure. Members may recall the so-called fiscal strategy of Labor, something the former Treasurer Tim Pallas dreamed up a few years ago. The former Treasurer was forced to develop this fiscal strategy after the credit rating agencies told him that Victoria’s credit rating would be cut and downgraded. I ask: what good is a fiscal strategy if the Labor government cannot even follow it?

The first step of this so-called fiscal strategy was to reduce unemployment. Under Labor unemployment is forecast to increase to 4.75 per cent – an increase of half a percent – and it is above the national average. That is right. In fact Victoria’s unemployment rate has been the highest in the country for such a long time now. That is not the gold standard that we want. We want to see unemployment going down, but under Labor they are forecasting unemployment to go up. A high unemployment forecast means that more Victorians are going to be out of work this time next year under this Labor government.

The second step was to return the budget to an operating surplus. Whilst back in March the Department of Treasury and Finance were predicting a $1.8 billion cash deficit, this figure has miraculously turned around in the budget papers to about a $620 million cash surplus, and you will hear the Premier say this. But such a massive turnaround deserves closer interrogation. It is not because this government has suddenly adopted any fiscally responsible measures or put in place any structural reforms. The turnaround is a result of a deficit and accounting trickery by this Labor government. Not only did the government receive a GST windfall, but many property owners received their annual land tax bills twice in the one year. By making Victorians pay their land tax twice in one financial year, all that did was just make Labor’s bottom line creep up into the black. It is trickery. It is an absolute disgrace. How can this government say that it is helping with the cost of living when it is forcing Victorian families to pay land tax twice in the same 12-month period? It is an annual land tax bill, and Labor made people pay it twice in the one year. Under Labor Victorians already pay the highest property taxes in the country.

The third step of Labor’s doomed fiscal strategy is to return to operating surpluses. Again this is a spectacular fail from this tired 11-year-old Labor government. The government have not recorded an operating surplus since 2019, and they repeatedly demonstrate that they are incapable of making the financially responsible and hard decisions to introduce structural reforms to curb spending or cut waste.

Where is the Silver review – the review into Victoria’s public service Labor commissioned? It cost over $2 million in consultancy fees for a report that Labor is still keeping secret. When is Labor delivering its promised $3 billion of savings from the Silver review, and how many public service jobs is Labor going to cut? If Labor is not willing or able to implement the recommendations of the Silver review, it will fail this fiscal strategy measure.

The fourth step of Labor’s so-called fiscal strategy was to stabilise debt. The government said it was going to do this by introducing a COVID debt levy. The former Treasurer said this was necessary because, according to him, ‘some did better out of the pandemic than others’. Well, to this day I have not found anyone in my community or in my travels around Victoria that was better off after the pandemic than before it, and if they were, they did not live in Victoria. This Labor government wants to keep this COVID debt levy, after the longest lockdowns, the worst results of COVID of any state in the country, the worst health results and increasing mental health issues for Victorians, particularly our youth. To pay down debt, every property owner and employer have been forced to pay a COVID debt levy on top of their land tax bills and on top of their payroll tax bills. Even though COVID finished in 2021, many, many years ago now, Victorians will still be forced to pay this COVID debt levy, this COVID tax, because of Labor’s incompetence and financial mismanagement. At this stage the Labor government wants to keep this COVID debt tax in place until 2033. It is just a disgrace.

One of the fiscal strategy measures was to stabilise debt. Well, instead of stabilising debt, this Labor government is increasing debt, so it is failing on this measure too. It was quite something to hear the Premier claim that Labor is delivering on its fiscal strategy when the budget papers show in black and white that debt will be skyrocketing to a record $194 billion by 2029. Debt is completely out of control in Victoria under Labor, and it is crystal clear that this Victorian Labor government, the Allan Labor government, has no idea how to fix this debt debacle. Only the Victorian Liberals and Nationals have the credibility to tackle this debt bomb of Labor’s making.

Labor’s last step in their fiscal strategy, which was added on late last year, was to reduce debt as a proportion of gross state product, GSP. Currently, debt as a proportion of GSP is 22 per cent. However, instead of reducing, the Labor government’s budget forecasts it to increase to a staggering 25.1 per cent of GSP in the 2025–26 year. That means net debt now makes up a quarter of Victoria’s entire economy. If that is not shocking enough, the budget forecasts say it will remain at 24.9 per cent in the 2028–29 year.

Back in 2019 Labor promised to stabilise net debt at 12 per cent of GSP. Instead Labor has broken that promise and more than doubled debt as a proportion of GSP. Victoria now suffers the absolute embarrassment of a quarter of its entire economy being made up of debt. Debt soaring to $194 billion equates to around $71,000 per Victorian household. And what comes with debt? Again, an interest bill – an interest bill that must be repaid. Interest to service Labor’s debt will increase by $10.6 billion in 2028–29. That equates to nearly $29 million a day or $1.2 million an hour or more than $300,000 after a member of Parliament has finished their 15-minute speech.

Labor’s fiscal strategy is not worth the paper it is written on, and there is a major risk under Labor that Victoria’s credit rating will once again be downgraded from its current AA credit rating from Standard & Poor’s after Labor delivered a budget that forecasts net debt will increase by $38.5 billion over the next four years.

Let us not forget that under Labor, this Suburban Rail Loop project, this pet project of Labor’s, is not funded. They even had the Prime Minister come and visit, but he will not say whether he will commit any money. It is not funded, and the only way that Labor will fund the Suburban Rail Loop is by taxing Victorians more.

The Treasurer, after delivering the last budget, hightailed it, just like the last Treasurer did. The new Treasurer hightailed it to the United States to plead with the ratings agencies not to downgrade Victoria again. The risk of course is that Victoria will have its credit rating downgraded, and what that means is that it is only going to cost more to borrow and it is only going to cost more in interest repayments, and that means Victorians pay the price.

The debt and waste in Victoria under Labor must end. The Liberals and Nationals, the coalition, are the only parties committed to rebuilding Victoria and providing Victorians with cost-of-living relief and lower taxes. The Victorian Liberals will stand up for Victorian families and make Victoria a stronger and safer place to live.