Wednesday, 18 March 2020

Statements on parliamentary committee reports

Public Accounts and Estimates Committee

Report on the 2019–20 Budget Estimates

Mr D O’BRIEN (Gippsland South) (10:09): I am pleased to rise to speak on the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee report on the 2019–20 budget estimates. I am a member of the committee and went through the gruelling process of the estimates hearings last year. We make jokes about it, but I actually do heartily enjoy it. It is a very important role to be a member of the committee.

The committee has a number of functions, but the objectives of the estimates process list that the committee’s inquiry into the estimates is to benefit the Parliament and the community by promoting the accountability, transparency and integrity of the executive and the public sector, and encouraging effective and efficient delivery of public services and assets, among other things. I highlight those two issues because in these times we need assurances to the community that the executive—the government of the state of Victoria—can help the community in times of need. I am becoming increasingly concerned that the capacity of the state to do that from a fiscal perspective has been somewhat limited, and I will come to that in a moment.

We have had an awful summer. We have had the worst bushfires this state has seen in terms of scale at least since the 1850s and in terms of the damage that has been done to our tourism communities, particularly in East Gippsland but I emphasise those communities in the north-east and also the rest of Gippsland, indeed right across the state. Smoke and poor weather ironically enough have affected the tourism businesses, and not just the tourism businesses. Those businesses that rely on tourists coming through in secondary industries have had a terrible time. I think this government’s performance in terms of assisting those communities has been very poor. I will leave commentary on the actual response to those most directly affected by the bushfires to others, but with respect to promoting tourism and marketing into Gippsland, it has been very ordinary. We have seen a $200 000 grant to Destination Gippsland and some more work done through Visit Victoria, but I do not think that is enough. The government itself is talking in the realm of $200 million to $300 million put towards the bushfires while the commonwealth has committed $2 billion and the New South Wales government over $1 billion. I think this has been sorely lacking.

We now have the coronavirus. I fear that the economic impacts of this have not been well understood. I do not think they have been well discussed in the community. I know one area that absolutely understands it, and that is the share market. That is why we have seen massive writedowns not just of Australian but global shares over the last couple of weeks. I am concerned that there has been nothing from this government. We had the extraordinary spectacle yesterday in question time of the Premier of this state praising the federal government and saying what a great job their stimulus is doing, which is just completely foreign to us on this side. We have never heard them say that. But in this case we are actually seeing the government saying, ‘Look, the federal government has got this stimulus package and we are waiting to see how that goes’. What the federal government is doing is good, and they have announced some more stuff today. It is incumbent on this government to actually put some support out there for businesses.

On Friday we had the release of the 2019–20 midyear financial report, which revealed a $1.1 billion deficit for the first six months of this year. That is a lot. One of the main reasons for that, as listed in the report itself, was that employee expenses were up $947 million on the same period in the previous year. That has left us with a massive deficit, and that has raised significant concerns because of course that is before the impact of the bushfires and the coronavirus on the state budget bottom line. It leaves this state in a weakened position to be able to respond to the crises that now face us.

I am calling on the government to recognise the scale of the economic impacts on business that are coming at us and to ensure that it does what it possibly can. The member for Brighton just outlined in members statements the support that other states have provided to their business sectors, and so far we have seen nothing. We have seen nothing from this government. One of the main reasons is they have lost control of the finances. They are not able to control their spending and Victorians have a $1.1 billion deficit as a result, leaving us in a far weakened state to face the crises that we are now facing.