WA election costings row escalates
Date
March 1, 2013
The row over the price tags on West Australian election commitments has escalated, with the opposition pouncing on Treasurer Troy Buswell for betting on hefty federal government contributions for the Liberals' transport projects.
Mr Buswell said he expected half of the projects - the MAX light rail, a heavy-gauge rail line to Perth's airport, and the Perth-to-Darwin highway - would be paid for by the federal government.
He said that was "pretty consistent" with commonwealth investment in other metropolitan projects, including the Gateway road project.
Funding from the federal government's Nation Building Program had been included in current forward estimates, he said.
"There is plenty of evidence that that money will flow and it will flow into those projects because they are the government's priority projects," Mr Buswell told reporters on Friday.
"I would be looking at the commonwealth to fund at least half of those projects."
But opposition treasury spokesman Ben Wyatt said the admission was extraordinary and showed the Liberals' key election pledges were "nothing but empty promises".
"It casts serious doubt over these major Liberal Party promises and highlights a massive black hole in their budget," Mr Wyatt said.
"They will only proceed if the federal government picks up more than half of the tab."
Mr Buswell said he would submit all of the Liberal Party's election commitments to treasury for independent costing on Friday afternoon.
They would appear on the treasury website by Thursday at the latest, he said, adding the Liberals were "very confident and comfortable" with the figures they had provided for validation.
If the party had made mistakes, that would be made clear in the Treasury documents, Mr Buswell said.
Meanwhile, treasury revealed its assessment of Labor's Metronet rail project, costing it at $4.335 billion, compared with the party's $3.8 billion estimate.
The Liberals had said Metronet would cost $6.4 billion.
Mr Wyatt defended the party's decision not to hand over all its election commitment costings to treasury - saying the Liberals had done the same while in opposition in 2008.
"We'll be submitting the aggregates of our costings to treasury so they can then inform us what impact that has on the net debt level of the state," he said.
Mr Buswell accused Labor of being "all over the shop" with its costings and called on the party to fully inform voters about its plans.
He said there were "risks" around operating costs for Labor's Metronet, pledges relating to police and building an AFL stadium in Subiaco by 2018, as well as an alternative plan for developing Perth's waterfront.
Opposition leader Mark McGowan initially said the alternative waterfront plan was "good" but later denied he had adopted it.
Mr Buswell also said Labor's plan to abolish the Tariff Equalisation Contribution levy to reduce household power bills could cost up to $250 million a year.
He said he had not met anyone other than Mr McGowan who believed Labor's plans were deliverable.
Mr McGowan said Labor would build Metronet, because the city's roads would choke if it didn't.
Read more: http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/wa-election-costings-row-escalates-20130301-2fbk0.html#ixzz2MKovIdR5
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