The Opposition has criticised the Minns Government\u2019s Budget, saying it leaves behind hard working families struggling under Labor\u2019s cost of living crisis and instead rewards Labor\u2019s union mates for their support during the election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Budget relies on increased taxes and cuts to programs to offset the Government\u2019s union wage deals.
\u201cSince coming to office the Government has broken a string of promises,\u201d Mr Speakman said.
\u201cThe Budget doesn\u2019t account for major expenditure items such as the cost of extending the Eraring power station and assumes employee expenses won\u2019t increase by more than 4.1% per year. This severely undermines the credibility of forward projections and forecasts.\u201d
\u201cThis Government\u2019s first priority is rewarding their union mates for their support during the election campaign. Chris Minns lacks vision, and ultimately families and households across NSW will pay the price.\u201d
Leader of the Nationals Dugald Saunders said the Budget failed regional NSW.
\u201cChris Minns and his Government has again demonstrated that they don\u2019t understand regional NSW. This Budget does little to help communities as they continue to recover from the impacts of drought and natural disasters,\u201d Mr Saunders said.
\u201cVital cost of living programs that regional communities rely on have been cut, meaning more pressure on household budgets.\u201d
Shadow Treasurer Damien Tudehope said the Budget forecasts, including a return to surplus next year, are entirely dodgy because the ultimate cost of the Minns Government pay deal with unions remains unknown.
\u201cThe Budget today revealed that the wages bill (including superannuation) will exceed $55 billion in 2027. There is no prospect of the Government\u2019s $3.6 billion being enough to cover union wage demands for the next four years.\u201d
\u201cWages are the largest expenditure item in the Budget. We have seen a $17.6 billion tax hike \u2013 a massive $5.5 billion in 2023-24 alone \u2013 and cost of living measures cut to pay for this deal with the unions. Further unfunded wage increases will wipe out any prospect of achieving a surplus and risk the state\u2019s Triple A credit rating.\u201d
Shadow Minister for Finance Eleni Petinos said that over the coming days the Opposition will scrutinise the Budget and ensure that any secret cuts or creative accounting practices are brought to light.
\u201cThe Treasurer has boasted about $13 billion in savings, including $1.4 billion from the Education Department. We want to ensure that these cuts won\u2019t impact frontline services and adversely affect people across NSW,\u201d Ms Petinos said.
\u201cIn the midst of Labor\u2019s cost of living crisis, rising inflation and high interest rates, the Government\u2019s ongoing focus should be on providing support to families and households \u2013 not cutting essential cost of living programs as evidenced in today\u2019s Budget.\u201d
The Opposition will continue to hold Labor to account and ensure that families and households across NSW are put first.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Opposition has criticised the Minns Government\u2019s Budget, saying it leaves behind hard working families struggling under Labor\u2019s cost of living crisis and instead rewards Labor\u2019s union mates for their support during the election. The Budget relies on increased taxes and cuts to programs to offset the Government\u2019s union wage deals. \u201cSince coming to office the … Continue reading “NSW Libs: Labor\u2019s budget puts union mates before families”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nswnews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22962"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22962\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22963,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22962\/revisions\/22963"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}