COST OF LIVING — FEES AND CHARGES
600. Ms M.J. DAVIES to the Premier:
I have a supplementary question. Can
I confirm that despite growing commentary from WACOSS, Foodbank WA and Carers WA, the Premier is refusing to spend
just $156 million out of his $6 billion surplus to freeze government
fees and charges to relieve the cost-of-living pressures on Western Australian
households?
Mr M.
McGOWAN replied:
The Leader of the Opposition's
figure is absolutely incorrect. I will get the exact figures later, but it is
absolutely incorrect. The thing about opposition members is that the Liberal–National
model does not work. They cannot work together. We have seen that in New South
Wales. Look at what happens over there when the Liberals and Nationals are in government. We have the National
Party, which wants to cut down the forests and kill the koalas and thinks that is a virtue, and we have the National
Party, which runs separate processes from those of the Liberal Party.
The National Party in NSW is totally irresponsible. I might say that I have
talked to some people of note in the New South Wales Liberal Party, who tear
their hair out about the National Party there. The model does not work, because
they cannot work together in government. The model of what occurred when the
Leader of the Opposition was in office was —
Ms M.J. Davies interjected.
Mr
M. McGOWAN: Hold on! Let us go
through it. You want to talk about when you were in office! When you were
the Minister for Water, you put up water fees by 80 per cent over eight years.
When you were sitting in Colin Barnett's cabinet, opposition leader,
that is what you did as a minister.
What have we done? We actually have one
budget process. We do not have two. The former coalition government had two
budget processes—the National Party process and the Liberal Party
process. We have one budget process. We have proper Expenditure Review
Committee processes. We actually brought public sector expenditure down to
arrest the inexorable climb in debt that you left us. We turned deficits into
surpluses. We now have the best set of public finances in Australia. We are
going to continue to put this state in the best possible position should there
be a recession next year. If there is a recession next year and we adopted the
former government's model of debt and deficits, opposition members
would be coming in here saying, ''Why did you do that? What a disaster!
What a disgrace! Couldn't you see
what was going to occur?'' We can foresee what is probable. The federal
Treasurer has said that an international recession is quite probable
next year. Preparing the state for that eventuality is what we are about. We
are not going to listen to irresponsible, profligate, hopeless managers like
the Liberals and Nationals.