Jeremy Rockliff

Premier of Tasmania



18 November 2020

Peter Gutwein, Premier & Treasurer

Labor caught red-handed fudging jobs figures

Not only would Labor blow the Budget surpluses and take us more than $400 million deeper into net debt but they can’t explain their job numbers.

I note the Shadow Treasurer has agreed with nearly 100 per cent of our Budget, however he needs to explain his claims that he will create an additional 10,000 jobs over and above the 25,000 jobs supported in the Budget, for a total of 35,000 jobs.

Labor’s red debt book doesn’t explain how there will be 10,000 more jobs.

Additional infrastructure of $180 million doesn’t equal 10,000 more jobs, and even the total spend of $470 million doesn’t equal 10,000 jobs.

It simply does not add up.

The question for the Labor Leader and the Shadow Treasurer is, how have they modelled this? What assumptions are they using? Where are these fantasy jobs coming from?

And we know that Mr O’Byrne has got form here. He can’t add up.

He made a $210 million adding error regarding the Roads allocation in last year’s Budget debate, which he tried to simply laugh off when called out on it – and he never corrected the record.

Mr O’Byrne needs to clearly explain how he arrived at his 10,000 extra jobs number.

The Tasmanian Liberal Government Budget supports more than 6000 jobs each year, for a total of 25,000 jobs, using commonly understood multipliers.

All Labor has confirmed is that they support 99.7 per cent of our budget, but added $234 million in expenditure and over $400 million in Net Debt.

At such an important time in our State’s history, Tasmanians deserve better than a con job by Labor.



More Media Releases from Members