Kennett's mini-budget hits workers, environment

November 4, 1992
Issue 

By Peter Boyle

MELBOURNE — The Kennett Liberal-National government hit the public's pocket and the environment in an October 28 mini-budget. Victorian families will be up to $870 worse off on the average because of increased state taxes and charges.

The environmental damage will prove far costlier, though harder to express in dollar terms, environmental activists have warned.

The mini-budget includes the slashing of another 7000 public sector jobs; the abolition of holiday loading for all state award workers; a 10% increase in gas, electricity, water and public transport charges; a $70 increase in car registration fees; a 10% increase in stamp duty on everything except life insurance policies; a new tax on lottery tickets; a $100 levy on all rateable properties; a 2% across the board cut in government department spending. A further $1 billion of spending cuts is promised over the next four years.

While the public was offered more pain, employers and petrol guzzlers were offered incentives. The Pyramid petrol levy was abolished, thresholds for payroll and land taxes were lifted, stamp duty on debenture raisings under $10 million was scrapped, and financial institutions duty on offshore banking units and treasury products was abolished.

Also feeling no pain are 17 government MPs, whose salaries have been raised by a total of $1.5 million. Minister for industry and employment Phil Gude received an extra $8500, taking his salary to $122,000.

Premier Jeff Kennett sought to exploit public shock at the chronic state government debt and liabilities estimated by the auditor-general to be $41.3 billion plus $13.4 billion owed by statutory authorities. The idea was to shift the burden for the state's financial crisis — clearly a direct result of unbridled corporate greed and the previous Labor government's willingness to underwrite private speculators — more on to the backs of ordinary people.

Worse will come as Kennett's privatisation program gets under way. On the block are more power stations, profitable sections of other utilities and the very profitable state softwood plantations. More jobs may go, and the Wilderness Society warned that the government had also declared "open slather" for woodchipping of native forests on private and public land.

Ray Walford of the Public Transport Users Association told Green Left Weekly that the mini-budget would impact immediately on the environment by discouraging public transport and encouraging petrol guzzling.

Higher fares would mean a further fall in public transport usage (which fell by 50% between 1961 and 1990). They follow a 34% increase under the previous Labor government.

Previous transport spending cuts had caused short-staffing, which made services less reliable and so further discouraged public transport usage. The prospect of more cuts was horrendous.

The mini-budget will increase air pollution and make the targets for reduced greenhouse gas emissions even more unrealisable.

Instead of lifting the levy on petrol, the PTUA recommends a 3.5 cent levy on petrol to replace the $70 increase in car registrations. As long as public transport is inadequate, some people will need to own cars, and raising the up-front charges unfairly penalised low income earners instead of hitting excessive users of petrol, Walford said.

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