Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s efforts to sell an unpopular budget have taken another hit as ACT Chief Minister Katy Gallagher joined state and territory leaders to criticise “unilateral” federal funding cuts to health and education.
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Speaking after an emergency meeting of premiers and chief ministers in Sydney on Sunday, Ms Gallagher said Mr Abbott could be receiving poor advice on the immediacy of the fallout from the cuts nationwide.
“It’s hard to put a dollar figure on it but what is clear is the cuts to health start from next year and they are significant and in the order of around $40 million,” she said before returning to Canberra.
“We’ve also got cuts in national partnerships and they look to be in the order of about $26 million.”
A one-page communique from the hastily convened meeting said the termination of existing intergovernmental funding agreements was unacceptable.
The leaders stressed the impact would be harsh and immediate, despite suggestions from Mr Abbott that the states and territories had three years to absorb the pain.
He told ABC TV there was an "enormous amount of time" for funding changes to be implemented.
The group has called for a Council of Australian Governments meeting with the Prime Minister before July 1.
“I have sat around the COAG table since 2008 in various capacities, but I’ve not seen a group of first ministers as united as they were at [Sunday’s] meeting,” Ms Gallagher said.
The leaders expressed concern that a national reduction in funding for 1200 hospital beds and the withdrawal of more than $300 million per year from concessions for pensioners and seniors could be made without any consultation.
Together they called for an acceleration of the white paper process on reform of the Federation,
“progressed as a true partnership with the states and territories”.
Ms Gallagher said the meeting had not discussed alternative revenue-raising strategies, including changes to the rate and base of the GST or any changes to income tax models.
Conceding Australia’s tax system could be improved, Ms Gallagher said any review needed to look at all current structures.
NSW Premier Mike Baird said the cuts "cannot proceed".
Queensland Premier Campbell Newman said Mr Abbott and Treasurer Joe Hockey appeared to be edging state leaders towards needing to call for increases to the GST rate.
He called on the federal government to fix its own waste and inefficiencies – not push the burden of savings worth $80 billion to the states.
West Australian Premier Colin Barnett was the only state leader missing from the meeting, which Ms Gallagher said put aside all partisan differences.
She said Mr Abbott would have to face the leaders before Canberra’s hospitals had to consider funding cuts equivalent to about 90 hospital beds.
Ms Gallagher also raised concerns about preventative health measures, pensioners, elderly citizens waiting for care in territory nursing homes, non-government service organisations and students.
“They created a problem in their budget that pushed this fairly and squarely to the states and territories and today we said “this problem is coming back at you and we need to have a meeting about it”.
Ms Gallagher called for Mr Abbott to face the leaders at COAG.
“It is a simple request and it can be easily granted and at least that gives some platform to have discussion and for us to hear from the Prime Minister about what his understanding of the cuts are,” she said.
“I’ve never seen such a group of concerned and hot-headed premiers and chief ministers as was at the meeting today.”
