Voters in today’s ACT election are being asked to cast their ballots on promises by the territory’s three major political parties worth nearly $13 billion.
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Ambitious infrastructure pledges and contentious accounting techniques from the parties have meant that big spending promises worth $12.9 billion, more than three times the territory’s annual budget, have been dangled in front of voters.
On the final day of campaigning, the two major parties were still trading accusations of extravagance, waste and financial sloppiness.
By the close of business yesterday, the ACT Greens had 174 of their pledges costed by Treasury, Labor had 151 pledges examined and the Canberra Liberals had 48 of their policies scrutinised.
Chief Minister Katy Gallagher conceded that Treasury had refused to accept for costing a $15 million promise made on Thursday for outpatient services because it was submitted too late. ‘‘I thought you should be able to put it in by Monday and say this is embargoed but Treasury won’t accept it unless you can link it to where it’s been publicly announced,’’ Ms Gallagher said.
The Canberra Liberals say that new spending pledges of $539 million have been examined by Treasury.
A campaign spokeswoman said yesterday that the party did not have time to provide a breakdown of recurrent and capital spending.
The party’s campaign material has also spruiked a $7 billion plan for health, a $3.6 billion plan for education and a $700 million plan for roads with much of the money already committed in the four-year forward estimates period. It is unclear how much overlap exists between the spending pledges in the opposition’s campaign material and the policies submitted to Treasury.
The ACT Greens have pledged $167 million in recurrent spending over the four-year budget cycle and $316 million in capital spending, none of which has already been budgeted.
The centrepiece of the Greens’ campaign, a light rail system for the city, accounts for $200 million of their promised spending.
Labor has pledged $412 million in recurrent spending in the next four years while $307 million has been pledged in capital spending. The party says that the estimated $615 million cost of its light rail promise will be met by private sector investment.
Ms Gallagher said the Liberals were making announcements with money that had already been allocated in the budget, particularly in the health portfolio. ‘‘It appears that that is just adding up money in the budget and re-announcing it as new spending or trying to make it look as though it’s new allocations,’’ Ms Gallagher said.
The opposition was also on the offensive over money yesterday. Liberals leader Zed Seselja alleged the Greens and Labor had racked up spending promises of $1.7 billion. ‘‘It’s up to ACT Labor to explain what will be slashed to pay for their coalition’s $1.7 billion cash splash,’’ he said.
‘‘Whichever way you look at it, they will either have to make massive cuts to their policy platforms or go into even further deficit to pay for their promises.’’ Greens leader Meredith Hunter said she was proud that her party had submitted all of its policies to Treasury by Monday.
‘‘We have gone through the Treasury costing process for every one of our policies and people, for the past week, have been able to go to the ACT Treasury website and view the costings and see that they stack up,’’ she said.
