Liberals haven't costed any policies with the PBO since caretaker mode began

[Caesar]

You are drawing a pretty long bow there. On Thursday Hockey said the costings are being redone by the PBO in accordance with PEFO. As far as I am aware, the PBO hasn't come out and said that this is incorrect. Until they do I'm happy to accept that on face value, rather than assume that people are lying.

It's easy enough to criticise the delay of costing releases without needing to resort to conspiracy theories.

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

You are drawing a pretty long bow there. On Thursday Hockey said the costings are being redone by the PBO in accordance with PEFO. As far as I am aware, the PBO hasn't come out and said that this is incorrect. Until they do I'm happy to accept that on face value, rather than assume that people are lying.

I'm drawing a long bow? What do you expect us to do when we've heard for years that Hockey/Abbott:

• claim to be great economic managers
• claim Australia's debt and deficit will doom us
• claim we need an election immediately

And this year, Hockey and Abbott go even further and:

• claim we are in a "budget emergency"
• claim (falsely) that they left $70 billion in surplus and (falsely) that Labor has $400 billion of debt
• refuse to release their costings until the budget
• refuse to release their costings because they don't trust Treasury
• refuse to release their costing until PEFO
• refuse to release their costings now we're after PEFO
• refuse to release their costings because they'll bore everyone
• say they'll release their

They've admitted they have a $50-70 billion black hole in their proposals previously and now say it's more like $30 billion (probably due to the cuts Labor has brought in and backflips like saying they now won't remove asset-testing on the Private Healthcare rebate). They have previously lied about the auditing of their 2010 election budget and had errors in that budget worth $11 billion.

What do you expect us to do but to assume they will never reveal their full policies and costings? I can see them releasing some figures a few days before the election without supplying detail (like the supposed $4.8 billion saving from sacking 12,000 public servants) but for you to rely on the double-negative that because the PBO haven't announced that the Coalition hasn't submitted them policies since caretaker mode began, you therefore think that they have - it's just absurd.

They annouce when parties do submit policies. They have told me that the Coalition hasn't submitted any since the caretaker period began. Yet you want them to come out - as an independent parliamentary body - and step into the election with comments that make it look like they're taking Labor's side?

Absurd.

By the way, did you have the same standards for what is a 'lie' when people spent the last 3 years saying Gillard 'lied' when she put a fixed price on carbon?

 

[Caesar]

Like I said, unless the PBO actually comes out and dismisses that what Hockey said as factually incorrect, then a reasonable person would take the situation at face value. Imagining conspiracies isn't really sensible.

I'm surprised you have the energy to get so worked up about this stuff anyway, given that the election result is a foregone conclusion.

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

Like I said, unless the PBO actually comes out and dismisses that what Hockey said as factually incorrect, then a reasonable person would take the situation at face value. Imagining conspiracies isn't really sensible.

I'm surprised you have the energy to get so worked up about this stuff anyway, given that the election result is a foregone conclusion.

I know you would like it to be, which is why you spend so much energy on Big Footy trying to belittle legitimate arguments or waste all our time with straw-man arguments.

You've done both this time - Great work, moderator!

 

[Caesar]

I don't know how it's a strawman argument to point out that if Hockey was actually lying about what the PBO was doing, they'd make a press statement to correct the record.

You don't think the election is already decided? Genuine question. What do you reckon it will take for the ALP to win?

 

[GuruJane]

It's adolescent immature thinking to carry on about costings. As has often been pointed out Labor did not put out its costings until 5 p.m. on the night before the election in 2007 - despite Costellos charter of budget honesty.

Quite correct that they did not, imo and I didn't recall any of the luvvies complaining about it then. Altho you might still have been in primary school Ratts?

All costings are BS if for no other reason than it has now been demonstrated that Treasury figures Mean Nothing. Hockey and co just playin the game.

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

It's adolescent immature thinking to carry on about costings. As has often been pointed out Labor did not put out its costings until 5 p.m. on the night before the election in 2007 - despite Costellos charter of budget honesty.

Quite correct that they did not, imo and I didn't recall any of the luvvies complaining about it then. Altho you might still have been in primary school Ratts?

All costings are BS if for no other reason than it has now been demonstrated that Treasury figures Mean Nothing. Hockey and co just playin the game.

You think it's correct for political parties to not reveal their costings before an election? Wow.

And you do realise Australia's GDP is $1.38 trillion and taxation revenue is around 375 billion? An error of ~$10 billion isn't as far off as your reaction suggests. Policy costings could use the hard figures of what has happened in the year just gone as well, if you are that distrustful of economic predictions.

 

[Skeppersap]

You think it's correct for political parties to not reveal their costings before an election? Wow.

And you do realise Australia's GDP is $1.38 trillion and taxation revenue is around 375 billion? An error of ~$10 billion isn't as far off as your reaction suggests. Policy costings could use the hard figures of what has happened in the year just gone as well, if you are that distrustful of economic predictions.

I note that you did not address Guru Janes atatement about Labor releasing costings at 5pm on the day before the elections in 2007. Why do you Labor apologists find it such a crime this year, yet did not complain one iota in 2007?

You avoided this issue as poorly as Bowen did on Q&A on Monday night. So transparent!

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

I note that you did not address Guru Janes atatement about Labor releasing costings at 5pm on the day before the elections in 2007. Why do you Labor apologists find it such a crime this year, yet did not complain one iota in 2007?

You avoided this issue as poorly as Bowen did on Q&A on Monday night. So transparent!

No - you are making up that people avoided this question in 2007. It was a question in 2007, and quite a prominent, repeated one that was aimed at both parties in that election.

The key differences between then and now as I mentioned earlier in this thread in post #42 (you and GuruJane seem to have conveniently ignored that), is that Rudd and Howard had very similar policies so there was less need to focus on costings. More importantly, the fact the Liberals...

• spent 5 years saying debt and deficit will ruin us
• are doing nothing to address debt and deficit in their proposals
• won't release their costings
• change their reason for not releasing costings as often as Abbott changes his costumes
• had an $11 billion hole in their illegally-audited costings last election
• have already released "PBO-costed" numbers (without revealing the report) that don't add up
• and are SPENDING FAR MORE than Labor

All that makes the Coalition's costings INTEGRAL to this election.

They talked down the economy for 5 years. They talked about about debt+deficit for 5 years. They claim to be good economic managers. They have to stand by their own standards.

(P.S. seeing as you don't post around here often, let me tell you that GuruJane is a bit of a joke. S/he is so biased she thinks everything Abbott does is "brilliant" or "genius" - she even said he is great in bed! And do you really think Bowen avoided more questions than Hockey on Monday?)

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

It appears the Coalition gave all their costings to the PBO just before the official Caretaker period took hold. This means the PBO cannot publicly release them.

It is a massive loophole and a massive blow to transparency.

Policies that weren't costed before PEFO will also get costed with the PEFO numbers, so the Coalition can claim their policies are costed according to the latest figures, but we don't get to see the full detail unless they choose to reveal it. Given estimates of a $30-70 billion black hole in their funding, it would seem there will be a lot of costings they won't want to reveal.

They have already avoided transparency by only revealing PBO conclusions rather than full reports (they did this with Peter Martin and the "$4.8 billion" they claim they can save from 12,000 public servants being cut by "natural attrition" - a hugely optimistic figure). They will be able to do the same tricks with their other policies and claim that they've released costings. And do it just a few days before the election. ****. What a bunch of douches.

 

[Docker Clint]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/23/coalition-costings-australia-still-guessing

The Coalition has run out of excuses for not releasing its costings.

The "they did it too" excuse was always a bit pathetic.

True, Labor waited until the final three days of the 2007 campaign before submitting more than 100 policies for formal costing by the departments of Treasury and Finance, but in this campaign the Coalition has circumvented that process altogether, submitting its policies to the new parliamentary budget office in a way that ensures the results will not be released until a time of the Coalition's own choosing – during the final frantic week of the campaign when there will be little time for scrutiny.

And while oppositions of both persuasions have tried to game the formal costings processes, individual policies have almost always been released with their full price tags detailed over four years.

The Coalition's health policy, released on Thursday, had one line under costings which read: "The Coalition's policy to support Australia's health system will cost $340m over the forward estimates." Some of that – we were told on "background" – would come from cuts inside the health portfolio, an$100 Australian dollar notesd some from "elsewhere". In other words: they'll get back to us.

 

[yibbida]

This is why they haven't released their costings. There is a lot of cuts to come.

 

[AM]

Notice they've attempted to hide their intention of removing franking credits from shares to pay for the wasteful parental leave scheme. When Hockey was confronted with this return to double taxation he was all over the place in attempting explain what the Coalition intends doing.

 

[Ice-Wolf]

The Labor Party have been requesting/releasing costings through Treasury see http://electioncostings.gov.au/

Provides links to the PBO requests for the Greens as well.

Coalition yet to make new requests or release any costings through either mechanism since the caretaker period began.

 

[yibbida]

The Labor Party have been requesting/releasing costings through Treasury see http://electioncostings.gov.au/

Provides links to the PBO requests for the Greens as well.

Coalition yet to make new requests or release any costings through either mechanism since the caretaker period began.

We are about to have the most dishonest government in Australian History.

 

[RUNVS]

The Libs say they are going to cut 12,000 public service jobs but so far have not said from which departments

http://www.news.com.au/national-new...tion-8212-day-24/story-fnho52ip-1226705405717

 

[yibbida]

The Libs say they are going to cut 12,000 public service jobs but so far have not said from which departments

http://www.news.com.au/national-new...tion-8212-day-24/story-fnho52ip-1226705405717

The biggest saving will be reducing the public service by 12,000 people, saving $5.2 billion over the budget forward estimates.

Now it's $5.2 Billion? By the time we vote it will be Eleventy billion.......

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

The Libs say they are going to cut 12,000 public service jobs but so far have not said from which departments

http://www.news.com.au/national-new...tion-8212-day-24/story-fnho52ip-1226705405717

This is one of the only policies the Liberals had shown a PBO costing for (just the conclusion, no detail of course). They were claiming a $4.8 billion saving. That seemed unrealistic even before they said it would take 2 years for the 12,000 to be removed, which makes it ridiculous.

Today Hockey announced his $30 billion worth of savings (with Sweet FA detail about how they got their numbers and only 26 numbers in 7 pages of 'savings' - what a joke), but he includes the saving for removing public servants. There is a sudden jump to $5.2 billion. That's a change by $400 million in 15 days (Aug 3 was when Peter Martin published the $4.8 billion figure).

How on earth does the removal of 12,000 public servants save that much money? It would be $433,333 for each and every public servant removed. Nuts!

 

[DeanoT]

How on earth does the removal of 12,000 public servants save that much money? It would be $433,333 for each and every public servant removed. Nuts!

Over 4 years Ratts. Do keep up. That's 108K py.

Per APS salary numbers we previously discussed, plus super, workcover, etc, it would easily get to $400K plus per position.

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

Over 4 years Ratts. Do keep up. That's 108K py.

Per APS salary numbers we previously discussed, plus super, workcover, etc, it would easily get to $400K plus per position.

I know it's over 4 years, DeanoT, as I have mentioned back when I first raised it and more recently as well, which you should recall. However, the removals will take place over 2 years, so for some it will have to be more like 200K per year when they're removed, and this is the average across the full 12,000. That means 6,000 who earn well over $100K and as we worked out last time that means being AP6, EL1, EL2 or SES. There aren't many management structures that can live without managers so even in the utterly unrealistic situation that one manager is removed for every worker, you still have to have some managers. If you even removed say 3 managers and replaced them with 1, that would mean 9000 managers removed to get back to an average of 6000... And I still don't know how the 'saving' can jump $400 million in 15 days, unless they are making it up as they go along.

What I think is really happening is they are double-counting. Hockey was caught doing that in his last election budget (you know the one that resulted in the auditors getting fined for professional conduct), and in this instance I think he is probably including the full savings of removing environmental departments, not just the staff and resources savings. Then somewhere else he can list the saving for closing those departments to cover a different expense of their's. This would be why they said they wouldn't release a budget bottom line, as it would count as a 'lie' if they double-counted in the one budget, but having several different savings summaries allows them to re-use savings without 'lieing'.

 

[PottSie2]

Does anyone know how Kevin Rudd plans to fund his naval base relocation and what the actual costs are ?

Sent from my GT-I9305T using Tapatalk 4

 

[Ice-Wolf]

Does anyone know how Kevin Rudd plans to fund his naval base relocation and what the actual costs are ?

Sent from my GT-I9305T using Tapatalk 4

It's not for a number of years he has only set in motion the planning for what will be relocated North. Much like the High Speed Rail announcement it funding for the initial planning of a long-term project.

 

[tazzietiger]

Surprise Surprise Rudd, Bown and Wong are going to hold press conference soon to claim there is a black hole in Abbott's savings that was announced yesterday. There is no point for the liberals to release their policy costings and savings because no matter what Rudd will claim there is a black hole. The ALP are the last people who should be calling others out for having black holes in their budgets given their record of record deficits.

 

[Ice-Wolf]

Surprise Surprise Rudd, Bown and Wong are going to hold press conference soon to claim there is a black hole in Abbott's savings that was announced yesterday. There is no point for the liberals to release their policy costings and savings because no matter what Rudd will claim there is a black hole. The ALP are the last people who should be calling others out for having black holes in their budgets given their record of record deficits.

Maybe just maybe, the Coalition should release numbers that actually add up.

You can say what you will about Labor forecasts not materialising but at least their numbers added up correctly.

 

[Andre]

The ALP are the last people who should be calling others out for having black holes in their budgets given their record of record deficits.

Voters should look at their record and say 'Well given their track record, if they say there's a $10 billion dollar shortfall, it probably means it will end up being $50 billion of savings.'