SA State Budget 2022: Treasurer Stephen Mullighan to deliver $233m surplus

A bigger-than-expected surplus will be unveiled in Treasurer Stephen Mullighan’s first state budget.

Rising revenues as South Australia rebounds from Covid-19 have bolstered a larger-than-expected surplus in Treasurer Stephen Mullighan’s first state budget, to be unveiled on Thursday.

Vowing to deliver on the state government’s election agenda without new taxes or “shock” hikes, Mr Mullighan will unveil a $233m surplus for 2022-23 – $94m more than the latest forecast in February.

Mr Mullighan also declared his budget would be in surplus across the four-year forward estimates, while keeping fee and charges increases to about 2 per cent next financial year.

Covid-related spending has plunged the current financial year’s budget – the final one handed down by former Liberal government – almost $150m further into deficit to a total of $1.733bn.

Opposition Leader David Speirs accused Labor of filling a $1bn budget black hole through money saved by pushing out completion of the North-South Corridor road project by a year to 2031.

But Mr Mullighan said the budget would deliver the government’s “substantial agenda” – Labor detailed $3.118bn in spending two days before the March 19 election – while maintaining a “commitment to fiscal discipline”.

“We are delivering on our promise – budget surpluses and no new taxes and no shock tax hikes,” he said.

It is understood a GST surge and increased stamp duty revenue have contributed to the 2022-23 surplus, which last December was forecast to be $102m and in February was forecast to be $139m.

Treasurer Stephen Mullighan in his city office ahead of Thursday’s State Budget. Picture: Keryn Stevens

Mr Speirs said the more than $1bn the government had used to prop up Labor’s $3.118bn election commitments by stalling the North-South Corridor project matched a $1.1bn budget blackhole predicted by former Liberal treasurer Rob Lucas just before the election.

This was rejected in parliament by Infrastructure and Transport Minister Tom Koutsantonis, who dismissed accusations of cost-shifting as “simply not true”.

It is understood $50,000 separation packages for public servants will be extended in Thursday’s budget until the end of the year to help oust 50 executive staff paid an average $200,000, that Labor vowed to axe in an election promise saving $41.5m over four years.

Mr Mullighan has vowed to slash spending to squash state debt, which had been forecast to skyrocket to more than $64bn in 2035-36 if unchecked expenditure growth of 4 per cent continued.

Releasing Labor’s costings on March 17, Mr Mullighan said public sector spending would be slashed by more than $670m over four years by a 1.7 per cent “efficiency dividend” but frontline services would be quarantined from such cuts.