Qld budget: Treasurer Cameron Dick rules out new revenue sources

The Queensland treasurer has ruled out any new revenue measures in next month’s budget, unlike Victoria’s recent effort.

There will be no new revenue measures in Queensland’s upcoming state budget, Treasurer Cameron Dick has affirmed, signalling the state isn’t “labouring” under Covid-19 debt like Victoria.

And there are “three key aspects” to the mid-June state budget all focused on cost of living, with the state government “relentlessly focused” on supporting Queenslanders amid hip pocket pain.

Mr Dick’s comments come after the Victorian government’s shock move this week to slug property owners and businesses with a Covid-19 debt levy in a bid to pay down $31.5bn of pandemic borrowings over a decade.

Despite the contentious revenue measures Victoria’s net debt trajectory is on track to reach $171.4bn by 2025-26.

Treasurer Cameron Dick in Question Time this week. Picture: Glenn Campbell/NCA NewsWire

Comparatively, Queensland’s net debt was set to hit $39.2bn by 2025-26 based on last year’s forecasts.

Mr Dick said the state’s economy was strong and the budget was “not labouring under $30bn of Covid debt like Victoria is”.

“Queensland families and businesses can be confident our revenue settings will be unchanged in next month’s budget,” he said.

He also reaffirmed the state government’s intention to provide Queenslanders with a power rebate on top of what the Commonwealth included in its recent budget.

“We’re going to be relentlessly focused on that to support Queensland individuals, families and businesses going forward. But there’s some good things happening in our economy. And there’ll be some good things in the budget too.”

The budget update in December last year revealed the state government was expected to pocket $27.3bn in royalties by 2025-26, up from the $20.7bn initially predicted in the June budget — a majority of it from coal.