Premier Jacinta Allan takes swipe at Queensland: ‘They literally dig it out of the ground’

Jacinta Allan has fired back at the Queensland government’s criticism of Victoria’s windfall in the GST carve-up, saying resource-rich states shouldn’t complain.

Jacinta Allan has fired back at Queensland’s attempts to have Jim Chalmers reconsider the GST carve up which saw the sunshine state dudded of cash to “prop up the poorly performing” Victorian government.

The Premier on Thursday said she would make “no apologies” for fighting to receive every cent of the $3.7bn windfall that Victoria received in the GST carve-up earlier this year.

In March, the Commonwealth Grants Commission announced that Victoria’s GST share would increase by nearly $4bn to $28bn, at the same time that Queensland’s would drop by more than $2bn.

Queensland Treasurer David Janetzki on Wednesday wrote to his federal counterpart, Jim Chalmers, warning the “unprecedented reduction will compromise Queensland’s ability to deliver critical services and infrastructure across our decentralised state”.

Jacinta Allan says she makes ‘no apologies’ for fighting for Victoria’s $3.7bn windfall in the GST carve-up. Picture: Luis Enrique Ascui

“I have written to the federal treasurer asking that the re-elected Albanese government reconsider our government’s request to remedy the injustice of the Commonwealth Grants Commission, which saw fit to take 2.4 billion and more than 5 billion across the forwards from Queensland to prop up the poorly performing governments in New South Wales and Victoria,” Mr Janetzki said in a statement.

But Ms Allan on Thursday hit back saying the recent GST allocation came after “significant reflections” from the Commonwealth Grants Commission”.

“It recognised that Victoria is a growing state, it’s creating more jobs and needs to deliver more services,” she said.

“Unlike those resource-rich states of Queensland and Western Australia where they literally dig it out of the ground, Victoria doesn’t have that ... we are a people state.

“We are a great state, we are a growing state, we’re a state that’s built on the skills and talents of our people and it’s more than beyond time that that was recognised by us getting our fair share back of the GST revenue that we send to Canberra.”

Originally published as Premier Jacinta Allan takes swipe at Queensland: ‘They literally dig it out of the ground’