Shannon Deery: Jess Wilson’s appointment as shadow treasurer has spooked Labor
The Allan government now looks like a horse stuck three-wide without cover while the Coalition has started making a late run down the outside rail, thanks to the appointment of rising star Jess Wilson.
The Victorian economy has set in like a bog track at Flemington after a week
of rain.
The Allan government now looks like a horse stuck three-wide without cover while the Coalition has started making a late run down the outside rail.
An almost unprovoked barrage of attacks on the Opposition’s costings ramped up last week, suggesting they can hear the hoof beats coming.
It would have been completely unprovoked, except for the recent promotion of rising Liberal star Jess Wilson to the position of shadow treasurer.
To say Wilson has spooked Labor would be to understate the impact of Brad Battin’s shadow cabinet reshuffle.
The new shadow treasurer has brought sharper messaging, a steadier grasp of the numbers, and a more disciplined approach that appears to have rattled the government benches.
Which goes some way to explaining the series of campaign-style attacks on what the government dubbed the “radical right wing Liberals and Nationals” last week.
A series of press releases warned the Coalition’s economic plan didn’t add up and would lead to thousands of job cuts.
Hypocrisy, thy name is Labor.
This from the government who has for a decade been comprehensively incapable of making its numbers add up. In its first decade in office, just the government’s public sector wages bill alone blew out by almost $17bn.
It means on average the government has had to find an extra $1.8bn every year since it came to office to pay its public servants.
Add on top of that major project blowouts, threats to cut health funding to ease its budget woes and a massive increase in taxes to help pay its bills.
This from the government who inherited about $22bn of debt, but now presides over a debt bill growing at $2m an hour on track to hit $194bn by 2028-29.
It attributes about $40bn of that to Covid.
This from the government who itself has threatened thousands of job cuts across the public sector, the details of which are due to be made public imminently.
Not to mention a string of “commercial-in-confidence” excuses that have kept taxpayers in the dark about how billions have been spent.
And yet it has the gall to call out the Opposition’s economic plan as reckless.
At its core the criticism of that plan is that the promised tax cuts by the Coalition will leave a $11bn blackhole in the state’s budget.
The government is right to call this out and hold to account claims made by the Opposition as we draw closer to the election.
Still, for Labor to now demand forensic detail from the Opposition about every policy cost is a little like the arsonist demanding to see the fire evacuation plan.
Internally, some Liberal MPs are hugely concerned about promises to cut five key taxes, while at the same time promising to increase services.
Doing more with less is a tough task, and the Opposition will need answers about how that can be done.
Especially if it pits them against the might of the state’s massively unionised workforce.
But the Opposition attacks are about more than purely flushing out its economic credentials.
Government insiders say the new focus on the shadow treasurer is grounded in a belief Wilson is a weakness for the Liberals.
Why? Because they say she is against workers.
With her history with the Business Council of Australia they believe they can sell her as someone with HR vibes and views aligned with conservative think tank the Institute of Public Affairs.
And now she’s promised billions in cuts.
“The irony is, she has all the big business coding but none of the credibility, experience or competence,” one senior government insider said.
“Pay attention to when the Premier said that Labor’s people are in the staffroom not the boardroom.”
Labor will use Wilson to contrast itself and recommit as the party of the working class.
As Daniel Andrews so successfully did in 2022.
Who can forget the election ads fun by the then furious CFMEU, still reeling over his handling of Covid.
“Dan might be a prick, but he’s a prick who’s delivering for construction workers,” the ads screamed.
The Coalition has made sweeping promises about cutting waste, fixing the budget and easing pressure on families.
But so far it has been thin on detail about how those ambitions would actually add up.
If the Opposition wants to be seen as a government-in-waiting, it needs to do more than lob grenades at Labor’s spending habits.
Both sides have work to do.
Until that happens, Victorians are stuck watching two sides of politics argue about who’s worse with money, while the bills keep piling up.
Shannon Deery is the Herald Sun state politics editor
More Coverage
Opinion: Depressing decline of Melbourne’s iconic shopping strips
