Election 2025: Peter Dutton’s claim he’ll stop $100bn of Labor money put to the test

The Opposition Leader says his fiscal credentials are in tact because the Coalition voted against $100 billion of Labor spending in the past three years, he would not say what proportion of this spending would be reversed if he wins the election.

Peter Dutton visits Food Bank Queensland. Picture: Richard Dobson / Newswire

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Peter Dutton is refusing to say how he will offset the massive increase in expenditure he has unveiled before the May 3 election, despite claiming his bottom line will be better than Labor’s.

Although the Opposition Leader is claiming his fiscal credentials are intact because the Coalition voted against $100bn of Labor spending in the past three years, he would not say what portion of this spending would be reversed if he wins the election.

The debate over fiscal management comes as Mr Dutton claims his $6bn cut to the fuel excise will not stoke inflation, in comments that were rejected by economists who claim it could delay rate cuts.

Veteran economist Chris Richardson said the fuel excise would put upward pressure on underlying inflation, which is the barometer the RBA is looking at while considering interest rates.

“The fuel policy, a bunch of recent policy, adds money to an economy that hasn’t yet defeated inflation,” Mr Richardson said.

“It is the equivalent of a cut in interest rates of 0.2 per cent – meaning that the fuel tax cut would slow interest rate relief for Australians.”

Opposition Treasury spokesman Angus Taylor said the Coalition’s final costings would show a better bottom line than Labor’s because it opposed $100bn of spending during the Albanese government’s term.

Mr Taylor’s office has distributed a list of the Labor spending the Coalition has opposed, with $45bn being through the creation of off-budget funds that will not impact the headline deficit challenge.

The spending also includes the increase in public servants, the Help to Buy scheme and the Suburban Rail Loop, which the Coalition has committed to cut.

But it also includes tax breaks for electric vehicles and funding committed under the Future Made in Australia program.

When asked if he would roll back funding for the programs, Mr Dutton said he would release his costings before the election.

Mr Dutton, his son Harry Dutton and Liberal MP for Ryan Maggie Forrest, who visited a local housing construction site to talk about the Liberal housing policy. Picture: Richard Dobson / Newswire

Pre-election costings do not need to be released until 48 hours before polling day.

“All that detail will be provided in due course in the run up to the election,” Mr Dutton said in Brisbane. “What we’ve said is we are not supporting Labor’s wasteful spending because we don’t want inflation to go up.”

When asked if it was unfair to withhold information from voters with pre-poll beginning next week, Mr Dutton said Australians could trust the Coalition to be a better economic manager than Labor.

In his first speech of the year, Mr Dutton flagged a push against cost-of-living “sugar hits” in favour of getting the economic fundamentals right.

But his two key tax policies have been one-off sugar hits, with the fuel excise cut to add $6bn to the economy this year and a one-off $1250 income tax cut to add $10bn next year.

The Coalition has also chosen against addressing tax reform and big industrial relations changes, or outlining a pathway to surplus.

This is on top of tax breaks for first-home buyers and more money being flagged for defence.

Mr Dutton has backed many of Labor’s spending initiatives, including an $8.5bn top-up for Medicare, more money for schools, an extension of the energy rebate and cheaper medicines.

The Coalition’s major savings initiative is to reduce the public service by 41,000 over five years.

Mr Dutton said the one-off nature of the Coalition’s tax policies meant they were assisting people in the short term and not putting structural pressure on the budget.

He said this was in contrast to Labor’s legislated tax cuts, which will cost the budget more than $7bn a year by 2028-29.

“We haven’t locked in a recurrent spend like Labor has,” Mr Dutton said.

“They’ve spent over $17bn under their tax cut, which is 70c a day, starting in 15 months’ time.

“Australians need help now, which is why we’ve done the 25c-a-litre tax cut on petrol.”