Queensland debt to surge by $41bn over four years ahead of big-spending budget
Queensland Treasurer Cameron Dick will rack up an extra $41bn in debt over the next four years as the state Labor government prepares to hand down a big spending budget ahead of the October state election.
Queensland Treasurer Cameron Dick will rack up an extra $41bn in debt over the next four years as the state Labor government prepares to hand down a big-spending budget ahead of the October state election.
New Treasury forecasts, released on Wednesday, reveal total government debt will surge to $188bn by mid-2027, up from the $147.02bn predicted in last June’s budget.
Mr Dick blamed the huge revision in borrowings on a collapse in coal prices, a reduction in GST share from the Commonwealth and population growth.
He would not say whether the cost-of-living relief package to be unveiled in the budget, which will exceed $8.2bn next financial year, would be wholly funded by taking on more debt, but said the government would “use borrowings to deliver for Queensland”.
“We are looking to put together … the biggest cost-of-living relief package that any Queensland government has ever delivered, we remain absolutely committed to that to that,” he said. “We will go into deficit as a state if it means keeping Queensland families and households in surplus – that’s the most important thing for me at the moment. Cost of living is hurting every Queensland family.”
On the government’s preferred measure of net debt, which excludes publicly owned companies, borrowings are forecast to hit $73bn by mid-2027, up from $46.93bn estimated in the budget.
A large portion of debt is being used to pay for the state’s $96.2bn capital works program – and its blowouts – including new renewable energy projects, public housing and hospital expansions.
The growing debt bill comes despite a $15bn coal royalty windfall in last year’s budget.
Liberal National Party Treasury spokesman David Janetzki said debt had increased because of “wasteful spending”, citing the $223.5m it splashed to build the privately owned Wellcamp quarantine facility, which was used for just six months and housed 730 people. “We’ve never seen a government that has blown more on project overruns, borrowed more, taxed more, and yet Queenslanders have less and less to show for it,” he said.
Mr Janetzki said debt and taxes would be reduced under an LNP government, but confirmed the opposition would not release its debt-reduction strategy or tax plan until after the June budget.
Mr Dick lashed LNP leader David Crisafulli for failing to detail an economic policy six months out from the election.
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