Victorian election: Liberals ‘can balance books’ despite cash splash

Matthew Guy has promised Victorians that he can deliver his big spending election promises and restore the state budget, with the details of his plan to be revealed next week.

Victorian Opposition Leader Matthew Guy and wife Renae on Monday. Picture: Mark Stewart / Herald Sun

Matthew Guy says he is confident a government he leads will be able to balance the state budget, and begin to pay off the Labor’s skyrocketing debt, despite billions of dollars worth of election promises, which include cutting seven taxes.

In an interview with The Australian on Monday, the Victorian Opposition Leader committed to revealing how the Coalition plans to balance the books with the ­release of a pre-election financial statement early next week.

Labor is not expected to release its election costings until two days before the November 26 poll, meaning Victorians who take ­advantage of early voting – which opened on Monday – will do so without knowing how the parties intend to pay for their commitments.

Asked how he would balance the books while pledging billions in spending, cutting seven taxes and promising not to introduce any new ones – amid rising inflation and interest rates, and with state debt headed for $165.9bn by 2025-26 – Mr Guy said: “You’ll see it in our financials next week.

“We are confident that there is sufficient scope over the forward estimates for us to be able to pay certainly for everything we’ve committed … and, more to the point, over the forward estimates the budget will be in a much better position under us than under the current government.”

The Liberal leader has promised to subsidise power bills for six months and water bills for a year, trial free school lunches and cap metropolitan train fares at $2 – all of which he says adds up to an ­average family saving of $6000 a year. Asked whether this was taxpayer-funded bribery at a time when taxpayers can’t afford it, Mr Guy said governments “have to provide incentives”.

“You have to give incentives for business to come here, incentives for people to remain here,” he said.

Mr Guy denied such promises risked exacerbating inflation, ­arguing they amounted to less spending than that promised by his Coalition ahead of the 2018 election.

Asked how he would help Victorians with cost of living if the economy was in a worse state in two, three or four years when many of his short-term promises have expired, Mr Guy said those were questions for the future.

“You’re right, some of those (promises) are only for time-limited periods,” he said. “But that’s the responsible thing to do. I can promise some relief, but I can’t promise everything, and what we’re doing is modest and reasonable.

“It’s not huge. But I think it is sensible, and people would expect us to give some relief, but also be able to afford it, and I can’t break the bank. I have to do what I can ­afford. So we’ve committed what we can afford. We’ll have a look what the economy looks like in 12 months, 18 months if we’re in government. I obviously can’t make that prediction now.”

Mr Guy has pledged to introduce a “debt cap”, which would ­require both chambers of parliament to approve any increase in borrowings beyond what has been budgeted, and to redirect what amounts to about $11bn set aside in the Andrews government’s budget for the $35bn first stage of the Suburban Rail Loop to the health ­system.

“The Premier is lying when he says the state can afford to do both. It can’t,” he said.

Asked how it was that he continued to trail in the polls despite being up against a Premier who locked Victorians down for 262 days, was presiding over a health crisis and soaring debt, and had been the subject of at least four anti-corruption probes, Mr Guy said changing government was “not an easy thing”.

“It’s only happened five times in Victoria since Bolte,” he said.

A November 5 Newspoll was 54-46 in Labor’s favour, two-party-preferred, with both major parties’ primary votes at 37 per cent.