Liberals deliver massive markdowns on election promises

The best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour, so just how much of the Liberals’ election promises can be expected to come true? Political Editor DAVID KILLICK has the numbers.

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THE political adage is “campaign in poetry, govern in prose”, but Treasury provided an interesting metric for Liberal campaign promises during the week — just take 25 per cent off.

For all the hype around multi-billion dollar multi-year infrastructure plans and repaving the roads and bridges to prosperity, only about three-quarters of the florid verse that tumbles from the lips of our governing party ever seems to come true.

Just ask anyone who can remember the promise of the four-lane Midland Highway.

You can get there by coming down the fifth lane on the Southern Outlet, go past the underground bus mall, turn left at Macquarie Point then follow the Hobart Light Rail to the new Bridgewater Bridge.

The Liberals have made about $750m in promises so far in this campaign.

They are about to become the first party in Tasmanian electoral history to fund their election pledges with the money left over from the promises they didn’t deliver from the last election campaign.

Labor claims there will be $600m left in the bank this financial year alone.

Premier and Treasurer Peter Gutwein. Picture: Zak Simmonds

Nobody can credibly blame COVID either.

“Over the period 2014-15 to 2019-20 an average annual underspend of approximately 25 per cent has occurred,” the Treasurer’s own Pre-Election Financial Outlook Report says. That’s the entire time the Liberals have been in power.

At Thursday’s leaders’ debate, Premier Peter Gutwein asked Labor leader Rebecca White how she could sleep at night when her party was airing ads claiming TAFE and Hydro were being privatised.

But you’d have to wonder who is losing sleep after promising for the fourth time to start Stage Two of the Royal Hobart Hospital.

Does Michael Ferguson wake in fright after accusing Labor of making “promises that simply cannot be believed or delivered”?

There is another handy adage — that the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour.

So when you hear someone from this government making a promise with a dollar sign attached during this election campaign, make sure you take about 25 per cent off.

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