Wednesday, 21 June 2023

Economic policy

Peter WALSH (Murray Plains) (16:33): The list goes on. The recent changes to put more taxes on payroll, to put more taxes on businesses, just means that people who have mobile businesses can put their people in Sydney, put their people in Brisbane or put their people in South Australia. There is the announcement that the South Australian Treasurer is targeting Victorian businesses. There is a classic example here. Australian Plant Proteins, who have their pilot plant in Horsham, who turn lentils and fava beans into protein drinks for people that want to be fitter, are now going to put their new, big plant in South Australia, because South Australia has given them a better deal than Victoria to move across the border. There are 300 jobs involved in that business, and that is now going to go to South Australia, because South Australia is more competitive and more dedicated to actually getting businesses into their state.

Those are the things that are happening, that this Andrews government does not realise – that their punitive measures on business, their socialist views on business, are actually driving businesses and jobs out of this state. They will move interstate. They will move their head offices to other parts. They will keep a skeleton staff here in Victoria, because the costs of doing business here in Victoria are going up. Victorians are being punished for those sorts of decisions and Labor’s incompetence.

How could you have a budget that actually puts taxes up but also increases debt and keeps that debt spiral going up? As previous speakers have said, when we have an interest bill of $10 million a day at the moment rising to $22 million a day we all think about our electorates. What would $22 million a day do in fixing the roads? You could actually totally rebuild the Calder Freeway from Melbourne to Bendigo with the interest bill for six months. That is the sort of transitional difference it would make, particularly to regional Victoria, if that interest was being spent on particular projects. We have a government that is hooked on debt, which gets expensive and more expensive, and it is always someone else’s fault. It is someone else’s fault that the GST carve-up is not right. It is about time the Andrews government started barracking for Victoria rather than barracking for their federal mates in Canberra. If you look at that debt as a share of gross state product, it is continuing to get bigger, and that means we are going to have more challenges as interest rates rise to pay the interest bill on that into the future.

How much better off would Victorians be if the major infrastructure projects in this state were actually being built on budget and on time? Thirty billion dollars is a number that most people just cannot comprehend. That is how much over budget those major infrastructure projects are. That $30 billion would build new hospitals in every one of our regional cities – would build the hospitals that we need in Melbourne. More importantly, it would employ more nurses, doctors and health professionals to help solve the health crisis here in Victoria. We would not need to borrow more money to solve those issues if the projects were actually being delivered on time and on budget.

If you go through that list of 49 new and increased taxes, a commitment that the Premier gave in 2014 was that he would not bring in new taxes, would not increase taxes. We now have 49 of those, but if you go through that list, there are a lot of charges there that most people probably do not know that they are paying until they actually have to deal with them. A 50 per cent increase in the Births, Deaths and Marriages Victoria fees is an issue for people, but even if you pay the 50 per cent more, I have got constituents coming to me who want to finalise the estate of a loved one and cannot get a death certificate because births, deaths and marriages are just slow at doing those particular transactions to get the death certificates out the door.

The government generously funded five days sick leave for casual employees, but once the two-year term is up on that with the government funding it, employers are really worried that that will be a new tax to pay for that into the future. What most people do not realise is that casual employees are paid a loading to be casual employees. It actually suits their lifestyle quite often to be casual, so they are going to get the same benefits as a permanent employee but the additional pay of a casual employee. This is the whole issue around a socialist government, a communist government, that has no understanding –

Members interjecting.

Peter WALSH: There are jests from the other side of the house. I would suggest they go and look up the meaning of ‘communism’ and ‘socialism’, and you will find that you fit it to a tee. You actually fit it to a tee. You are fitting it to a tee.