State Election 2021: WA Liberals to release policy costings in week before poll, call for establishment of PBO

The WA Liberals will only release their policy costings the week before the election, unless the McGowan Government follows through on its pledge to establish an independent parliamentary budget office. Opposition leader Zak Kirkup renewed calls for an independent umpire on election commitments after Labor yesterday unveiled a “spendometer” claiming the Liberals and Nationals had already made a combined $8.1 billion worth of election commitments. While declining to nominate his own estimate of Liberal spending to date, he revealed that policies announced by the National Party were not guaranteed should the two parties form government together after the March election. “There's obviously the negotiation that will take place as part of forming government,” Mr Kirkup said, adding he was only committed to following through on Liberal policies. “It depends of course, we might be lucky enough to form a government with a majority and then in that case our friends in the National Party — whilst I welcome them as part of the Cabinet –— would be in different positions.” Labor’s analysis of the costs of the Liberal and National election policies ignores $1.2 billion in promised Commonwealth Government funding for Roe 8 and 9, which would knock the total down to $6.9 billion. However, that remains seven times more than the McGowan Government’s $940 million worth of commitments, with Treasurer Ben Wyatt yesterday claiming Mr Kirkup and Nationals leader Mia Davies were “climbing a debt mountain with no plan to get down.” “I reject that entirely,” Mr Kirkup said, accusing Labor of resorting to negative attacks because it had “no plan for the future of Western Australia”. “It's only the Liberal Party who has a plan and a vision for the future of Western Australia,” Mr Kirkup said. “The Labor Party will continue to attack us at every turn, they'll continue to try and spin their way through this election because Mark McGowan and the Labor Party are treating this election as if it's a foregone conclusion. “They don't think they need to put a plan to the people of Western Australia. That they don't need a plan to address the record issues in relation to ambulance gridlock, violent crime, the lack of resourcing for police, the homelessness crisis (and) the family and domestic violence crisis that's happening in our city.” In other States, parliamentary budget offices assess the election commitments of opposition parties and provide confidential advice and analysis of their likely costs. Establishing a PBO was a Labor pledge ahead of the 2013 election and a key recommendation of the Langoulant Report into government programs and projects commissioned by the McGowan Government. Once elected, Premier Mark McGowan claimed the promise was only made ahead of the 2013 election and “we have not made a similar commitment since”. Mr Kirkup insisted it was not too late to set up a PBO and that he was willing to “work constructively with the Government” to get it done. “We haven't heard whether or not the Government is or is not going to establish a parliamentary budget office,” he said. “If that fails, then we will definitely irrespective release our costings to the people of Western Australia in the week before the election which is the tradition here in our State during campaigns.” Mr Kirkup would not commit to providing his policies to Treasury to be costed, an opportunity Mr McGowan also refused ahead of the last election when in opposition.

State Election 2021: WA Liberals to release policy costings in week before poll, call for establishment of PBO

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