The South Australian Liberals will today announce a plan to wipe out the equivalent of two years of the entire budget for South Australian Police with a reckless and dangerous pledge to scrap stamp duty.
In a cynical electoral ploy, Vincent Tarzia is announcing a plan to abolish around one-third of SA's total tax revenue – with no plan to fill the massive black hole he will kick in the state economy.
Already, the Liberals have shown their economic incompetence – citing two different stamp duty revenue figures before their policy is even formally announced. The financial hit to SA was initially reported as being $2.3 billion - according to the Liberals' own calculations - before they evidently panicked and revised it to $1.6 billion. It seems the Liberals are still unsure of the scope of their own policy, and don't know whether it includes stamp duty on motor vehicles and insurance!
Either way, to put the scale of the proposed annual financial shortfall into context, it represents up to two years of funding the entire SAPOL budget – and up to six times the total annual budget of the CFS, MFS, SAFECOM and SES combined!
Vincent Tarzia would have to sack as many as 26,000 public servants a year to make up the shortfall – the equivalent of firing every single public school teacher in the state!
It is abundantly clear that services will be cut sector-wide to pay for this electoral bribe, which looms as one of the most dangerous and incompetent pieces of economic policy ever proposed in South Australia.
If this policy were to be implemented, all South Australians would pay the price through dramatically reduced services and service standards.
Moreover, it would remove the advantage of existing stamp duty concessions for first home buyers in new homes, making it comparatively more difficult for young people to enter the housing market.
The Liberals refuse to tackle the real impediment to people buying homes, which is a lack of available supply.
Labor is already taking big steps to address this - the state's public housing stock is growing for the first time in a generation as a direct result of targeted investment, industry partnerships and a determined focus on building the homes South Australians need.
We have also pledged that a re-elected Malinauskas Labor Government will establish a $500 million pre-sale guarantee fund that will unlock more apartment developments in the CBD and accelerate the delivery of more homes for South Australians.
As put by Tom Koutsantonis
This is a reckless, dangerous and foolhardy policy from an Opposition that wants to take the executioner's axe to South Australian services.
Abolishing stamp duty will gut the state's economy, removing around a third of state taxation revenues every year – representing more than the entire annual budget for SA Police, the CFS, the MFS, SAFECOM and the SES combined, and then some!
Make no mistake, this is a disaster waiting to happen.
Vincent Tarzia is proposing a budget shortfall the equivalent of sacking every public school teacher in the state – every single year!
There is no way South Australia and its services could sustain such a blow.
What makes it far worse is that the chaotic Liberals are already confused about how much their policy disaster will cost the SA economy each year – they initially cited $2.3 billion before panicking and claiming it was actually $1.6 billion!
If even the Liberals can't tell us what their policy entails, they simply can't be trusted to deliver it!
And to add insult to injury, the policy wouldn't even fulfil its most basic objective of helping more young people into their own homes – as it removes the relative advantage of existing stamp duty concessions for first home buyers in new homes.
Vincent Tarzia will say and do anything to get elected, but there is more to government than outlandish promises – and this policy, if enacted, would smash the South Australian economy for decades to come.
Make no mistake, this is one of the most dangerous and incompetent pieces of economic policy ever proposed in the history of South Australia, from a dangerously incompetent Liberal Opposition.
