Barry & Bairds Big Bad Backwards Budget

Follow @madwixxy

It is great having the Liberal Party back in government is NSW.

This week we got to welcome back the Budget Deficit, how cool, years of budget surpluses and good economic management under Labor were getting a bit boring. I mean really, who wants $1.3Billion sitting around in surplus, when you can owe $718 Million instead?

16 years of Labor, and 15 Budget surpluses, it’s about time we saw what life is like in the red, and it’s great to see the Barry and the Liberals start out the way that they are bound to continue.

Stability is dull and boring. The Gillard government going into deficit to avoid a recession and create jobs, yawn, yawn…. Barry and Bairdie can go into deficit while putting 20,000 on the dole queue so far, with 5,000 still to join them. That’s some adventure, thrill seekers…

Under Liberal we are finally going to enter an era of exciting ducking and weaving.

It is great to see a Liberal Government finally have the guts to stand up and say “You people in NSW are all fools and idiots, so we will treat you as such”

OK, maybe they haven’t actually said that as yet, but at least they are treating us like it. There are numerous examples, I’ll mention a couple that are recent.

Last Friday I watched Pru Goward, Minister For Family And Community Services on 7 30 on the ABC. She was asked explain to the audience why, under a Liberal government, DOCS (Department Of Community Services) was costing more taxpayer dollars to run, yet case workers were seeing fewer children in need. This was raised after the death of a child in the states north. A pretty valid question.

Pru thought for a while (I heard the cogs turn), and then told us it was due to the legacy she had inherited from the Labor government.

“Fair enough”, I thought. Would that would be the legacy where more desperate and helpless children got the attention they needed, and the taxpayer spent less money….??

Tough gig Pru, however based on where you are currently, I wouldn’t look at that as a legacy, I’d tend to look at it as a goal, something you can aim for… Pru also said she was grateful for being given a Ministry where she has some expertise. Wow. Can you imagine how bad she’d be in a Ministry where she had no experience?

Barry knows how stupid we are though, we will fall for anything. The Liberal Party in NSW, as in other states have been telling us how bad the Mining Super Profits Tax is, it will “cripple the industry” and “drive the companies offshore”, or “make them uncompetitive”. The Labor Party would be irresponsible and crazy to add extra costs to the mining industry. The whole “don’t bite the hand that feeds” argument…

Then, this week when announcing his budget, with a straight face, Barry slips in that the mining royalties in NSW will be raised.

Raised??? WTF????  So all that gesturing about Julia raising mining costs doesn’t count for Barry?? This is a flat-out state tax, and it’s not even profit based??? Geez Barry, we may be stupid, but we are not total idiots, we all understand hypocrisy when we see it.

So, back to the Big Bad Budget, let’s have a look at where Barry’s almighty axe fell.

It’s interesting to note that yesterday, NSW saw the biggest protest we have seen for decades, last century even. Schools shut down, as did ferries. Ambo’s, firemen, nurses, and police walked off their job in disgust at the Liberal governments culling of their wages. Over 30,000 people all screaming for Barry’s head on a stick. Barry said it meant nothing, but it brought in over 100 times as many protesters as the “Convoy Of No Confidence”, and over 5 times as many protesters as the biggest Anti Science/Anti Carbon Price Rallies.

This budget however, has a couple of big winners. Removals companies and The Queensland Govt are no doubt celebrating. I would have said the Victorian Government also, but nobody in their right mind would move there with a State Government that is arguably the worst the world has seen since the Third Reich.

First home buyers will be headed north for sure. NSW is already the most expensive state for property, so Barry has decided to bleed a further $1 Billion from the first home buyers by upping their stamp duty.

When it comes to expensive property, Barry knows best. That’s why, under this budget, Barry has personally raised the rent for the 70,000 pensioners in public housing. Barry, creating a whole new generation of the homeless.

Speaking of the homeless. Those kids who end up under foster care, many from living on the streets, or from violent homes, kids that really need  a break, are also set to suffer under the weight of Barry’s Budget .

I think most of us would agree that the Foster Carers who take these kids in, and are so selfless in the risks they take, and the absolute crap they deal with on a daily basis, all to help needy children, these carers are worth their weight in gold.

Not Barry, clearly he doesn’t think these carers are worth their weight in shit. Those 30,000 angry protesters yesterday were getting the royal treatment next to these underappreciated saints. Barry has decided to CUT the Foster Carers allowance by more than $212 a fortnight. That should help with the cost of living….

Did, I say cost of living? Well, that big hike in power prices that the carbon price is supposed to bring, it seems the Alan Jones’s and Andrew Bolt’s of the world were wrong, we don’t need a price on pollution to pay more, we just need a Barry
budget.

Again, Barry thinks we are all stupid on this one…. Barry has locked in an 18% increase in electricity prices. Guess what day that kicks in? July 1. Any clue as to why that date? It is the same day as the Carbon Price kicks in. Do I smell an agenda and detect some finger-pointing to come…?? You bet I do…

But before then, we have the water rates to come. Now Barry and Bairdie haven’t actually raised the water rates, so don’t get all defensive. What they have done though, is threaten privatisation to large parts of Sydney Water, particularly the desalination plant, whilst demanding a 79% increase in post tax profits from them. How do you think Sydney Water will increase profits 79% Hmmm

Oh well, on the bright side, at least Barry is looking after the health aspect by providing funding to hospitals.

On Tuesday he announced $500,000 for Blacktown/Mt Druitt Hospital, and $3Million for Tamworth Hospital. Great stuff Barry.

Except you won’t hear any cheering in those areas….

Blacktown was to be receiving a $125 Million upgrade under O’Farrell, to have this cut to half a million is beyond a joke. Last year under Labor, the hospital was budgeted to receive a $245 Million Dollar upgrade including 120 new beds, and a cancer care centre. Alas, that’s all gone now.

Tamworth’s $3Million dollars, is also rather pale when compared to the $220Million upgrade that was coming via Labor.

Call me a conspiracy theorist, but do such drastic cuts to these 2 particular hospitals seem a little vindictive? A little like Dexter with a scalpel and a bad migraine?

Surely this could have nothing to do with Blacktown being John Robertson the NSW Opposition leader’s electorate, or Tamworth being the Federal electorate of Tony Windsor. Surely Barry wouldn’t be that immature and childish, right?

Now I’m no economist, or rocket scientist, but I wasn’t born yesterday either. I mean, I don’t need someone like Joe Hockey to tell me that if you type 58008 in a calculator and hold it upside down it spells “boobs”, I discovered there was more to the calculator than that in 4^th grade.

Surely if someone like me can see that the alternative plan from John Robertson and Labor makes sense, then someone from the Liberal Party can. At some point they need to take the L Plates off and keep up pace with the rest of the world.

Robbo’s plan helps expand regional business, funding for regional companies under stress. Funding for business’s looking to innovate and take up new opportunities, and at the same time, assist in underwriting up to 44,000 jobs, more than double the number axed by the NSW Liberal govt so far.

Anyway, I’m not going to hold my breath waiting for any good to come out of the NSW Liberal govt. My local member is Missing In Action, my neighbouring MP Kevin Connolly is only seen in the local paper when there is a photo opportunity as new classrooms are opened as a result of the Federal Labor Governments BER he spent months slamming, just a wee tad hypocritical…

I will look back to the good old days fondly, the Labor government were not perfect, not at all, but at least we weren’t travelling full speed backwards.

Back then we had a Premier that spoke to us, not at us. Back then I could drive down Macquarie St without having to wonder if it was closed off for yet another protest. Back then the ferries were running, not on strike. The children were at school learning, not home playing X Box while their teachers marched on Parliament House. Back when pensioners could afford the rent, and Foster Carers were appreciated not singled out and punished. Back when desalinated water was considered “emergency use only”. Back when first home buyers didn’t have to buy a house so far out of Sydney that they needed an Atlas to find it on a map. Back when clean water was seen as a basic human right, not a revenue raiser. Back when hospitals were something you put funds into, not pulled funds away from. Back when we had a government that despite its flaws, actually worked.

I am hoping that people remember those days next Federal and State, and Council Elections.

No matter how much bad press, no matter how thick the political smear, and no matter how much mud is thrown. While a Labor Government  may look not such a good option, experience is telling us the alternative is too terrible to contemplate.

In NSW we live with our mistake daily, and yearn for the day we can correct it.

Barry should have delivered this budget whilst stroking a cat.

Follow @madwixxy