What’s $10.6b between friends?

#ausvotes #auswaits

The Australian public learned today why the coalition failed to release their election commitments to treasury prior to he last election.  Because their figures were bogus.  All the shadow boxing about treasury leaks was a great diversion for the real fact that while they claim to be the best economic managers, without the treasury holding their hands, they are incompetent and reckless and will, like the Howard Government before them, spend to win office.  Here is what the couriermail reported today:

TONY Abbott's budget credibility was under fire last night with Treasury saying there was an error of up to $10.6 billion in his election promises.

Tony Windsor, one of the three independents who asked for the costings, last night described it as "a black hole''.
But Mr Abbott stood by his election costings and insisted he would improve the Budget bottom-line by more than $11 billion.
The Treasury documents released at 10pm by the independents found the Coalition would improve the Budget bottom line by $863 million over the next four years - well below the $11.5 billion improvement predicted by the Liberals.
The Liberals would deliver a Budget bottom line that was eight times better than Labor, but only a fraction of what they had promised.
The Treasury's five-page report on the Coalition's costings suggested the bottom-line could rise from $863 million to $4.5 billion if other assumptions were made. Mr Abbott said those other assumptions could be "responsibly achieved through prudent economic management''.

The Treasury said Labor would improve the bottom-line by $106 million - double its prediction of $44 million.

Mr Abbott refused to submit the Coalition's costings to the Treasury during the election campaign.  "I think we understand now why he wasn't interested in releasing the numbers," Mr Windsor told the ABC's Lateline program.

"(It's) what I call a black hole anyway of probably somewhere between 7 and 11 billion in terms of difference between what the Coalition said their costings were and what the Treasurer would suggest in terms of an incoming government for their bottom line."

Read more here