Liberals plan a three month budget delay to get their policies settled

Tasmanian public servants will be waiting months before the new government reveals where it will find $500,000 in budget savings promised during the campaign, and whether their jobs are safe.

The incoming Liberal Government has revealed it will not hand down its first budget until August, three months later than the usual May announcement.

Treasury spokesman Peter Gutwein says the party needs time to get its policies settled and incoming Labor governments have delayed their first budgets in the past.

While he is yet to be officially named Treasurer, Mr Gutwein is already planning a public sector jobs freeze when the new government takes power.

He says it will start hiring new police officers, school nurses and teachers in the coming financial year.

"I say it takes time for a budget to be re-written, we are not going to bring down a Labor budget, we are going to be bringing down a Liberal budget and we will be doing that in August this year," he said.

He says most departments will be instructed not to hire new public servants between now and budget day.

"We've made our position perfectly clear in regards to the way that we want to see the public sector managed," he said.

"And obviously it would be ridiculous if we were to allow a significant increase in employment numbers in the public sector over the next couple of months, and we'll be talking through those matters with both Treasury and the other departments when the ministry is sworn in."

Greens Leader Nick McKim thinks the Liberals could be planning more spending cuts.

The rest is here:

Liberals plan a three month budget delay to get their policies settled

Related Posts

Comments are closed.