Media Release

The Hon Andrew Robb AO MP

Shadow Minister for Finance and Debt Reduction
Federal Member for Goldstein

Friday 13 August 2010

LABOR’S COSTING HYPOCRISY STANDS EXPOSED

Labor’s continued call for the Coalition to submit policies to the Treasury for
costing by the end of today is breathtaking in its hypocrisy.

It must be highlighted that the Coalition has submitted more policies for costing
than Labor - despite serious concerns that the integrity of the process has been
compromised by a leak of a confidential Treasury document - an offence under the
Crimes Act.

As of this morning the Coalition has submitted 52 policies - eight more than
Labor. This includes 39 savings measures totalling $14.7 billion and 13 expenditure
proposals totalling $11 billion.

What’s more, Julia Gillard has repeatedly said in statements that by election day:

“All our policies will be submitted for costing under the Charter of
Budget Honesty.”

It should also be noted that Labor will formally launch its campaign on Monday.

Labor will inevitably announce further spending commitments at its launch as part
of its desperate bid to buy the election - after the cut off for the submission of
policies for costing under the Charter.

We are still awaiting the ‘unpopular cutbacks’ that Julia Gillard promised. These
are critical considering that Labor is currently in the red on their spending
commitments to the tune of $276 million.

It must also be remembered that in 2007 Labor submitted 85 per cent of its
policies for costing the day before the election.

The inconvenient truth that Wayne Swan was reminded of this morning by Fran
Kelly on Radio National.

The Australian Federal Police is currently investigating the leak of Treasury

analysis which was designed to discredit Coalition commitments.

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 Media Release
Until this issue is resolved and confidence is restored in the costings process, the
Coalition will withhold the remainder of its policies from the Treasury process until
confidence in the impartiality of Treasury is restored.

The Coalition is committed to having all its spending and savings initiatives
independently verified by a major accounting firm and publicly released well in
advance of polling day.

Media Contact: Cameron Hill 0408 239 521

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