06 October 2024
Time for Liberals and Greens to take independent costings process seriously

With two weeks to go before polling day, neither the Canberra Liberals nor the ACT Greens have submitted a single commitment for formal costing through ACT Treasury. 
 
Canberrans should rightly expect that parties who want to be involved in a future Government are putting their commitments through an independent costing process. 
 
The ACT Treasury costing process is an important mechanism in the ACT election process that provides a level of transparency and integrity around election commitments. 
 
The Liberal’s failure to submit their policies for independent costing shows they have something to hide.
 
To ask Canberrans to vote for policies and projects lacking detail and without proper independent assessment is typical of this party.
 
Canberrans are left wondering if this is deliberate tactic to hide the true costs of their proposals before Canberrans go to the polls, or is it yet another demonstration of their ineptitude and the approach that the Canberra Liberals would take to governing. 
 
As the campaign enters the final stages it is increasingly clear that the Canberra Liberals vision in 2024 is just a repeat of Alistair Coe’s self-contradictory slogan in 2020: Better Services, Lower Taxes.
 
It is also disappointing that the Greens are yet to submit any of their commitments for independent assessment.   
 
ACT Treasury have made clear to all parties many months ago that in order for commitments to be properly assessed they need to be submitted by Friday 11 October to allow adequate time for Treasury to publicly release any submitted costings – given this is now only six days away it is clear that Canberrans will not get the opportunity to properly understand the true costs of Liberal and Green election commitments.

Statement ends

Media contact:
Kaarin Dynon    0422 772 215   [email protected]