The once proud State of Victoria is facing an existential crisis without parallel in its 174-year history.
Taxpayers are rightly fretting over their physical safety, their mental health and perhaps most of all, the rapidly escalating cost of living in the state.
As the leftist media lavishes praise on the soon-to-be legislated, but highly divisive ‘Indigenous treaty’ – celebrated by Labor – the state slides further into the sludge of debt and decline.
Private sector investment is fleeing Victoria in search of stability and opportunity. Global ratings agencies have the state on permanent watch in light of the huge escalation in public sector debt, coupled with cost blowouts on every infrastructure project this Labor government touches. A finger in the air on costings, it seems, is Labor’s definition of rigorous economic analysis.
Defensive claims by the hapless Victorian Treasurer, Ms Jaclyn Symes MLC, that all is well, are utterly absurd and discredited.
Imagine, for a moment, what a wise government could achieve with a billion dollars well invested.
Improved teaching standards, better school facilities, curbing youth crime, an overhaul of the broken mental health system, repaired roads, more police on the beat, to name just a few possibilities.
Painfully for Victorian taxpayers, the state’s socialist left Labor administration does not constitute a ‘wise’ government. Far from it.
By this time next year, having by then notched up 12 years of atrocious governance, taxpayers will be forking out a jaw-dropping $1 billion in interest repayments every month thanks to Labor’s economic illiteracy and obscene borrowing practices. To make it even more sobering – approximately $25 million per day will be allocated to interest repayments alone.
Imagine 12 billion dollars per year, going to domestic and international money lenders from Victorian taxpayers. The combined efforts of both the Andrews and Allan governments have resulted in a state debt approaching a forecast $200 billion in the coming two years. Victoria’s net debt has grown from a manageable $22.3 billion in 2015 to a figure exceeding $190 billion by mid-2028, unless radical action is taken.
How is it possible that a government could wreak such havoc on its own balance sheet and keep pretending the economy is fine? Profound ignorance and ineptitude appear to be prominent factors in the answer. Not a single Minister or public sector bureaucrat is prepared to state the obvious. Victoria is broke – and still the borrowing and reckless spending continues.
As businesses close their doors, city restaurants lose customers because of wild weekend protests in Melbourne’s CBD – more and more people are exiting Victoria in a bid to avoid high energy costs along with higher state and local government taxes such as the outrageous land tax imposts WorkCover premiums and a plethora of local levies, charges, and fines.
Australia’s leading daily business paper – the Australian Financial Review – has branded Victoria the worst performing economy in the nation and it’s easy to see why. Victoria’s per capita net debt eclipses all other Australian states and territories by a significant margin.
Along with the obscene growth and politicisation of the Victorian public service – Premier Allan and her acolytes are manifestly failing to convince global markets that the government has a way out of the mess. This is very bad news for all Victorian taxpayers as borrowing costs are likely to increase and repayment terms will stretch into decades.
On the political front – Premier Allan is looking more and more isolated by the day. The police do not appear to be happy with government decisions (for good reason), business groups are angry about rising costs and declining sales, and ordinary mums and dads are rightly terrified by the explosion in violent crime across the state.
Allan’s pitiful media performances (and her Ministers’) merely underscore the government’s impotence to influence prevailing social and economic forces (of Labor’s own making). The discredited Daniel Andrews – followed by Jacinta Allan – have trashed Victoria’s economy, its reputation and its credibility.
Labor has run out of solutions, run out of ‘friends’ and is rapidly running out of time.
Vale Victoria.
