The media announcements are that $19 million will be spent in this budget to build the first part of the $70 million Daintree microgrid. Federal Leichhardt MP Warren Entsch said โThe Morrison Governmentโs $19.3m investment will support Stage One construction of the Daintree microgrid project.โ
The budget papers below tell a very different story.
Only $750,000 has been allocated to be spent on it in this budgetโs financial yearย 2021 to 2022. The Federal Government is only committing 1% of the actual $70 million estimated cost of the microgrid in real money this budget. $750,000 is a lot less than $19 million they have spruiked in the headlines.
The balance is in forward estimates of $6,200,000 in 2022-23 and $1,800,00 in 2023-24.
Forward estimates are not firm commitments. They are estimates of what may, or may not be, in future budgets.
Remember Back in Black in the 2019 budget when the government stated that budget was in surplus?
It turned out that this was a forward estimate for 2020, as the actual budget in 2019 was in deficit.
2020 ended up having the biggest deficit in Australiaโs history instead of a surplus.
This budget has set a new record for budget deficits. It is estimated to be the greatest deficit in Australiaโs history- of almost one trillion dollars. This is a debt that will have to paid off by the taxpayers by either reducing government spending, services, increasing taxation, or all of these options. At some point the government has to rein in its record spending and become fiscally responsible so that Australians are not lumbered with enormous debt with no way to pay it back.
The reality of this enormous debt will most likely come next year when the pandemic is over and life starts to return to normal. DouglasNews.Network will be interested to see if the forward estimates in this budget are works of fiction like the forward estimates in the last two budgets.
Is this just an election budget with lots of extravagant pork barrels?
DOUGLASNEWS.NETWORK
