Baillieu's Budget Blustering: another tale of desperate state Tory opposition

Poor Ted Ballieu must have got the word from Federal top brass that when times are tough there is only one rule for the Tory's: oppose everything, even if its exactly what you asked for, and then some. Then blame Kevin Rudd. Then deny the existance or importance of inflation.

Before the release of today's budget Ted had a simple message: restrain borrowing and invest in "productive infrastructure". Today, in the midst of the global financial crisis the Victorian government delivered a surplus budget alongside the biggest investment in public infrastructure in Victorian history.

All his demands exceeded, Ted Ballieu should have kept his mouth shut, instead he plunged his foot into it, coming out with a series of bizarre attacks, including:

- Blaming Kevin Rudd for putting the Victorian budget in surplus, and then using this to argue that Labor were poor economic managers;

- Claiming Victoria would lose its triple AAA credit rating (either totally invented, or based on his misinterpretation of a statement from ANZ yesterday, which was clarified within 4 hours);

- Attacking the government for engaging in massive spending on infrastructure that he demanded;


And finally in a stunning display of economic prowess:

- Basing his arguments about future possible debt on what is apparently his own personal accounting method, which revolves around what he refers to as "raw dollar terms", which allows him to make comparisons between today and 17 years ago without the time consuming and disadvantageous process of taking inflation into account which would have destroyed his argument.

Read the full debacle - in the 'leader' of the oppositions own words - here.