Treasurer Kevin Foley misled Parliament yesterday with his claim that economic growth had never been higher in South Australia than under the Rann Government, Shadow Treasurer Rob Lucas said today.
Hansard records Mr Foley making the following claim:
“Econom¬ic growth has never been higher in this state than under this Labor government.”
10 May 2006
“However, independent figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) on economic growth under Labor clearly show this claim is untrue,” Mr Lucas said.
“The accepted measure by all economic commentators of economic growth by the ABS is the percentage increase in the Gross State Product (GSP):
Government Year Increase in GSP (%)
Liberal 1999-2000 1.7
Liberal 2000-01 4.7
Liberal 2001-02 3.4
Labor 2002-03 1.7
Labor 2003-04 2.8
Labor 2004-05 2.6
“ABS figures show the Rann Government inherited an economy growing strongly at 4.7% in 2000-01 and then 3.4% in 2001-02 and since then the economy has grown at a lower average rate of 2.4%.
“In fact, ABS figures also show that under the former Liberal Government economic growth rates peaked at 6.2% in 1995-96 and then 6% in 1997-98.
“It is apparent that once again Mr Foley is guilty of not letting facts get in the way of his over-inflated claims of the Rann Government’s economic performance.
“These independent ABS figures demonstrate conclusively that Mr Foley has misled the Parliament.”