Labor begins election campaign with a big lie
12th July, 2010
The Labor Party has got the 2010 election campaign off to a grubby start with its untrue television advertisements claiming that Tony Abbott stripped $1 billion from health funding during the time he was Minister for Health, according to the Federal Member for Wide Bay, Warren Truss.“Labor’s television advertisements are a lie,” Mr Truss said.
Commonwealth expenditure on health increased from $19.809 billion in 1996/97 when the Coalition government took office and rose to $39.882 billion in 2006/07 when Labor came to power. (Source: Parliamentary Library) Health expenditure more than doubled during the term of the last Coalition government.
Public hospital funding increased in every year that Tony Abbott was Health minister — from $7.49 billion in 2003/04 to $9.76 billion in 2007/08. This represents a $10 billion increase in funding during Tony Abbott’s term as Health minister, not a $1 billion decrease as claimed in the Labor ads. (Source: Budget Papers)
“Labor’s misrepresentation of Tony Abbott’s record as Health minister has been formally corrected at least ten times in the Federal Parliament, but Labor still continues to run the unsubstantiated lie,” Mr Truss said.
“Labor has begun the election campaign on an appallingly low ebb. When they make such clearly false statements in their advertisements, why should anyone believe anything they ever say?”
