Negative Labor talking Tasmania down at every turn

Michael Ferguson, Treasurer

Labor continues its constant talking down of our great State at a time when Tasmania continues to have the best conditions in Australia to run a business.

Treasurer, Michael Ferguson, said Labor’s main goal is to do exactly what they did in Government with the Greens – and that’s to create havoc in Tasmania.

“Dr Broad can cherry pick statistics and talk down our State all day, the facts however are clear,” he said.

“The former Labor-Green Government trashed Tasmania’s economy when they were last in power. There were over 54,000 fewer jobs.

“The year-average unemployment rate in 2012-13 was 7.2 per cent – with the employment rate in free fall on a year-average basis.

“State Final Demand contracted for six out of seven quarters between December 2011 and June 2013, and was 31 per cent lower, at $32.01 billion in 2013-14 compared to $41.96 billion in 2022-23, the largest ever.

“Gross State Product was 22.7 per cent lower, with the overall economy contracting in 2012-2013 to a negative Gross State Product growth of 0.6 per cent. Retail Trade was over 55 per cent lower.

“And, Tasmania was performing worse under all metrics compared to today according to CommSec’s State of the States report.

“In contrast, under our Government, Tasmania’s economy is thriving.

“Tasmania has topped the CommSec State of the States for 12 out of the past 14 quarters.

“The unemployment rate has maintained historically low levels for months, with a current recorded unemployment rate of 4.2 per cent – a whopping 3.4 per cent lower than the catastrophic 7.6 per cent in 2014 under the former Labor-Green Government.

“And Tasmania is also employing a historically high number of women with 139,200 women employed in our State.

“There’s a reason why Labor have been rejected by the Tasmanian people three times in a row.

“While Labor reminisces of the bad old days when they were in government and unemployment was double what it is now, the Rockliff Liberal Government is focused on delivering on its long term plan to build a strong economy and deliver jobs.”

/Public Release. View in full here.