Abetz fails to rule out forced redundancies as cuts ramp up

Eric Abetz has failed to rule out forced redundancies in the wake of a damning report revealing his cuts would be the deepest imposed by any state or territory this century.

The McKell Institute has found the Abetz cuts are nearly ten times larger than the cuts imposed by Campbell Newman’s Government which had a devastating effect on Queensland’s schools and hospitals.

With $1.5 billion worth of cuts on the way to the services Tasmanians rely on, our own teachers and nurses are bracing for impact.

Labor has been contacted through our Uncover the Cuts website by workers concerned that forced redundancies are on the table.

Eric Abetz’s response today will do nothing to ease their fears. Not at this stage is well short of a guarantee.

The McKell report notes that the “2.1 per cent cut to health funding proposed for the current financial year would be the only instance this century where a state or territory government reduced total annual health expenditure (excluding the Northern Territory in 2022-23, which was entirely due to the unwinding of COVID-era programs)”

We’re already hearing stories of Tasmanians waiting up to 12 months for urgent colonoscopies that are meant to be undertaken 30 days after positive bowel cancer screenings.

It is impossible to see how our desperately overstretched health services are going to cope with $700 million worth of cuts, as Premier Rockliff and Eric Abetz make Tasmanians pay the price for 13 years of Liberal waste.