Fiery debate between Zempilas and Carey as WA state election looms

ABC NEWS (Australia)

High-profile Liberal candidate Basil Zempilas and Labor housing Minister John Carey traded barbs in a fiery debate just days before the state election. It comes as the Liberals released much-anticipated costings for their election commitments less than 48 hours before polling day, just like Labor did when it was last in opposition.

Transcript

00:00Get straight into it.

00:06No love lost between these political antagonists.

00:09Basil, respectfully, it's about giving me an opportunity to have a say.

00:13I can see you're getting...

00:14You've had eight years, friend.

00:15The debate veering towards an episode of Faulty Towers at times.

00:19Under the previous Liberal government...

00:20But how long are we going to go back to the previous Liberal government?

00:23Basil...

00:24John, that was eight years ago.

00:25Basil...

00:26And this observation on the Liberals' long-awaited election costings.

00:29Not a single person of either persuasion or independence or Greens has said to me,

00:34where's your costings?

00:36Nevertheless, they've now revealed their election commitments would cost just over $4 billion.

00:42But with some $620 million in savings identified,

00:46the Liberals say the net impact on debt is $3.4 billion,

00:50virtually the same as Labor's.

00:52The Liberals' costings were conducted by former top public servant Peter Conron,

00:57who ran former Liberal Prime Minister John Howard's office

01:00and was a top adviser to former Liberal WA Premier Colin Barnett.

01:04But the Liberals have defended his independence.

01:06If you rise to the heights of the public service that Peter Conron did,

01:11you vast experience, enormous reputation,

01:16so now I think that would be a slur on his reputation to suggest he's biased in making decisions.

01:21Four years ago, the Liberals' costings amounted to just adding them up,

01:24but even struggled with that.

01:26I'd have to check the policy to see what the cost is.

01:29Well, I don't have it in front of me right now.

01:32This time they say the rationale for the cost of each policy has also been checked.

01:37It was a PowerPoint presentation that was added up by a Liberal Party mate.

01:42That was a sham process.

01:44Also critical of the $5 billion the Liberals have initially allocated

01:48for their promised rebuild of Royal Perth Hospital.

01:51That's less than they're committing to our underfunded Royal Commission into Health.

01:56What we're promising for Royal Perth will actually be determined out of that Royal Commission process.

02:01Meanwhile, Labor's denying the Nationals' claim

02:04the party under-submitted their costings to Treasury by $2 billion.

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