The Western Australian Government has posted a surplus of $196 million for the state’s 2012-13 Budget, with surpluses projected to continue for the period going to 2015-16.

 

State Treasurer Christian Porter said the state’s projected growth of 4.75 per cent GDP underpinned the state’s ongoing strong growth.

 

“Business investment is strong, particularly in the resources sector, and exports will drive growth in 2012-13 and the next three years of this budget period,” Mr Porter said.

 

But the Treasurer said despite the strong economic outlook, the State faced a challenging revenue and fiscal outlook.

 

“This reflects growth being concentrated in areas not covered directly by the State’s revenue base, most noticeably the massive LNG projects such as Gorgon and Wheatstone which fall under the Commonwealth’s Petroleum Resource Rent Tax,” he said.

 

The Treasurer said the 2012-13 State Budget contained major re-prioritisation of service delivery, with a range of new State Government initiatives being introduced and funded through savings measures.

 

Mr Porter said the savings initiatives totalled $4.9billion over four years and included:

  • an efficiency dividend to be applied to public sector agencies from 2012-13, starting at two per cent for all departments (one per cent for Education), with additional one per cent dividends to be achieved in each of the three financial years to 2015-16
  • a further efficiency dividend for Government Trading Enterprises to be measured as a percentage of the discretionary spending, starting at 2.5 per cent in 2012-13 with an additional 1.5 per cent in 2013-14, 1.5 per cent in 2014-15 and 0.5 per cent in 2015-16
  • a two-year cap on the growth in the number of public sector workers to further control public sector salaries expenses. This measure will require all departments to operate for the next two financial years inside their FTE cap as it was set in 2011-12
  • a formal policy of limiting general government sector FTE growth to 1.5 per cent per year in 2014-15 and 2015-16
  • deferral of spending on a range of capital works projects across a number of agencies.