‘Hang your head in shame’: Government lashes Labor over ratings downgrade​on February 19, 2025 at 5:55 am

An international ratings agency has issued a “negative outlook” for Queensland government finances and called on the Crisafulli government to outline its plan to stabilise the budget.

Shortly before parliamentary question time on Wednesday, S&P Global formally downgraded Queensland’s outlook from stable to negative, while maintaining other key ratings.

It prompted Treasurer David Janetzki to declare the downgrade, which he foreshadowed last month in the mid-year budget update, “Labor’s legacy”.

“There’s no doubt that this will add to the cost of borrowing,” he said, without outlining the cost to the budget.

Premier David Crisafulli called to the Labor members on the opposition benches: “Hang your head in shame.”

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In a statement, S&P Global said the downgrade was in response to the mid-year budget update and the prospect of deficits and debt ratios weakening in the coming year.

But in pointing to “elevated uncertainty over Queensland’s fiscal outlook,” it made clear the new LNP government was not without blame.

“This is because the government describes [the mid-year budget update] as the previous government’s ‘last budget update’ and hasn’t incorporated its own fiscal strategy or all of its decisions in fiscal forecasts,” it said.