EMBARGO: 5:00 PM

PRIME MINISTER

FOR MEDIA SUNDAY MARCH 28 1982

.  Ã¢ÂÂ   ELECTORATE TALK '

During the. coming week, the people of Victoria will be making  their real decision about how this State will be governed over "   the next three years, and nobody should underestimate the  importance of choosing rightly, because the costs and damage  of a Labor government in Victoria would be enormous.

As a result of the campaign, the measure of the parties and  their leaders and the real issues in this election are now . starker and plainer than ever. It is a.simple question of the  kind of people we want to govern Victoria, and the policies

and goals we want to pursue. On the one hand,  there is  Lindsay Thompson, independent and free to govern in the  interests of everyone, with a proven record of dedication

and efficiency, with a knowledge of what people and their  families want, and with policies to keep building Victoria  up during the 80s. On the other hand there is the Cain Labor  Party, totally irresponsible about their promises.with the

socialist left waiting in the wings ready to call in its  debts and with the militant unions poised to extort sweetheart  deals that will damage employment, living standards and  growth in Victoria. .

Victoria is a great State with the highest household incomes  in Australia, the highest home ownership in Australia, with  tremendous rural output, long established resource projects  through coal and oil and great manufacturing enterprises. . Labor denigrates these and other great Liberal achievements  which have made Victoria a State which we can all be proud

of.Instead of developing workable realistic policies to keep  building Victoria up, Labor has gone around making promise upon  promise.for government spending schemes, promises which  Lindsay Thompson has added up to a cost of more than $3,000 million

in three years alone - $21 a week for every family.  When Labor  was told what it would all cost, they tried to deny the  commitments that had been made, even though they are written  down in black and white.

The people of Victoria won't stand for this, nor will the  people of this State stand.for the $600 odd million so-called  development fund ^-Labor's rabbit out of a hat which would  milk the public authorities of their funds and which the

official expert committee of enquiry has rejected.

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I do not believe the people of Victoria will run the certain  risk of the kind of chaos that now plagues the Wran government  in New South Wales, as it plagued the last days of the Holgate  government in Tasmania. In every case, Labor's mismanagement

in office, their inability to govern well, never fails to be  revealed.

Victoria does not want a government that relies on impractical  gimmicks. We do not want a government that has to go along with  what the union bosses want. We do want a government that  cannot face up to real issues,.that tries to hide its real

intentions when the damaging cost of its promises are brought  into the open. We want a government that knows where it is  going, whose goals match the needs and wants of Victorians  and their families, which can implement practical policies

in the interests of all Victorians. That.means a Liberal  government for Victoria, and Lindsay Thompson for Premier.

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