Bowen says revised budget strikes balance

TREASURER Chris Bowen says the government has struck the right balance between savings and spending in the budget but admits finding savings is getting more difficult.

"A lot of the low-hanging fruit is gone," Mr Bowen said in releasing Labor's mini-budget in Canberra on Friday.

"The task of government continues to be to drive efficiencies and to find savings which are real and sustainable."

He said spending as a percentage of GDP would come down over the next four years and tax as a proportion of GDP would remain lower than under the Howard coalition government.

"We've made revenue decisions and we've made spending decisions ... we've struck the right a balance."

Mr Bowen defended the methodology of Treasury's forecasts in light of revenues falling by $33 billion since the May budget.

"The world economy is more volatile than it's been for a long time and that makes forecasting more difficult," he told reporters.

Treasury's projections in the May budget were "professional and well researched", he said.

Former treasurer Wayne Swan commissioned an independent review of Treasury forecasting which found it was using every tool available.

"It was a good an economic forecaster as was possible," he said.

"I've not seen any methodology or any approach which is superior to the Treasury's in a volatile and difficult economy."

Mr Bowen said the 2016/17 surplus could be at risk if global economic circumstances changed, but it was the government's intention to deliver it.

"We may have further challenges, we may have further difficulties," Mr Bowen said.

"We will respond to changing economic circumstances as necessary but we are outlining our strategy today and the strategy we would intend to stick to."

Mr Bowen said that by world standards Australia's performance was still impressive with lower unemployment and stronger growth.

"But we are being realistic and laying out that there is a softening that affects both growth and employment," he said.

Mr Bowen said the reduction in GDP growth from 2.75 to 2.5 per cent was modest, with Treasury looking to the end of the investment phase of the mining boom.

"Exporting minerals soaks up nowhere near as many workers as building mines," he said.

"You will continue to see strong economic growth compared to the rest of the world in real terms because of the fundamental resilience and strength of the Australian economy."

Mr Bowen said some of the measures in the mini-budget would have their "political costs and political downsides".

But he said the Australian people appreciated the government being upfront and honest about its economic plans.

"We are saying to the Australian people we are calling it as we see it," Mr Bowen said.

"There are challenges in this economy, the transition in the economy ... requires careful management and it requires tough decisions and we will tell you about them now."

Questioned about the 5.7 per cent growth in real spending for 2013/14, Mr Bowen denied the government was engaging in a "spendathon".

He pointed to other figures across the four-year forward estimates, which showed 1.6 per cent spending growth in 2014/15, 0.8 per cent growth in 2015/16, and 2016/17 growth of 1.8 per cent.

"I don't think those figures would bear that out," Mr Bowen said.

"These are relating to revenue decisions, and spending decisions, that we have taken responsibly to ensure the budget returns to surplus."

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Rudd says LNP wrong to cut clinic services

PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd says the Queensland government is making a grave mistake by axing staff at a Brisbane sexual health clinic.

Biala, a sexual health and human immunodeficiency virus service, has about 12,000 patient visits a year and about 800 HIV-positive patients.

Mr Rudd says the LNP's decision to reduce staff numbers from 46 to 10 at a clinic that has been the cornerstone of sexual health in Queensland is disappointing.

Positions to be axed include specialist sexual health nurses and doctors.

"This decision is just plain wrong on so many levels," Mr Rudd said in press release.

"This is just more evidence of the LNP's addiction to austerity which completely ignores the needs of our community."

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Critics slam sale of NSW power plants

Critics have slammed the NSW government's decision to sell off two state-owned power plants. Source: AAP

THE sale of NSW's largest state-owned electricity generator is bad for the economy, bad for the environment and bad for the hip pockets of consumers, critics say.

NSW Treasurer Mike Baird on Tuesday called for expressions of interest for Macquarie Generation's two big power stations: Liddell and Bayswater.

They are the latest plants to be offloaded to the private sector after the Tamberlin report found selling the state-owned assets was consistent with a competitive energy market.

Electrical Trades Union (ETU) NSW secretary Steve Butler said the privatisation followed the sell-off of Newcastle Port, Port Botany, Port Kembla, the Sydney desalination plant and Sydney Ferries.

"NSW is becoming a poorer state thanks to the long list of asset sales that NSW Treasurer Mike Baird continues to preside over," Mr Butler said in a statement.

He said that last year Macquarie Generation delivered taxpayers a $124 million dividend.

"Once these assets and income streams are sold to the private sector it generally results in higher charges for the general public, a loss of income for future governments and a smaller assets base to borrow against," he said.

"Quite simply, the sale of Macquarie Generation doesn't make economic sense."

The assets were likely to be flogged off to foreign investors in China, Singapore or Korea, he said.

The opposition said the announcement was further evidence the O'Farrell government was moving towards full-scale electricity privatisation, which would leave consumers footing higher bills.

"This is just the latest step in the O'Farrell government's plan to privatise the state's electricity assets, which will send bills soaring for households and businesses," Labor leader John Robertson said.

Greens MP John Kaye said the sale of the Bayswater and Liddell power stations would make the move to clean energy much more expensive and disruptive.

"The sale is a greenhouse and economic disaster," he said.

Macquarie Generation is the largest single participant in the national electricity market, representing about 26 per cent of the state's generation capacity.

EnergyAustralia last week snapped up state-owned Delta Electricity's Mount Piper and Wallerawang power stations for $160 million.

Delta Electricity's power stations at Vales Point and Colongra aren't expected to be sold off until next year.

Mr Baird says the sell-off is part of the government's strategy to raise money for critical infrastructure projects.

The AMWU accused the state government of short-changing future generations.

"These assets should be generating long-term income for people of NSW, while also providing secure and affordable power," AMWU NSW secretary Tim Ayres said.

"Instead, the profits will most likely be heading overseas, and responsibility for our energy security will be handed over to unelected and unaccountable private interests."

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Night owls linked to anti-social behaviour

STUDENTS who stay up late at night are more likely to display anti-social personality traits, according to new research.

The University of Western Sydney study shows students who stay awake into the early hours of the morning display greater anti-social tendencies than those who go to bed earlier.

Dr Peter Jonason, from the university's school of social sciences and psychology, assessed more than 250 people to find out whether being a night owl is linked to narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathic tendencies, often described as the dark triad of personality traits.

"Those who score highly on the dark triad traits are, like many other predators, creatures of the night," he says.

There may be an evolutionary basis for the link.

"There is likely to be a co-evolutionary arms race between cheaters and those who wish to detect and punish them, and the dark triad traits may represent specialised adaptations to avoid detection," he says.

The features of the night - a low-light environment where others are sleeping - may facilitate the casual sex, mate-poaching and risk-taking to which the dark triad traits are linked.

Dr Jonason says more work is needed, but the results represent an important advance in the study of the darker aspects of human nature and personality.

His study, The Creatures of the night: Chronotypes and the Dark Triad, is published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences.

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Man injured by polar bear in Canada

A man camping in Canada is in critical condition in hospital after being mauled by a polar bear. Source: AAP

AN American lawyer camping in Canada has been seriously injured after being gored by a polar bear, hospital authorities say.

Matt Dyer, a lawyer from Lewiston, Maine, was attacked in Torngat Mountains National Park on Wednesday, and remains in critical condition at Montreal's General Hospital.

"His wife, who is by his side, says he is doing better and has received great care that should help him stay alive," the hospital said in a statement on Saturday.

The picturesque park is on the Labrador Peninsula.

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Tsvangirai urges fair Zimbabwe election

Zimbabwean PM Morgan Tsvangirai warns President Robert Mugabe(pic) to not 'steal' upcoming election. Source: AAP

ZIMBABWEAN Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has warned President Robert Mugabe not to "steal" a crunch vote next week, so that his veteran rival can exit office with dignity.

"Mugabe stole an election in 2002, he stole the election in 2008. This time we want to tell him that he will not steal again," Tsvangirai said to thousands of supporters on Saturday.

"As a party we don't have intentions of retribution. What we only want and what we are saying is: 'Mr Mugabe run this election freely and fairly so that we can give you a dignified exit.'"

After two previous polls condemned by observers as unfair, Tsvangirai is vying to end Mugabe's 33-year rule and a four-year shaky coalition forced after chaotic elections in 2008.

Speaking in the farming town of Chinhoyi, 100km northwest of the capital Harare, he hit out at the electoral authority after a disorganised special early vote and the absence of an electoral roll.

"I have not been given the voters roll, three days before the elections," Tsvangirai said, saying this was a loophole for rigging.

He again accused the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) of printing eight million ballots - instead of 6.2 million, the number of registered voters.

"I am saying this in full view of observers," he said.

"We know you have printed eight million ballots for (the) presidential election, eight million for (the) parliamentary election. You don't explain why you need two extra million ballots."

The lead-up to the July 31 election has been marred by flawed voter registration, chaotic early polling for security forces, and lopsided campaign coverage in state media.

A special early vote held on July 14 and 15 for police officers and soldiers saw polling stations open without ballot papers, leaving thousands unable to cast their vote.

The country's Constitutional Court on Friday ruled that the thousands of officers who were unable to vote due to the disorganisation, will get a second chance to cast ballots during the Wednesday general elections.

Tsvangirai claims his Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party had also discovered that some of the ballot papers that were cast were later thrown away.

"You (ZEC) messed up the special vote of 70,000 people. In two days you could not handle those people," he said.

"How are you going to handle the 6.2 million voters who are going to line up for one day."

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