12:00a.m. 13th May 2008

Sunshine Coast residents will learn just how much of Labor’s half a billion when treasurer Wayne Swan hands down his first budget tonight.dollars worth of promises for the region will be delivered over the next financial year

Mr Swan and fellow former Nambour High student prime minister Kevin Rudd received a rock star’s reception when they visited the Coast before the November election.

They and other senior Labor MPs pledged a fistful of dollars to fund projects and infrastructure.

The Coast was promised $5 million for an entertainment, conference and exhibition centre, with $1 million to be outlaid immediately and the balance to be paid when council was ready to begin construction.

Labor also vowed to contribute $5 million for stage two of Quad Park stadium, $1.3 million to revitalise Nambour’s CBD, $4.6 million for a water-recycling demonstration project at Coolum Ridges estate and $3 million for an Art and Ecology Visitor Centre at Tanawha.

Residents were told the region’s roads would receive a boost under Labor, with $480 million committed to improving the Bruce Highway.

The ALP pledged $200 million to start work on a 65km, four-lane bypass of the dangerous stretch of highway from Cooroy to Curra, and $35 million to rip up and re-lay 5km of damaged highway on the Nambour bypass.

A further $195 million was promised to upgrade interchanges at Boundary Road, Bribie Island Road, Pumicestone Road and Johnston Road; $30 million to fix highway-crash black spots; and an additional $20 million for maintenance.

Mr Rudd has already given an undertaking to honour Labor’s pre-election promises, despite the search for savings to keep a lid of inflation.

Some Sunshine Coast coalition MPs have previously expressed fears that some local projects could be axed when the Budget is unveiled.

Meanwhile, Mr Rudd has told government MPs that the federal budget will be a “good Labor” one.

Mr Swan is expected to announce a huge surplus of between $17 billion and $22 billion, fuelled by the minerals boom and bolstered by harsh cuts to government programs.

But the budget is also expected to show a major collapse in the government’s tax revenue growth – down by as much as $8 billion – because of the global economic downturn and the credit squeeze prompted by the US sub-prime meltdown.

The budget would honour Labor’s election promises while slashing spending to fight inflation, Mr Rudd told caucus.

“It is a good Labor budget that is consistent with meeting the commitments that we made prior to the election last year,” Mr Rudd is understood to have told MPs.

Mr Swan warned that deep cuts would have to be made to battle rising inflation.

A poll released yesterday showed 90% of those surveyed believed Australia had an inflation problem.