Queensland Premier Campbell Newman denies he broke a 2012 election promise after he committed to a reduced target of payroll tax cuts.
Mr Newman on Friday visited the electorate of Chatsworth, in Brisbane's east, to pledge the Liberal National Party (LNP) will progressively raise the payroll tax exemption to $1.4 million by 2017.
"It means that thousands of companies will not need to pay payroll tax," he said at an engineering facility.
"Indeed, companies with a payroll of up to $5.5 million will see significant reductions."
The move would constitute $100 million of foregone revenue.
But it was a theme familiar from the 2012 campaign.
Prior to the LNP's landslide win at the last election, the LNP had pledged to raise the threshold to $1.6 million over six years.
The government delayed the promise for two years in 2013, citing the impact from natural disasters, and it was due to commence mid-2015.
"When we were first elected, we found in the Commission of Audit that the picture was very, very bleak," Mr Newman said.
He denied it was broken promise.
"It represents us delivering what we said we'd deliver on. We're delivering it in a financially responsible manner," he said.
"We're going to get there. We did reduce taxes and charges. We wanted to do more.
"This is proof going forward because we've budgeted in these reductions that we will deliver them for business."
Mr Newman also promised that a re-elected LNP government would not introduce any new taxes in its next term.
He said Queensland would lead the nation with an economic growth rate of 5.75 per cent in 2015-16.
"We will go into a surplus position for the first time in 10 years and we have budgeted for these initiatives because we have a plan," he said.
The premier pointed to Thursday's job figures, which showed Queensland's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate drop from 6.8 to 6.1 per cent in December, as vindication of the government's economic strategy.
"There is no better place in Australia than Queensland to set up a business and grow a business."
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