Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The member for Moreton chuckles at this very notion. If, in fact, it were a result of the good work and the economic reforms of the coalition government, I ask the member for Moreton and all those who are listening to this broadcast tonight: why did productivity growth stop in 2004 and slip into reverse gear, and why has it failed to recover? If I remember correctly, the productivity surge began under the previous Labor government and, as a result of Labor’s reforms, carried through to 2004. But the lack of any investment or economic reform program on the part of this government has meant that productivity growth slipped into reverse gear in 2004 and has failed to recover. Talk about opportunities squandered. This government has squandered a great opportunity to continue the productivity surge that lasted a decade as a result of the economic reform program of the previous Labor government.

The government then had a wonderful second chance, and it is called the resources boom. The great second chance has meant that the Treasury coffers are overflowing. Every year, Treasury has underestimated the extent of the windfall, but it is $263 billion, with a series of large surpluses forecast right out to 2010. What is the government using this windfall for? Where is the investment program? The answer is: regional rorts programs. The government is using this money to invest in its future—that is, its electoral success—while squandering any opportunity to invest in Australia’s future. This period will go down in history as an era of unprecedented squandered opportunity.

And here we are debating tonight the creation of another hole in the capital gains tax system, because the money is there—because $300 million to the Treasury is small change. What could we do with $300 million? We could invest in education. We could have invested many tens of billions of that $263 billion. We could have invested in the greatest investment of all—in the talents of our young people. But instead, the government has been miserable in terms of its attitude to investing in education. The previous education minister spent two years arguing about voluntary student unionism. The previous education minister refused to come to an agreement with the states on training, and he abolished the Australian National Training Authority. And we wonder why there is a skills shortage. He was not interested in dealing with the skills shortage; all he wanted to do was to prove his credentials with the Prime Minister, live down the fact that he used to be a member of the Australian Labor Party and show that he was a true-blue Liberal, and he did nothing on education. What a squandered opportunity.

Now we have a new education minister—who also seems more interested in picking fights than in sitting down with the states and working out an agenda for reform and extra investment in education. I will give the Prime Minister credit for the fact that he has agreed to put education on the agenda for the Council of Australian Governments. Let the premiers and the Prime Minister sit down and work out what they could do with some of the tens and hundreds of billions of dollars that are gushing into the Treasury coffers—and do it in a cooperative manner instead of picking fights with the states and catching young people in the crossfire.

We could be doing so much more  in this country, but instead we are poking holes in the income tax base all the time. Why? For favoured constituencies. Why? Because we cannot get enough very highly paid foreign company executives. What is wrong with our company executives? Why do we have to keep giving tax breaks to foreign company executives? Why is that the priority? Why are young people not the priority? Why are young Australians not the priority in this country? Because we have to suck up to foreign company executives who are getting a pretty good deal anyway. And if the company fails they get an even bigger deal. Madam Deputy Speaker, you might guess that I have some real questions about the value of this measure.

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