John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

Overwhelmingly Australia’s future is about giving future generations a fair go. How can anybody who sits opposite claim that they worry about future generations of Australians if they are prepared to load an additional burden onto the backs of future generations? We are an ageing population. We cannot avoid that reality. No amount of quotation of legislation will alter the fact that what Labor intends to do is to conduct a smash-and-grab raid on the Future Fund. Money and assets that have been quarantined to provide for future liabilities are going to be accessed to pay for a current policy. What that in plain, simple Australian English says is you are going to rob future generations to further nourish the current generation. I do not think that is fair.

We hear a lot from the Australian Labor Party about fairness. I think we ought to be fair to our children and grandchildren and give them a capacity to meet the rising obligation of an ageing population. This is a problem all around the world. Fortunately, Australia is not as poorly served in this regard as other countries. But we do have an ageing population and, unless we lay aside savings and unless we lock them up and unless we cross our hearts and promise not to touch them, we are going to burden our children and our grandchildren with increasing obligations.

Labor have fallen at the first hurdle of economic responsibility. They had an opportunity—and we have heard all of this trumpeting from the Leader of the Opposition, and indeed from the member for Melbourne, about how economically responsible they are going to be—but what Labor have done is they have fallen at the first hurdle. They could not resist it. They have reverted to type. They have gone back to their old habits.

We quarantined this money. We set aside a fund built out of the budget surpluses that Labor opposed us accumulating. We have all of these surpluses that went into the Future Fund and the proceeds of the sale of Telstra, and the member for Melbourne has got the nerve to talk about the sale of Telstra! He opposed the sale of Telstra. The Labor Party opposed every step of the way the sale of Telstra, and now they have got the nerve to ask us questions about Telstra. There is a very simple issue of intergenerational equity involved in this. Which side of politics is in favour of giving our children and grandchildren a fair go into the future? It is the Liberal and National parties side. Which side of politics is in favour of spending for today and not caring at all about the future generations of this country?

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