Peter Costello (Higgins, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Kingston for his question and, in the presence of the gallery, say he is undoubtedly the best member for Kingston that this parliament has ever seen. And so says the gallery, Mr Speaker—carried by acclamation!

It is well known that the Liberal and National parties believe in keeping taxes low. That is why we have cut income tax. It is why we have cut company tax. It is why we have cut capital gains tax. It is why we got the abolition of financial institutions duty, bank account debits tax, and stamp duty on shares. It is why we abolished all exit taxes on superannuation for people over 60. That was a great breakthrough. As I said to the House yesterday, if you are on $30,000, your top marginal tax rate under the coalition government is 15c, whereas, under the Labor Party, on $30,000 your top marginal tax rate was 34c, which is more than double the coalition rate.

There has been a very interesting guessing game going on as to whether or not Labor has a tax policy. There has been a very, very interesting guessing game going on. We had the member for Perth yesterday suggesting that Labor does have a tax policy. He said it has all been prepared and it is ready to go. It is in the hands of the member for Lilley; it is in the coop. He was asked about it by David Speers yesterday:

SPEERS: ... you’re talking about let’s bring on the campaign.  Time’s up you said today and yet we haven’t seen things like your tax policy.

SMITH: Well, and there’ll be a whole range of areas both in my portfolio and others where there’ll be announcements in the days and weeks…

So there is a tax policy! This sent me looking.

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