Chris Bowen (Prospect, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I regret to say the honourable member for Wentworth has reached new heights of sophistry. We heard all about consumer prices and about how badly consumer confidence has fallen. Presumably it has fallen spontaneously since 25 November! It has fallen spontaneously in Australia against international trends.

We heard from the shadow Treasurer that the fall in consumer confidence in his view has nothing to do with international trends, the subprime crisis, global financial turbulence or the oil-price shock that is being experienced around the world. He said that this is all down to the new government.

Of course, the budget predicted a slowdown in global growth. The budget predicted tighter credit conditions and that significantly higher interest rates would be expected to impact on Australian growth and therefore on Australian consumer confidence. That is what this government’s budget predicted would happen. But if you listened to the member for Wentworth you would think two things. Firstly, you would think that everything was rosy—just dandy—on 24 November. Secondly, you would think that the rest of the world is going along just fine. If you listened to the member for Wentworth you would think consumer confidence was rising just before 24 November. You would think interest rates were falling. In fact, the Leader of the Opposition thinks interest rates were falling before 24 November. That is what he said at the dispatch box a few days ago—that interest rates were coming down. That comes as a great shock to the many millions of Australian mortgage holders.

If you listened to the member for Wentworth, you would think that the opposition thought inflation was falling just before 24 November. That is why the honourable member for Wentworth said that in his view under the Howard government inflation was ‘mission accomplished’. That is why the member for Higgins, the former Treasurer—said that we had inflation just where we wanted it. That is why the former Prime Minister said that Australian working families had never been better off. And that is why the member for Mayo said yesterday, in an interjection—I am not sure if it is reflected in Hansard, and I am not sure that all members heard it, but I heard it—that the Howard years were a golden era.

See this speech in context