Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Dickson for his question. This question was in fact asked by the shadow Treasurer, the member for Wentworth, some weeks ago, and I will give the same answer. You are not quoting comparable statistics—you are not quoting the comparable figures from the two different measures that are available. I would suggest to the member for Dickson that before he takes up these issues he should actually consult the budget papers and get the correct figures.

The government has a serious inflation challenge that it is dealing with in the course of the budget. The opposition—apparently it has another position on inflation today—is trying to block significant initiatives through the Senate. We have reduced the rate of spending growth that we inherited from the previous government from around five per cent per annum to one per cent per annum for the 2008-09 budget. That is putting substantial downward pressure on inflation and interest rates.

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