Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

It is a pleasure to have the member for North Sydney in the House. It was only yesterday that we had the report from Access Economics reflecting upon the stewardship of the member for North Sydney and the member for Higgins. What it said was that they, in a colourful way, wasted the good years from the commodity boom and they did not do enough to strengthen the economy for when the economy turned down. That was the conclusion of Access Economics. They wasted the fruits of the commodity boom and did not make the necessary investments in infrastructure and education. What they did was to go on a spending spree at the top of the cycle. What the cycle is about is that, in the good times, you save and, when the times turn down, you spend and invest. That is what it is about, and that is what our Economic Security Strategy is about.

The world has changed and, because we put in place a strong surplus in the last budget, we had the flexibility to respond to the change in global conditions—and respond we did, with a $10.4 billion Economic Security Strategy. Now we have for the first time, unlike under the coalition, fiscal policy and monetary policy working in tandem. What was happening under the coalition was that they were working in opposite directions. So this government is responding to the global challenges. We are using the surplus that we built in the last budget to strengthen our economy. What the Minister for Finance and Deregulation said when he was talking about a cycle was precisely what we are doing.

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