Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. So there we have the RSM, the member for North Sydney, out there confirming it, using his gross debt figure this morning—$300 billion minus $25 billion, so $275 billion—with absolute clarity and, 16 minutes later, the Leader of the Opposition saying, ‘Oh, no, I couldn’t possibly confirm a number.’ But the supreme irony is this: they chose the terrain of battle. This is what they wanted to fight us on today and, 16 minutes into the fray, you have got over there Captain Confusion and Colonel Chaos, who could not agree on a single number in terms of their assault on the government.

In this entire debate on net debt and on deficit and on borrowing, there are some very basic questions for the Leader of the Opposition to answer when it comes to his budget reply tomorrow night. Question No. 1: will the Leader of the Opposition confirm what the member for North Sydney has said and therefore borrow in order to meet the $210 billion plus collapse in tax revenue? Question No. 2: to what extent would he in addition fund discretionary stimulus and on what projects? Question No. 3: which of the government’s spending proposals and investment proposals do they support or reject? Question No. 4: which of the $22 billion worth of savings measures do they accept or reject? Unless these questions are answered, what we have from those opposite is just white noise. It means nothing. It is pure political spin—that is all they are engaged in.

Less than 24 hours after the budget, we have seen the single greatest disintegration of an opposition attack on an element of fiscal policy that we have seen in this place for decades. They should be ashamed of themselves. This used to be the once great Liberal Party. It has collapsed in a heap.

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