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

In this budget what we put in place was an absolutely essential economic stimulus to support jobs, to support businesses, to support households and to support regions, because of what has been imposed on this country by the rest of the world. And what he is confirming again is that the official position of the Liberal Party is to do a lot less—not to borrow and therefore to savagely put up taxes or to savagely cut services. That is the position of the Liberal Party of Australia.

It is not a position even shared by the business community that are normally more supportive of those opposite. The common-sense proposition is that when you have such a sharp contraction of private demand the government has to move in to stimulate demand to support jobs, to support households and to support businesses. That is something that simply does not occur to them. What we have got is an opportunistic play here from the Leader of the Opposition and the shadow Treasurer—a whole heap of confusion and fuzziness—because they are not up to the job.

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