Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister Assisting the Finance Minister on Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

I am just trying to draw a diagram to summarise what the Leader of the Nationals had to say. He started off saying it was all spin, and then he went on to say that Labor’s spending is creating too much debt. ‘Spin’ suggests that there is no spending. The next proposition is that Labor’s spending is creating too much debt, and then he says the Nationals would have the same level of spending that Labor in government has had—they would have done it anyway. I am advised by the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry that during the last matter of public importance the Leader of the Nationals complained about spending cuts the entire time. So this is the problem—they say one thing in one matter of public importance debate and another thing in another; one thing in their electorates and another thing in the parliament. They hope that no-one notices, but we do notice. This government is engaged in nation building for recovery, yet this MPI criticises the two stimulus packages that have been brought down by the government.

I will go through some of the economic context very quickly so there is an appreciation of the environment within which the budget was formulated and the two stimulus packages were brought down. Australia has experienced the biggest fall in export earnings in half a century. The coalition in government enjoyed the highest commodity prices in half a century. Labor has come to government at a time when Australia has experienced the biggest fall in export earnings in half a century. That has contributed directly to the carving of $210 billion off Commonwealth taxation revenue—$210 billion has been lost from Commonwealth taxation revenue. Sounds like a big number? It is a big number. It is one dollar in every five of Commonwealth taxation revenue wiped out as a consequence of the impact of the global recession and its impact on commodity prices, meaning that the Commonwealth has lost one dollar in every five of Commonwealth taxation revenue. That $210 billion deterioration accounts for two-thirds of the total deterioration in the budget bottom line.

These are the external influences—two-thirds of the deterioration in the budget bottom line caused by a $210 billion loss of Commonwealth taxation revenue. Yet the coalition, through this pamphlet and through their websites, which I have inspected, are giving the impression that they would not have any debt—that debt is bad and the coalition stand for no debt. Not only that, the Leader of the Opposition was asked about this very topic on the AM program on 13 May this year. Chris Uhlmann asked:

But just quickly, you would have engaged in some stimulus spending and there would have been a deficit?

Malcolm Turnbull gave quite long answer, but he said:

… it may have been in deficit by a very small amount or it may have been in surplus by a small amount …

There you have the Leader of the Opposition saying that if in government the coalition would have a small deficit, a small surplus or a balanced budget. They are saying they would eliminate the deficit. That is their public statement—and yet the fall in Commonwealth taxation revenue accounts for two-thirds of the deterioration in the budget bottom line. So the Leader of the Opposition is really saying that he can fix the fundamental problem here, and that is the collapse of commodity prices. I can just see him now—King Canute: ‘I command commodity prices to rise.’ The King Canute of Australian politics, the Leader of the Opposition: ‘I’ll fix it all. I command you to rise, commodity prices.’ So absurd is the economic prescription of the Leader of the Opposition.

If he is going to go around saying that Labor’s net debt is no good and we should have a balanced budget or a slight surplus, you would think he would have used the opportunity to say so on the Thursday night of his budget reply speech—a golden opportunity. Expectations were raised. I was waiting in breathless anticipation for the Leader of the Opposition to come in here, show some courage and say, ‘This is how we would move from deficit into a balanced budget. These are the taxes that we would increase. These are the savings, the reductions in government spending, that we would make.’ What did he do? He produced not one dollar of net savings when he had a golden opportunity in his budget reply to do so. He does not have the courage to put his money where his mouth is, say where the money is coming from, say which taxes he would increase and say which programs he would cut. He is guilty of duplicity. He is guilty of hypocrisy.

Let us see what the Leader of the Opposition said about the first stimulus package, about which he has subsequently become so deeply critical. On 14 October last year he said:

… we are not going to argue about the composition of the package or quibble about it. It has our support. It will provide a stimulus to the economy, that’s for certain.

Here he is supporting the stimulus package, saying it is great. On the same day, he went on to say:

… we’re not arguing about the size of the stimulus. We support these measures and we are particularly pleased about the measure, the payments to pensioners.

What did he subsequently describe it as? A cash splash—a total waste of money. This is the duplicity and the hypocrisy of the Leader of the Opposition. He says something one day to suit his purposes and then something different the next. I will not have time to list them all, but there was a litany of quotes from the Leader of the Opposition subsequently saying, ‘We never liked that stimulus package at all. We voted for it, but we never liked it and never said it was good.’ But they did say it was good—they supported it at the time.

On the second stimulus package, of course, the Leader of the Opposition said, ‘We wouldn’t have introduced the same stimulus package; we would have had one about half the size.’ So instead of Labor’s net debt of $188 billion they are saying they would have $168 billion. Half of 42 is 21. Take 21 from 188 and you have 167.

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