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

Mr Speaker, I was referring to the sloppy behaviour of the shadow Treasurer. That is what I was referring to. He is somehow wanting to pretend that a very significant increase in the company tax rate is a windfall gain for companies. Fair dinkum; these people have simply lost the plot! And it does not matter where you look. We had three spokespeople this morning who could not define whether or not it was a tax. Barnaby finally, for once, got it right—he said it was a tax; the shadow minister over there said it was not; and the shadow Treasurer said it was a windfall gain. How Orwellian can you get!

This is the least qualified economics team from an opposition in this parliament in decades and decades and decades. And it has been on display in this House day after day, and on display in the Senate day after day. Of course, that brings us to the Leader of the Opposition, who thinks that economics is boring. Well, there is proof positive of that today, isn’t there? This is an opposition leader who changes his mind like he changes his shirt. He simply cannot be believed in anything that he says. He said three weeks ago, ‘There will be no new taxes,’ and today he pops up with a new ‘windfall gain’. Fair dinkum! They have no credibility and no standing and no rigour.

I was asked by the member for Kingston why this country needed long-term reform. It needs long-term reform because of the ageing of our population. It needs long-term reform so that we can maximise the opportunities for wealth creation that will come from growth in this region in the decades ahead. We on this side of the House are putting forward a serious program to deliver that to Australia. But we have a destructive, untrustworthy, risky opposition, who are simply trying to torpedo the serious long-term agenda every step of the way, and for that they will be condemned by the Australian people.

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