Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Chairman of the Coalition Policy Development Committee) Share this | Hansard source

The last 13 minutes says it all. There are thousands of jobs being lost in our community and the person the government throws up to defend their management of this economy—to set out what they are doing to stop this loss of jobs that is so damaging to so many thousands of families across the country—could not even use his full 15 minutes. He did not even spend any time describing what the government is doing. No defence. We had the Prime Minister here last week urging an economic debate. Here is an economic debate. Here is an economic problem: thousands of jobs lost. What did we hear? Just a whole lot of scuttlebutt derived from Google from the member opposite. This is pathetic.

This is a classic example of why there is a crisis of confidence throughout our community. That is at the heart of the problems we are facing; it is at the heart of the job problem. It is why last year there was no net increase in jobs in the middle of a mining boom. Off goes the member for Blaxland, who did not even know that the market interest rates are different to the cash rate. No wonder this government is incompetent from an economic point of view. There is no confidence in this government amongst every Australian and amongst every business in Australia. It is evidenced by the fact that over the last 12 months savings rates amongst families have skyrocketed to plus 13 per cent of their disposable income. They are paying off the mortgage, they are paying off the plastic and they are putting money on deposit, because they are scared. They have no confidence; they have no sense of direction; they have no feel that this government is on top of its job. That is why they are saving like they never have before. They have sensed the vulnerability in our economy for 12 months, and yet this government has had a sense of complacency. It has a sense of entitlement about sitting on those benches; it has an obsession with holding onto its members' jobs and not worrying about other people's jobs. This crisis of confidence has also infected business. We have got a business sector that has not created one new net job in the last 12 months. We had a situation today where Dick Warburton, who is the Executive Chairman of Manufacturing Australia and a most experienced manufacturer, someone who has been asked by both sides of politics to assist with major policy decisions, warned that up to 400,000 Australians are in danger of losing their jobs during this year. What a chilling warning that is from someone who has got his finger on the pulse. When did you last speak to the manufacturers in some sort of serious way, other than for a photo op?

I put it to the parliament that we have a crisis of confidence and that is the reason people are saving like there is no tomorrow, the reason they are waking up at 2.30 in the morning worrying about what losing their job will mean for their mortgage payments and their ability to look after their families and the reason that business people have got lots of money on their balance sheets but are not spending or investing any of it. I put it to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, that we have a Treasurer and a Prime Minister who have created this crisis of confidence. We have a Treasurer who has displayed some very special talents over the last few years. This Treasurer has taken the highest terms of trade in 140 years, a balance sheet with not an ounce of debt on it, a balance sheet with nearly $70 billion of reserves, a highly skilled workforce, a workforce which had unemployment rates at four per cent and an unprecedented and prolonged global mining boom and he has wasted it. He has taken all of that and he has wasted the boom. He wasted terms of trade at 140-year highs. He has presided over a panic reaction to the global financial crisis—$87 billion, $900 cheques, pink batts and school halls. The waste that this Treasurer has presided over is just criminal.

This Treasurer has presided over the four biggest budget deficits in our history—$167 billion. This Treasurer has now increased the spending of this government by around 40 per cent. In 2007 the budget was $262 billion. The budget for 2010-11 is expected to be $370 billion. That is an increase of almost $100 billion. This is like a household who are spending a certain amount of money and then one year decide to put on major extensions. So they have a real spike in their spending for that year. It is a bit like a stimulus for that family for one year. Then the next year, what do they do? They go back to their original level of spending. Have the government done that? Not on your nelly. They have gone up above the spike. The $87 billion is now embodied in every year's budget. They are spending it on other programs. Yet they had the gall to talk about fiscal prudence and this fastest fiscal consolidation, using mumbo jumbo words that no-one can understand when in actual fact what they are doing is hiding the great deception of a government that have spent like there is no tomorrow.

An increase of 40 per cent is $100 billion. What would be the inflation rate over the last four years? It pales in comparison, yet they try to tell us that they are fiscally responsible. No wonder we have had the four biggest budget deficits in our history. No wonder we have got a debt which is approaching $136 billion. No wonder we have got exchange rates under pressure. That $100 billion a day in the market has pushed up the price of money, which has attracted more overseas capital. Some of that exchange rate increase is directly at the door of the government, yet they wash their hands of it. They do not do anything about it. Some of the interest rate rises are a result of the government's spending, which continues.

We have got a Treasurer who is a dangerous lightweight. He is a wholly owned subsidiary of Treasury; he has not got an original thought. They say 'You jump' and he says 'How high?' On Friday I did my 76th boardroom since I got this job two years ago. I can report that the Treasurer is viewed with contempt in boardrooms across Australia. He is seen as out of his depth. He is seen as hapless and he is seen as anti business. No-one for a second believes he can sell your economic story because he has not got one. He is not up to it and he cannot fashion an economic program that is suited to the problems. The Treasurer has created a vulnerability in this economy, yet he has the gall to walk in here today and say Australia's economy walks tall—said with a sense of complacency born of ignorance. This is a Treasurer who, combined with the Prime Minister, has no vision, has no direction and cannot be trusted—

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