Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I have assumed that the question is motivated by a genuine concern about a small business and, in making that assumption about the motivation of the question, I would have thought people would be interested in benefits for small businesses, benefits that will flow from 1 July this year. If people are not interested in those benefits for small businesses then I do really wonder about their motivations. People who care about small business would care about delivering a tax cut to small business. People who care about small business would be interested in delivering an instant asset write-off benefit for small business. On this side of the parliament we care about small business, and that is precisely why we are delivering those benefits and why we are prepared to say that in the resources boom we have now we should be sharing the benefits with the many, not the few. I understand that the member for Indi and the Liberal and National parties would prefer to benefit a few billionaires, but that is not our approach.

We also want to make sure that the voice of small business is heard at the cabinet table, so I have taken the opportunity of the recent change in ministerial arrangements to make sure that the small business voice is directly at the cabinet table. We will continue to work with small businesses for a prosperous future. I presume we will continue to see fear campaigning and denial of benefits from those opposite.

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