David Bradbury (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Treasurer ) Share this | Hansard source

Which other essential services are they going to rip the guts out of in order to fund their $70 billion black hole?

I mentioned earlier that the member for North Sydney and the member for Goldstein have all sorts of difficulty in agreeing on basic matters. It is a bit of a problem when they are two of the key figures in the shadow economic team. One issue where there has been a lot of disagreement has been on the question of a surplus. The government's position on a surplus is very clear: we will return the budget to surplus. That will require some difficult decisions, but we will do it because that is what the nation requires. We need to stick to the plans that we have made; they are tough fiscal plans, but, all around the world, capital markets are looking to governments to actually deliver on these plans. We are a government that is intent on doing that and, by doing that, we will keep pressure off interest rates and keep interest rates low for families.

The member for Goldstein was asked whether or not the opposition would deliver a surplus. 'Would they commit to a surplus?' He said, 'Well, it just depends.' The member for North Sydney—not as directly contradictory as he normally is—simply said, 'Maybe.' The Leader of the Opposition said, 'We will do it as quickly as possible.' But then there was poor old Senator Abetz, who did not get the memo. Senator Abetz was out there and said, 'Look, we are not in the business of making extravagant promises.' Promising to return the budget to surplus is not of itself an extravagant promise, but when you are wallowing around in a $70 billion black hole, that is a very ambitious commitment to make; a very extravagant one, to use Senator Abetz's term.

When it comes to the contradictions in their positions on key questions of economic policy—and of course this matter of public importance goes to the importance of transparency in budget policy when it comes to business making the decisions that business needs to make—there are very few areas that have exposed just how flaky the policy approach of the opposition has been on economic policy quite as much as the question of tax cuts for business.

We have seen them cutting each other up over the last couple of weeks. Talk about poor judgment! Who was the brains trust that decided that they were going to lead the Liberal Party off this cliff? Who decided that they were going to come into this place and vote against tax cuts for business? If you go through the Hansard, you will see that just about every person on that side of the House came into this place and professed their 'unabashed support' for businesses large and small—'generators of jobs', 'creators of wealth'; but not worthy of a tax cut. When it comes to delivering a tax cut for them, they want to talk about how tough it is out there in the business environment. They talk the economy down, but when it comes to delivering them tax relief they come into this place and vote against it. To their eternal shame they will do that, and each and every one of them will have to go back to their electorates and explain why they voted against tax relief for the businesses in their electorate.

On the question of business tax cuts, just last year the Leader of the Opposition said, firstly, 'The government should keep its commitments,' and, secondly, 'We support company tax cuts.' But then, just a couple of days ago, the member for North Sydney was asked the same question about whether or not they would support a cut in the company tax rate. The journalist asked, 'Are you signalling that when this comes to the House you will support a cut in company tax?' The member for North Sydney said, 'No, No, No, No, No,' and just for further effect he said, 'We have said no.' Six noes. Not one, not two, not three; six noes. When it comes to cutting tax, they say no.

In fact, when it comes to any good idea proposed by this government, they say no. The only thing they will ever say yes to is a big fat tax cut to the likes of Clive Palmer. We have seen over the last couple of days—and in particular in the last 24 hours—some extraordinary comments from Mr Palmer. You would have thought there would be a handful of people in the Liberal Party sensible enough to come forward and at least acknowledge that perhaps it was a little bit of overreach. Talk about conspiracy theories: the CIA!

The only CIA that the Australian people have to worry about is Clive's influence agency. Those on the other side seem rather beholden to it. They want to give a big fat tax cut to the millionaire miners but not to the Australian— (Time expired)

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