Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

During the GFC we had the opposition leader sitting there and going to sleep. He did not think there was a GFC. He just missed the whole lot because he was snoozing. He was snoozing away in his office, doing nothing, while Treasurer Wayne Swan was getting on with the job of keeping us the strongest economy in the world, delivering things that they can only dream of. We had lower interest rates, lower unemployment, higher job growth—every major factor that you look at when you talk about the economy we had, and they sit there and wallow in their negativity. They cannot find a positive thing. I want to quote Julian Morrow because I reckon his quote was fantastic. He said that the Leader of the Opposition is so negative the only thing he would eat for an entree is an antipasto. I think that was an absolutely amazing and so truthful comment.

We have been working extremely hard to deliver the things that they cannot do. Our net debt is one-tenth that of major advanced economies. We have to tame inflation. We have a budget coming into surplus in 2013. We have done this during the toughest economic times in my lifetime. We have delivered this and we have got on with the job of making sure that we support working families. We support workers. We do that by not cutting their wages and conditions. That is really not going to help them, is it? Lose your wages and conditions and earn less money—that is the Liberal way of thinking. They have voted against every single opportunity to support families across this nation. When our bills come before the parliament, they are gone. They hide away and they keep coming up with this idea of, 'We can do it better. But we can't.' They will not release their policies. The cat was let out of the bag by the shadow minister for finance, Andrew Robb. He said they will do that at a later date because at the last election they went and got their policies audited by an auditing company and, lo and behold, that company was charged and fined for fudging the figures.

Today we learned—because Minister Emerson came out and showed us—that the $70 billion black hole has grown to $84 billion in one day. That is $84 billion that they have to find. Where are they going to find it? They are going to cut workers' jobs. They are going to cut wages and conditions. They are going to cut support to families. It is just rank hypocrisy for them to come in here and say, 'We're here to help look after the families.' The shadow minister, Sophie Mirabella, said on Q&A

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