Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

Listen, old sunshine: it is not your money; it is the taxpayers' money. It is the taxpayers' money out there, not yours. That is the problem with Labor. They think it is their money, but it is the taxpayers' money—the same poor old taxpayers who have to pay for the $900 cheques that go to dead people, for the pink batts that go into people's roofs and burn down people's houses, for the massive overspend on school halls. That is the same Labor Party and you know it is the same taxpayers who have to pay those horrific bills.

We know that it can only come from one of two sources. It can come from increased taxes, and Lord knows the Labor Party is pretty good at that. There have been 26 new or increased taxes since the Labor Party was elected, some of them real crackers, like the carbon tax and the mining tax. The carbon tax has had six different versions and is over $8 billion a year. Gee, that's gone well for you guys! That is terrific. That has done great things to the Australian economy. Then there is the mining tax, which now raises less than one per cent of Commonwealth government revenue. The Labor Party has been so diligent in its application to delivering a simple mining tax that there are mining companies spending up to $1½ million a year on accountants, complying with the mining tax, and they have no liability to pay it. They have no liability to pay the tax, but the paperwork of the tax is costing $1½ million a year for some mining companies, half a million dollars for most of the others.

I would say to you that the coalition is absolutely determined to get rid of the carbon tax. We are absolutely determined to get rid of the mining tax. We are absolutely determined to have smaller government than Labor. We are absolutely determined to empower taxpayers to have more control over their own hard-earned money. That is what we do. But it is in the DNA of the Labor Party to have increased spending and increased taxation. That is what the Labor Party does.

I always love referring to Doug Cameron. We love Doug Cameron. Dougie, with the Scottish accent over in the Senate, is a truth teller for the Labor Party. He said, 'We need Kevin Rudd to campaign for us at the next election.' Damn right they need Kevin Rudd to campaign for them at the next election. It would be a welcome change from Kevin Rudd campaigning against the Labor Party at election. So yes, they do need Kevin. But Doug Cameron said about the $120 billion of new commitments that it was:

… inconceivable that this amount of government expenditure on building a good society could be funded from existing revenue.

That makes everyone a little bit nervous. What tax is next?

The Labor Party is refusing to release the costings undertaken by the Treasury on the Greens policies. Let's just get this right. The Greens, who are the coalition partners of the Labor Party, went to the Commonwealth Treasury and said, 'Can you cost our policies?' Then the Labor Party gives us a lecture and says, 'You should do that and then everyone can see what the numbers are.'

But the thing is: the government are refusing to release the Treasury costings of Greens policies. They are claiming they are cabinet-in-confidence. I been around this place a while, Madam Deputy Speaker Burke, as have you—not nearly as long as me, but you are showing your age very well!—and I have never seen a Green in the cabinet. I do not think they are there. So how is their deliberation actually in confidence to cabinet? They do not sit in the room. So we will be looking at the information office's deliberations on this very carefully.

What we do know is that the Greens want to see company taxes increased to 33 per cent. We know the Greens want to reintroduce death duties to Australia—and the Labor Party struggles to answer the questions. The Greens want to increase taxes on superannuation. You might say, 'That's the Greens.' Well, the last time the Greens had a policy costed by the Treasury, it was changes to FBT on company cars. The Greens came out and said, 'This is our policy,' and then the government announced it. I thought at the time, 'Gee; I've heard that before.' What other policies do the Greens have? The Greens went to the last election promising a $23-a-tonne carbon tax. Wow! What does this government do? 'We're going to have a $23 a tonne carbon tax.' So now we know.

The Labor Party have a $120 billion black hole, in an attempt to make the Prime Minister more popular with the Australian people. They have had a huge raft of announcements over the last few weeks, and now they will not tell the Australian people where the money is coming from. It is a magic pudding. But you know what? At the end of the day, there is only one taxpayer, the poor soul. Labor are hoping that everything is going to be okay, that the economy is just going to choof on. They are ignoring what is happening in Europe. They are ignoring the challenges in the United States. They are ignoring that China is coming off what seems to be quite a peak. They are ignoring that, in the last national accounts, the government sector contributed 0.5 per cent to the 0.6 per cent growth. They are ignoring that, in the June quarter results, without their cash handouts household disposable income would have been in trouble, because the economy is not performing as well as was expected. They are ignoring that company profits are coming down, according to the national accounts. They are ignoring that investment in dwellings continues to slump. They are ignoring that the terms of trade continue to decline. They are ignoring that the June quarter accounts predate the introduction of the carbon and mining taxes. They are ignoring that retail sales fell by nearly one per cent in July. They are ignoring that ANZ job advertisements declined by nearly one per cent in July and two per cent in August. They are ignoring that the Sensis Business Index showed that confidence of small and medium businesses declined in the September quarter, and consumer confidence remained pessimistic for the seventh consecutive month. These are the stats.

What does the Labor Party do? In response to the general malaise across the Australian community, the Labor Party says: 'Don't worry. We're going on a big-spending, big-taxing binge.' You know what? The Labor Party are hypocrites for this. They criticise for Campbell Newman for job cuts. They are cutting 3,000 jobs this year out of the Public Service in Canberra, and they are trying to give us a sanctimonious lecture about who cares about jobs. Typical Labor—all hypocrisy.

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