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

Only one. What about the other four? I am sure that, over in the Senate, Senator Cameron as the chief flamethrower for the member for Griffith is right now saying, 'It's outrageous—I didn't challenge on spending priorities; I actually challenged on the basis that I want more taxes'! That is what Labor is about: more taxes. The member for Bass gave it his best shot. He said, 'Let's double the Medicare levy.' The Treasurer said, 'No, we're not going to do that.' That is a more effusive, more direct and more comprehensive answer to the member for Bass in the Labor Party caucus than anything this Treasurer has ever given to the Australian people in this place. But it gets better. According to the article yesterday:

One Labor MP, who asked not to be named, told The Australian Financial Review that some MPs were concerned about Labor's recent raft of funding commitments.

''They want to talk about these all encompassing programs, but they don't want to talk about how they are going to fund it,'' the MP said.

"It’s probably a sign of maturity in caucus—

it has only been around for 113 years, caucus, but finally there is a sign of maturity in caucus, according to this Labor MP!—

that people are not just prepared to go along with this wishful thinking.''

I repeat: 'this wishful thinking'. It is like The Wishing Well, one of the books I read to my kids, a story about making wishes, or The Magic Pudding, The Magic Faraway Tree, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and all those stories. They are all great stories but they are all fantasy—all fantasy, like the economic credibility of the Labor Party. It is all fantasy. They know how to spend money and, boy, are they good at it.

We have had pink batts that have burnt down houses. We have had $900 cheques go to dead people to stimulate the economy, which is a big ask of a dead person! We have also had the government spend outrageous sums of money on massively overpriced school halls. But, if you thought for a single moment that Labor might have learnt its lesson on waste, you are wrong; we have found a couple more examples. The Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities—actually, I think it is a bit of a waste to have a title with five different roles in it—

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