Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

It has everything to do with the bill, because it is to do with the fact that your government, in power for six years, were nothing but wreckers. The member for McMahon, the shadow Treasurer, can waffle on all he likes about Labor's so-called proud record and quote economists and Nobel prize winners, but ask people in regional Australia, Mr and Mrs Average in your own electorate, and see if they are giving plaudits to the Labor government or singing your praises in the streets. I am sure they will not be. You know in your heart of hearts that we are getting on with the job of fixing the economy after you people made such a mess of it. You know in your heart of hearts that that is the absolute truth. You know we are getting on with the job of fixing and repairing the mess you left, but it is not we, the coalition, who were left with the mess—it is unfortunately the taxpayers of this nation. It is, unfortunately, the future generations who need better schools, who need better bridges, who need better roads and who need better hospitals. We are getting on with the job of putting the economic drivers in place to ensure that the nation's finances are put back in place so that we can do the job we were entrusted with by the people of Australia. We could talk forever about Labor's debt and its mismanagement, but it is important that this bill passes and it is important that the amendment is rejected, as it ought to be, and I certainly commend the Tax Bonus for Working Australians Repeal Bill 2013 to the House.

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