Natasha Griggs (Solomon, Country Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to support the Tax Bonus for Working Australians Repeal Bill 2013. This bill repeals the Tax Bonus for Working Australians Act (No. 2) 2009, the tax bonus act. That act was responsible for the millions of what were commonly referred to as $900 stimulus cheques. Hundreds of thousands of those payments were made after the GFC had passed, and common sense tells me that we do not need to be borrowing money to give to taxpayers to stimulate an economy after the danger has passed.

The cheques were first handed out after the 2007-08 financial year to Australians who paid tax during that income year, and they were designed to stimulate the Australian economy during the global financial crisis—we all get that. In total, the Australian government had to borrow $7.7 billion to make these payments. I will say that again: $7.7 billion of borrowed money to make these payments. Most payments were made in 2009. However, in true Labor style—they are Australia's waste-creation gold medallists—over 480,000 payments, totalling $400 million, were made after the GFC, and they still continue to be handed out today.

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