Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you so much, Madam Speaker, for the call. This matter of public importance goes to the yawning chasm between the government's rhetoric and their performance, between what the government says they will to and what they actually do, between their rhetoric and what, dare I may call it, the real action that the government have taken when it comes to the economy. We have a Treasurer who likes to huff and puff and beat his chest and lecture Australians about how they have to work harder, earn less, pay more and receive less from the government, but we have a Treasurer who does not follow his rhetoric when it comes to his performance in the Australian economy.

The Treasurer's favourite line is about the age of entitlement. He loves to tell us that the age of entitlement is over. He tells us that SPC should not get industry assistance because the workers there are on $50,000 and they earn too much. He tells Australian families that they should pay when they go to the doctor. He tells Australian lower-middle-income earners that they should get no relief from the tax system when they save for the future through superannuation. He tells the Australian people that the age of entitlement is over and then he says, 'By the way, can we give you a cheque for $75,000 when you have a child? We do not care if you are a millionaire; we do not care how much you earn.' But this government is going to introduce an extravagant and unaffordable paid parental leave scheme at the same time that he tells us that the age of entitlement is over. So, there is a fatal and fundamental flaw to the rhetoric of this government and the rhetoric of the Treasurer, in particular.

No wonder he appears more like a c-grade actor in the North Shore dramatic society than the Treasurer of Australia, with his antics. I do fear that I might just have offended the North Shore dramatic society and I do under the chairmanship apologise if I did. Of course, this is just one part of the Treasurer's rhetoric. On the weekend we saw the G20 held in Australia—a very good thing for Australia—under the chairmanship of the Treasurer. I am more than willing to recognise those who contributed to the key role Australia has played in the G20—the member for Lilley, the former member for Griffith, the former Prime Minister and I will even pay tribute to Peter Costello for his role in formulating the G20 finance ministers. The Treasurer was not backwards in coming forwards when talking about his own role in the world economy the other day. I saw that he gave an interview to the Financial Times and he said:

I have a unique goal to try to drive the world into greater growth and prosperity.

A unique goal, he said. Greater growth and prosperity! You can just imagine the rest of the world's finance ministers saying, 'Oh, phew, we have a new Treasurer in Australia and he's going to get world growth and prosperity. We were thinking about recession and poverty. That is where we were going wrong. That is what we got wrong. This Joe Hockey, he's better than ours.' He said, 'I have a unique goal for world growth and prosperity and I am going to force it through.' Thank goodness we have that Treasurer in Australia! But what is the reality of the Treasurer's goal for world growth and prosperity?

We got the G20 communique, and it did set a target for growth—an aspirational aim for more growth—and that is something that is very welcome. But an aspirational target for more growth does not create one job.

And what is this Treasurer's plan for jobs for Australians? Let us just check in and see how he is going. We have seen 63,000 full-time jobs lost since the last election. Sixty-three thousand full-time jobs were lost on his watch, making 2013 the worst year for full-time job losses since 1992—worse than at any time during the global financial crisis, on his watch. Of those full-time job losses in the last calendar year, 57,000 happened since the last election, and then another 7,000 in January. We now have more people looking for work in Australia today than at any time since 1998. And yet we are very glad that the Treasurer has a unique goal of world growth!

What does all this mean in terms of the economy going forward? We know we now have unemployment at six per cent, and the House will be interested to know this: we have also seen participation in the workforce decline—fewer people in the workforce looking for jobs. If we had the same participation rate now as we had under the Labor government, unemployment would be a full one per cent higher. We would have unemployment now at seven per cent if participation rates were the same now as they were under the Labor government.

The Australian people understand that unemployment does go up from time to time, but they want to know that the government has a plan to deal with it. What is the plan of this government? The first thing they have done is rip up the previous government's $1 billion jobs plan and throw it out the window. That plan, which involved innovation precincts and a half-a-billion-dollar contribution to innovation and research and development in Australia—gone. That plan is even more needed today than it was when it was introduced by the previous government almost exactly a year ago. It is needed now more than ever before, and this government throws it out.

This government talks about how: 'It's all right. These people will get other jobs—high-tech jobs, innovative jobs, well-paying jobs. But, by the way, we're going to rip up the innovation plan.' The Prime Minister told the Holden workers: 'Don't worry. You can go and work at the uranium mine.' Never mind that it doesn't exist; never mind that it is not going to start; they were going to get jobs at the uranium mine, the Prime Minister told them. And then he told them, 'Don't worry, you'll get high-paying, innovative jobs,' but they ripped up the jobs plan which was exactly designed to create those jobs.

We hear a lot from the government about taxes and how we need to reduce taxes. We need to spur growth, the Treasurer tells us. Well, if that is the reality, if that is the case, the Treasurer might want to explain why he is introducing a $3.2 billion tax hike for Australia's small businesses—$3.2 billion over the forward estimates because this government is ripping up the previous government's instant asset write-off and loss carryback measures; ripping them up; taxing small businesses more. And it is not just small businesses; it is also big businesses, because this government is introducing a $3.7-billion-a-year levy on business to fund that extravagant and unfair paid parental leave scheme that their Prime Minister is so proud of. So do not lecture us about taxes when you are increasing small business tax and increasing tax on business generally.

While we are on tax, we also saw the G20 communique talk about the need to reduce tax minimisation and base erosion—a very important initiative, for which I congratulate the G20. It was a long time in the making, and both the member for Lilley and I were very clear in our views at the G20 finance ministers meetings successively, and the meeting that I attended in Moscow, that this was the most important initiative for the G20, and I am glad that the current government kept it up. I am very glad of that, and I congratulate the Treasurer for doing it. I just wish the reality would match the rhetoric. I just wish that one of his first actions in government would not have been to wind back the reforms of the previous government to reduce tax minimisation, at a cost of $700 million to the Australian taxpayer, to benefit those multinationals that think it is okay to shift tax between their jurisdictions and minimise the tax they pay in Australia. So, if the Treasurer is going to get his chest-beating mode on, he could actually do something about it: all he would need to do is not come up with his own idea, not come up with a new initiative, but simply implement the previous government's plans. That is all he needs to do. It is not that hard to just implement a good policy.

Then we have infrastructure. The previous government thought infrastructure was important, and this government says it thinks infrastructure is important. We see infrastructure again figuring in the communique, and the Treasurer says he is pro-infrastructure.

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