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

The forecasts that were presented in MYEFO did not have forecasts presented to us under the alternative scenario presented to Labor. Therefore, you cannot have a number that is the difference, you clown. You cannot work it out, because the numbers that were presented were on the forecasts presented by the Treasury.

I was reading the transcript of the shadow Treasurer in his speech to the Deutsche Bank International Investor Mission, 12 March 2014, when he said:

We believe in returning the budget to surplus over time, and we showed that we have the ability to make the types of decision necessary to bring it about it.

You actually did not bring a surplus about. But that is contrary to what the then Treasurer, the member for McMahon, said to Fran Kelly when he said that Labor:

… have returned budget to surplus three years ahead of schedule and ahead of any other major advanced economy—

I am getting questions from someone who not only promised a surplus but claimed to have delivered a surplus when, in fact, nothing of the sort ever happened. Why? Because now we know that the Labor Party's true legacy was to leave us with the burden of the fastest growth in spending of the 17 major IMF economies in the world. That is Labor's legacy. They have left us with the third-highest growth in net debt in the world, and on top of that: $123 billion of deficits, $667 billion of debt, rising unemployment, falling terms of trade and below trend growth. Labor should be very proud of that legacy—oh, what a feeling!

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