Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

It is pretty clear what members opposite are doing today. They are going through the budget striving to find losers. Every Australian was the loser from Labor's six years of incompetence. Every Australian will be the poorer because of Labor's six years of incompetence. This government knows that a lot of people are doing it tough, we know there is not an electorate in the country where there are not some people doing it tough, but we owe it to those people to get this economy back into shape and you cannot fix the economy without fixing the budget. That is what this government is doing. Every single month the people of Page are contributing to having to pay $1 billion in interest. That is $1 billion in dead money, that is $1 billion that could have been spent on fixing the Pacific Highway. That is the kind of thing we would be able to do sooner and better but for Labor's six years of incompetence. If the member for Richmond—I think I called her the member for Page earlier; we have a very good member for Page, a much better member for Page than we have member for Richmond—is serious about taking the burdens off the families of Richmond, tell her leader to scrap the carbon tax. If she is worried about promises, tell her leader to let this government keep its promise to scrap the carbon tax and scrap it now.

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