Kelly O'Dwyer (Higgins, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

In this appropriation discussion and debate, I think it is important to understand the context in which the government has made its decisions and my question does go to that. But, first, I want to remind the minister that when we came into government in 1996 we inherited a situation where we had to pay back $96 billion of Labor's debt, which we did over about a 10-year period. Not only did we do that during the previous coalition government period, but we also provided for the future by putting more than $45 billion into the Future Fund and also putting moneys into other such funds. More than $6 billion went into the Higher Education Endowment Fund, which I note was raided by the Labor Party when it came into government. That is why we need to make higher education reforms, which we are doing in the upcoming budget.

The situation we have inherited coming into government, as I understand it, is that we have significant debt, with gross debt heading up to more than $665 billion if we were to make no change in the current budget. We are paying interest bills of around $12 billion today, which is about how much we currently spend on schools—that is, the Commonwealth contribution right here, right now, to schools—and, again, if nothing were to be changed it would go up to more than $35 billion in interest alone.

We saw under the Howard government multifactor productivity on average increase by about 0.7 per year during those years. We saw under the previous Labor government that multifactor productivity actually decreased by 0.7 per year on average. In this budget, because of the decisions that have been made in the appropriations, we are able to make investments in such things as productivity enhancing infrastructure. If we were to continue on a path of debt as a result of deficit after deficit being delivered, which is what the Labor Party delivered during their six years of government, we would have to pay interest bills that would mean we would not be able to make investments in productivity enhancing infrastructure.

Could the minister enlighten the House on the investments that we are going to be making in infrastructure as a result of the fact that we have made these appropriations measures?

I am particularly interested in my home state of Victoria. I know that we have made a broader announcement of more than $50 billion of investment over a seven-year period, but, in Victoria, I understand that we are going to make investments of around $7.6 billion, $3 billion of which is going into the East West Link, which will have a huge impact on productivity in my home state of Victoria. I would like the minister, if he might, to also talk about the asset recycling program, which will be able leverage up the investment that we are making with the state governments so that we can ensure that we can be on a path to prosperity and growth in our country, rather than a path of ruin and debt.

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