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

The only people who are not prepared to engage with this government are members opposite. They created the problem, and if they had any decency and if they had any honour—if they had any fidelity to the tradition of Bob Hawke and Paul Keating; people who took economic management seriously—they would say, 'All right; sorry. We created a problem, but now we are prepared to shoulder at least part of the responsibility for fixing it.'

So, I say again to the Leader of the Opposition: if you do not like the proposals of this government, tell us what yours are. This is supposed to be the year of ideas; give us some ideas. We do not want many; just one will do. But at the moment the only ideas that we get from members opposite are to repudiate the ideas for reducing the debt and deficit that they had in government. So, this is a good foundation upon which this budget will be built.

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