Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader for Small Business) Share this | Hansard source

It is a real pleasure to speak on this very important subject of sustainability for our economy. Sustainability is a concept that is often at the heart of most policies that we derive in this place—policies on the environment, economy, health, industry, energy, superannuation and, very importantly, on budgetary settings as well. It is timely that we raise this issue of sustainability and the need to have a plan for the country, because the government does not have one.

That becomes clear when you look at the big numbers, let alone the little numbers, that are contained in the budget. On the really big numbers, what has this government actually done in this budget compared to its budget 12 months ago? In 12 months, Joe Hockey and the Liberal government have added $35 billion worth of deficit. We have gone from a $17 billion deficit—that is $17 billion with a big minus in front of it—with those opposite saying it was the worst thing that this country could ever possibly have in terms of supporting small business and the economy, and driving the economy. What does the government do to make it better? It does not make it better. It makes it worse. It increases the budget deficit to $35.1 billion, and that is not since they won office but since their last budget—since Joe Hockey's last budget. There is more debt. Debt was a key feature; I think everyone can remember 'debt and deficit'. There were only three-word slogans and cliches and fluffy statements. That one rings in my head pretty loudly.

What has the government done in this budget compared to the last budget? According to the budget papers, last year's budget debt was $246 billion, but this year's budget debt is $285 billion. Just 'do the math': it is more. In fact, it is a lot more. The government, in 12 months, has added to the bad position of its own last budget. Top job! They have added more debt. They have made a bigger deficit and added more debt—not since they came to government but since the last budget. You would think that in two budgets, surely, they could at least start to redress it, halt it and maybe start to make it look a little bit better. That was certainly the promise, but it certainly has not happened.

On the deficit side, the budget shows they have doubled the deficit. On the debt side, they have added $39 billion more worth of debt. Where is all this money coming from? Who is paying for this? If it is debt and deficit, the government must have borrowed more money. Where else could they have got the money? It is certainly not coming from revenues. It is certainly not coming from economic growth. It is not coming from small business, confidence or anywhere else in the economy. Where is it coming from? In fact, under this government, at the last budget, real GDP growth was three per cent. It is reasonable; it is not great. You would want it to be more. What is it this year? Joe Hockey and the Liberal government have done such a great job that it has fallen even lower! It is almost at depression levels of 2.75 per cent.

What really interests me about the mantra of government ministers, as we heard from the Minister for Small Business earlier, is that, from listening to them, they are actually spending more on everything. Every single minister that stands up here says that they are spending more in their budget areas. They are quite proud of it, as you would be if you were the minister for widgets and you could say, 'We are spending more on widgets.' But they cannot all be spending more, because it does not add up. If every single Liberal minister says, 'We're spending more, more, more,' where are the savings coming from? Because there do not seem to be any savings. Hang on—I just found some! If you were a Liberal government, where would you look for savings? 'Let's look at low-income Australians first.' Where else are you going to find savings!

When the government decided that they were going to take money off people to help them spend, spend, spend as a big-taxing, big-spending government, who do they attack first? They attack low-income Australians, over two million working women who earn less than $37,000 a year. They take a 'measly' $500 off each one of those. Five hundred dollars is a lot of money to a low-income earner—not so much money to the government. Why would you just attack low-income Australians?

Why would you go even further and say, 'Absolutely never, ever—no adverse changes to superannuation'? We are now in this ridiculous territory where the government say they are never going to make any changes at all to anything to do with super, but they are quite happy to delay by many, many years the superannuation guarantee, which helps ordinary working Australians, going from 9.5 per cent today—which the government did not support—to 12 per cent in the future. We all know that this is part of having a sustainable economy, a sustainable pension system and a sustainable way of making sure that our economy continues to grow. As for whether this government is sustainable, it is not. It is spend, spend, spend, and it attacks low-income earners at the same time.

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