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

I thank the honourable member for Barker for that question. He knows, as every other member on this side of the House knows, that you have to earn economic growth. You have to earn an environment that is conducive to job creation. Because we are rolling out our economic plan for the nation that includes removing taxes like the carbon tax and the mining tax; entering into new free trade agreements with China, Korea and Japan; getting the budget back to surplus and fixing up the mess left by Labor and, importantly getting rid of regulation, tens of thousands of pages of regulation, left behind by Labor that we have already abolished; providing incentives for the states to go through an asset recycling program so they can put more money into infrastructure; rolling out the biggest infrastructure program in Australia's history, as a result of what we did in last year's budget; and delivering the biggest small business package in Australia's history that is giving small business the opportunity to go out and have a go—as a result of these things—we are able to create an environment where 38,000 new jobs are created in just one month in Australia, the fastest rate of job growth in the developed world, and at the beginning of this year we had the fastest economic growth of any major developed nation in the world. It comes about because we are entirely consistent in delivering policy that facilitates growth. And nothing illustrates our position better than what I have just said, and nothing illustrates the Labor Party's position better than what has happened in the last 24 hours in relation to the Adani mine—because the Labor Party does not know whether it is Arthur or Martha in relation to the Adani mine. Yesterday the shadow minister for the environment, the National President of the Labor Party—someone very close to the Greens in that regard—said, 'For the life of me I can't see where the particular problem is,' with the challenge to the Adani mine. And today Gary Gray—we like Gary Gray—

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