Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Absolutely, because that is the plan that brought us back to economic prosperity. Back in those days, we had the opportunity to sell down a rather large asset for $45 billion in the way of Telstra. We no longer have those assets, so our path to economic fiscal recovery will be somewhat longer. But we are up for the journey, because we will reduce our spending in the forward estimates.

I cannot miss the opportunity to follow the line of commentary that my colleagues have taken when it comes to Labor's past plans and record—that is, when you rush out policy it can be detrimental to the economy. I speak of none other than the old chestnut of the live cattle export debacle. The point I make with reference to live cattle export is that we only had eight per cent exposure to the international market. We talk of an 'enormous' hit. In my electorate of Wright, when those cattle no longer had homes, or markets to be filled in the international space, the cattle prices were immediately impacted in my local selling yards of Beaudesert, Moreton, Silverdale and Kalbar.

Labor, today, have spoken with great gusto about their capital gains tax plan. I suggest that, on every level, it fails every test. Influencing 30 per cent of the market to exit will have a detrimental impact in that space. I remind the House of Labor's plan for the mining tax. They rolled out a mining tax—a tax that raised no money. It was ill thought out. I remind the House of Labor's of the pink batts program—they rushed the rollout of that plan. There are many other program debacles because they were rushed and not well thought out. We will make no apology for working carefully, methodically, diligently towards jobs and growth with our new jobs packages.

Turning to the current economy and the transition we are making from the mining economy to the service economy, our plan has delivered just on 300,000 new jobs since we have been in office. We have seen the employment rate growing at around 2.6 per cent—higher than the average decade growth rate at 1.6. I want to talk about our plan and to remind the House of free-trade agreements with Korea, Japan and China. This plan is well thought out. As a government, we are the best sort to lead the country.

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