Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Hughes, who is a great champion of small business in this parliament—a great champion. In this budget, once again the Turnbull government has said yes to small businesses, to back them in to ensure that they can pay lower taxes. In particular, we have said yes again to extending the instant asset write-off, not just to companies with up to $2 million in turnover but to companies with up to $10 million in turnover. That is who we have said will get tax cuts and extra tax support as small businesses in this country. The Labor Party has said no to that. The Labor Party has said no to small businesses of up to $10 million having lower taxes and having access to the instant asset write-off.

In addition to that, in the budget we said yes to cutting the red tape of state and local governments by entering into a partnership with those governments, with some $300 million to cut red tape to lower the costs for small business in this country. We said yes to that. The Labor Party said no to small business when it comes to cutting red tape. They want small businesses to pay higher taxes and they want small businesses to deal with more red tape. We said yes in this parliament to cutting the taxes for small businesses and medium-sized businesses with up to $50 million in turnover. As the Prime Minister has said, some 6½ million Australian employees work in those businesses, to whom we gave a tax cut in this parliament. What did the Labor Party do? They said no and they voted no in this parliament for those 6½ million Australians working in more than three million businesses. And it is worse than that, because we know the shadow Treasurer and the Leader of the Opposition have fully backed it into their costings, reversing those tax cuts for small businesses.

Ms Butler interjecting—

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