Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister to the Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I apologise, Mr Deputy Speaker. I can assure the shadow Treasurer that John Howard does not have many kind things to say about his inability to stand up against the hard Left of his party, which has a vision for this country of higher taxes and strangling aspiration. We don't want to see this sort of leadership. We don't want to see the leadership, so-called, that we saw from this failed immigration minister—and the failures have followed you in every portfolio you've ever had. But in the Labor Party, when you fail, you get a promotion, apparently. That's what we've seen out of you.

Let's look at the Australian economy. This MPI refers to leadership and the Australian economy. Well, we now have an unemployment rate of 5.7 per cent. We now have GDP growth that's occurred for 26 years uninterrupted. Of course we don't take the credit for those 26 years, but we are continuing the great work that successive governments have done. But here, we're seeing the shadow Treasurer and his motley crew moving back to a pre-Hawke/Keating-era vision for this country—higher corporate taxes, higher small business taxes, higher personal income taxes. These were arguments that were won by our side of politics in the 1980s, and now we have the shadow Treasurer and his motley crew rehashing these ridiculous arguments from the 1970s. We shouldn't have to argue that lower taxes increases investment, that lower taxes for small businesses encourages them to invest more money, employ more people, expand their business operations and expand the opportunities for Australians. But we do have to make these arguments again, because we've gone back to a pre-Keating, pre-Hawke-era Labor Party.

We have seen an economy transition from a difficult mining investment boom and we've performed exceptionally well. Many pundits, and I suppose many in this House, have had private doubts about the ability of our economy to continue ploughing on, but we have. It doesn't happen by accident, shadow Treasurer. We had the opposition fighting one of the most important export trade deals that we've seen, the China free trade agreement. In that time, we've also seen a free trade agreement with South Korea and a free trade agreement with Japan. These things don't happen by accident. Twenty-six years of uninterrupted growth does not happen by accident. We've chased these opportunities and we've had obstruction from the Labor Party and this shadow Treasurer every step of the way. I had unionists in Melbourne handing out anti-China free trade agreement flyers—xenophobic flyers. It was absolutely disgraceful. We heard nothing out of the Labor Party for those months that that campaign was going on, but they skulked into the House and in the end voted for it, because they had to—after months of not speaking up. I suppose it's very difficult to bite the hand that feeds you. It's very difficult to speak about the union movement, but that xenophobic campaign—forget even the xenophobic aspects to it—was against the economic interests of this country.

So when we talk about 26 years of uninterrupted economic growth, these things don't happen by accident. We've chased these opportunities: the Howard government with the US free trade agreement; now, our government with three of the most significant markets in the Asia-Pacific region: Japan, China, and South Korea. It has provided opportunities to our small businesses as much as it has to our large businesses. It has provided opportunities to service industries, not just bulk commodities or agriculture. This does not happen by accident. It happens because we have a plan and we're working towards it.

It's very interesting. The shadow Treasurer referred to PBO costings. He didn't deny any of the numbers that were in any of those reports. He didn't deny any of the numbers that were in the News Limited reports, of $167 billion of higher taxes. $167 billion of higher taxes, and he claims to be the heir of Keating, the man who reduced corporate taxes. He refers to John Howard as though they're old friends! Corporate tax increases of $65 billion—outrageous! The Labor Party have still said that they will not give these big handouts to corporates and big handouts to small businesses, some of whom have two or three or four employees, some of whom are family businesses. They are apparently the big Apples and Googles of the world, these small cafes, small corner businesses. There is $65 billion there. We have housing taxes, taxes that purport to be housing affordability measures, of some $47 billion between negative gearing and capital gains tax. Why, or how, does increasing taxes on commercial properties increase housing affordability? Why should a teacher be denied the ability to invest in an investment property and negative gear it, but a surgeon who potentially has large amounts of investment income can negatively gear against that?

So the surgeon can negatively gear against their investment income, but the teacher or the nurse cannot negatively gear against their salary or wage. What a disgrace masquerading as housing affordability policies. What an absolute joke.

Now we've got the latest attack on small business, in what has been a succession of attacks on small business, with their family trusts policy. Small businesses don't engage through a structure in a family trust because they're criminal rorters of our tax system, and what a disgraceful thing to claim. The Labor Party claimed that farmers should be removed from their trust changes because farmers have lumpy income. Well, here's a newsflash for the shadow Treasurer and the Labor Party: most small businesses have very lumpy income. So the same rationale for taking farmers out of your changes equally applies to the hundreds of thousands of small businesses and families who will be subjected to a higher tax—another higher tax.

The Labor Party denied our implementation of the changes to the threshold for small business accessibility from $2 million to $10 million. The Labor Party think, if you're a business with a turnover between $2 million to $10 million, you're a massive corporate and not entitled to accelerated depreciation or increased tax cuts or the myriad other benefits in our tax law that apply to small businesses. So bereft are they of any understanding of small business that we just see, time and time again, policies from the Labor Party that smash small business. Small businesses employ millions of Australians. They are the engine room of this economy, and it's not by accident that we are where we are now. It's because of hard-won work and policies of this government.

I find it quite incredible that we've got a very discredited individual in the shadow Treasurer talking about leadership—a man who would be, between him and the member for Watson, one of the two worst immigration ministers this country has ever seen.

A government member: A close-run thing!

It's a very close-run thing—you're right. But I'd say that the member for McMahon probably takes the cake. And the chutzpah of that man to stand at the despatch box, arrogantly talking about how wonderful Labor are, is outrageous—absolutely outrageous! And he keeps getting promoted. This is the extraordinary thing about the Labor Party. I suspect it's because he keeps acquiescing to the hard left of his party. Some of us would like to think that he knows better, but we certainly don't want to see the sort of leadership we've seen from him in every portfolio he's ever had. We'll continue to work for Australians who aspire for better things in their lives.

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