Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

We're committed to doing everything we can to secure the votes of the senators to pass our budget measures. We are determined to deliver on our commitment to the Australian people to deliver jobs and growth. We've come a long way—record jobs growth last year, 415,000 jobs—and we're managing the budget in a way that is bringing it back into balance a year early. We're guaranteeing the essential services that Australians depend on, including health services, as I mentioned in my earlier answer. There is record funding for schools, and our reform of personal income tax is going to see the biggest comprehensive reform of personal income tax in more than a generation. These are big reforms, and they are driving investment, productivity, more jobs and better jobs.

The Labor Party should be supporting it, and they should be supporting our cuts to company tax for all the reasons so eloquently put by the Leader of the Opposition when he was taking a previous position—he has had so many on this issue. He said, 'Every student of economic history knows that lower company tax results in more investment, higher productivity, more jobs and higher wages.' For the Labor Party, it's not too late to return to the rationality of years past and back Australian jobs. That's what we're doing. We're backing jobs. We're backing investment. We're backing enterprise. It's about time the Labor Party did too.

See this speech in context