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

This is the shadow Treasurer who runs around saying that he's going to attack large businesses and go after the top end of town. Well, he's not going after the top end of town; he's going after these hardworking Australians that he's referring to in this MPI.

The shadow Treasurer, in his contribution, referred to the top 20 per cent of taxpayers. How much does the shadow Treasurer believe that the top 20 per cent of taxpayers should actually pay? The top 23 per cent of taxpayers pay 65 per cent of all tax. How much more should they be paying? The shadow Treasurer never says that, because that would require him to go out and say to people who are getting up at 6 am every day, working hard, missing out on family obligations, saving and trying to do things for their family: 'You're not contributing enough and you don't deserve a tax cut.' How much do you want those 23 per cent of people to pay? Or, if we talk about the next 53 per cent, who pay another third of the income tax, that 70 per cent of Australians carry our tax system, and the shadow Treasurer got up today and said: 'You do not deserve a tax cut. In fact, you're not paying your fair share, and we're going to go after you a bit more.'

In the end, the shadow Treasurer has spent two years running around this country, saying, 'We're going after the bad millionaires, the bad billionaires and the big multinationals,' and what's it all boiled down to? It's boiled down to him attacking working Australians on low and medium incomes, going after retirees, people who are on low incomes, and denying them up to a quarter of their income—

Ms Butler interjecting—

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