Cathy O'Toole (Herbert, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

This is certainly an interesting motion, to say the very least. To think that this government would consider that it is living within its means when debt and deficit have gone through the roof under their watch! Labor's record in managing money is a good record. As a nation, we really need to recognise our wealth as we truly are a very lucky country. Australia has experienced uninterrupted economic growth for a record 27 years, and we can thank one of the greatest prime ministers and treasurers that this nation has ever had, the Hon. Paul Keating, for Australia's economic growth. There are only two countries in the developed world to achieve this record, and Australia is one of them. This is a remarkable achievement.

Last month marked the 10th anniversary of the global financial crisis. The global financial crisis was a result of the financial mistakes of other countries, and the cost to Australia could have been considerable. With US$691 billion in assets—nearly $1 trillion Australian at current exchange rates—and 25,000 employees worldwide, Lehman Brothers remains the biggest corporate collapse in American history. This financial crisis was catastrophic and resulted in hundreds of thousands of people internationally losing their jobs. International debt increased overnight into the billions and eventually, for America, into the trillions. People lost their homes and their assets, but this did not happen in Australia, and this can be attributed to my Labor colleague and former Treasurer Wayne Swan, who ensured that Australia's economy did not crash like America's, the United Kingdom's and those of so many other countries. Instead, Australia's economic growth continued to prosper under former Treasurer Wayne Swan's stimulus package, and Australia was one of just four developed countries—along with Israel, Poland and South Korea—that avoided a recession in 2009.

Let's compare and contrast that with the current LNP government. Australia now has a Prime Minister who is the immediate former Treasurer, whose priorities were tax cuts for big business and the banks. Labor has been saying for quite some time that this LNP government's priorities are just plain wrong and unfair. This government's trickle-down economic policy is seriously flawed and simply does not work. There can be no better reference than the former Howard government's Treasurer, Peter Costello, who said just last week that this government's economic policy is 'weird'. There's a consistent lack of inconsistency—namely, through a rolling farce of budget rules, or lack of them, over the last few weeks. Last week, the government announced a tax plan—not fully offset—saying it would simply be paid from economic growth and the surplus. This is a clear breach of the government's own budget rules. Let me explain this to those opposite who may have suffered a memory lapse. Budget Paper No. 1 from this year's budget, on page 3-7, states:

Unlike the government, Labor will ensure that we deliver those tax cuts for small and medium businesses in a fiscally responsible way, the same fiscally responsible way that will allow us to properly invest $14 billion for government schools and make proper investments in health, universities and TAFE and invest $1.75 billion for preschools.

We will fund all of these because our priorities are and always have been clear. We will deliver better and fairer tax reform. We won't prioritise hardworking Australian's tax dollars to big business and the banks—that's the LNP government's priority and it would have passed if it weren't for Labor's lobbying efforts in the Senate. This country needs and deserves fairer tax reforms. Labor's economic history is clear and our future plan even clearer. We won't be lectured to by this government on fiscal discipline when they have so clearly given up or completely lost their way.

Let me finish by saying that in my electorate of Herbert unemployment is high both in the general and youth populations. If this government truly believed that a job is the best form of welfare, it would fund vital infrastructure projects that would create local jobs in my electorate; it would match Labor's $100 million for stage 2 of the Burdekin pipeline; and it would match Labor's commitment of $200 million for energy infrastructure. These infrastructure projects will actually fund local jobs, create opportunities for young people in my community to get apprenticeships and address the fact that we have very high unemployment.

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