Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Fisher for his question. The member for Fisher is a great advocate for the defence industry in his electorate, particularly a company called HeliMods, which gets a great deal of attention from the member for Fisher. He is also using the heft of the government spending on defence to help grow the economy in Fisher, his electorate on the Sunshine Coast, and he should be commended for it.

Because we are running a surplus budget, because we are building a strong economy, we can invest in the essential services and priorities that the Australian public regard as important without increasing taxes. That is in stark contrast to the Labor Party, who think that you can only increase spending and keep increasing taxes. What this government has done—and this year in particular has been a very busy year for defence and defence industry—what we have done is increase spending in defence, building our military capability, the largest in our peace time history, without increasing taxes. We're using that heft to drive our defence industry boom in this country. I welcome the Minister for Defence Industry to the chamber. He's doing an absolutely sensational job—

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