Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is said in this place that one of the constants here is change. The tide comes in and goes out politically for either side and has done for 300 years, since we adopted the Westminster system, not just here in Australia but overseas. Effective governments are always held to account by effective oppositions. Can I tell you that, under the Dutton administration, we will be an effective opposition, no question.

The government brought to the election a suite of measures, and it is right and proper that those be implemented, as any government would do. But it's right and proper that the Australian Labor Party have an honest and open conversation with the Australian public and don't follow in the same tracks that the United Kingdom's recently ousted Prime Minister, Liz Truss, did by signalling sending a heap of capital, a heap of government money, into the market, into the economy. That petrified the UK markets and sent them into a downward spiral, which forced her resignation. The spend over there was going to have a disastrous impact.

No-one begrudges anyone getting a pay rise, but I would ask those on the other side to inquire of the Treasury what the inflationary pressure looks like when pay rises are pushed through, because we see the suite of measures the Reserve Bank has to influence those outcomes through monetary policy. Interest rate movement is one of the tools—one of the few tools—that it has. It can jawbone, and there are a couple of other minor things it can do, but predominantly it's interest rates that it can use. With the inflation number at 7.3 at the moment and being estimated to go up, if we continue to put through more money through the economy through higher wages—like I said, I don't begrudge that those wages be done—we need to have an understanding of what the impact will be on interest rates. As they go up, we as the opposition will walk in here and say, 'Labor, you need to own some of those points in the interest rate going up,' because undoubtedly as people lose their jobs—heaven forbid. I pray that it never happens that anyone loses their house in my electorate or in this nation as a result of inflationary pressure.

We left a very strong economy. It was the envy of the OECD. Mr Deputy Speaker Stevens, when those on the other side of this House run out of money, be well assured that they'll come looking for yours.

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