Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

This is an important MPI put forward by the shadow Treasurer and it is one that talks on an important issue, but, as with all things with the shadow Treasurer, you really have to trust but verify some of the numbers coming out of the shadow Treasurer's office. I'm going to get back to that in a second—the real 'trust but verify' numbers coming out of the shadow Treasurer 's office.

First of all, let me say this. Inflation is real. It does hurt Australians, and that is why we have seen budgetary restraint and the leadership taken by the Treasurer, the Prime Minister and the Minister for Finance around banking some of the increased revenue that we've seen made not just by increased commodity prices but by Australians who are working harder and longer hours. There are more Australians in work. This is revenue that has been received by the government off the back of the hard work of Australians, and we want to make sure that we see Australians keep more of what they earn. That's why we've put so much effort into getting wages moving again and putting more back into the pockets of hardworking Australians. That is what we are doing, and we will continue to do that work.

But let's go back to the shadow Treasurer just for a moment, because the shadow Treasurer has a bit of form on his management of numbers. Full credit to the opposition for putting as their head bean counter someone who has an interesting relationship with being able to calculate numbers. Who could forget when the shadow Treasurer famously came in not only to this place but to other places and said that the City of Sydney had spent $15.9 million on travel expenses? At first glance, you would think that's a little bit more than you would think for a council. A council shouldn't be spending $15.9 million on one year of travel. And you would think that someone in such a senior economic position in the government would be able to think their way through what that number actually means. What does $15.9 million actually translate to?

I've done a bit of homework that, frankly, should have been done by the then minister's office. They're public servants, so you give them the flexi fare. You don't give them the inflexible fare from Jetstar. Let's get them on the flexi fare from Qantas and make sure that they can change their flights around. So $15.9 million at the $300 flexi fare between Sydney and Melbourne—because that's the most travelled route, you would think—translates to 53,000 flights that Clover Moore apparently took in one year. If you break that down one more level, the shadow Treasurer thought he had quite a scoop in saying that Clover Moore had taken 145 flights a day. Could you imagine getting on the plane to Melbourne, arriving in the most spectacular and cultured city in Australia and then having to go all the way back to Sydney, only to have to get back and do another 143 flights a day? It seems like a pretty implausible situation, yet that is what the shadow Treasurer led with. It's hardly surprising that on 2 November 2020, the Guardian had a headline that said 'Angus Taylor v Clover Moore: WhatsApp messages reveal panic as minister's staff realise figures were wrong'. I can imagine that there would have been a bit of panic in the minister's office. There would have been quite a bit panic because, of course, it wasn't $15.9 million. The actual figures that were used by the council—the City of Sydney—were $4,206 for international travel and $1,700 in domestic flights. That's a little different from $14 million.

So, like with everything this shadow Treasurer has to say, you have to be very, very careful with what he puts forward. I know that he has been in the vegemite jar this week. He has been right in there. He added a bit of mayo to the vegemite. That's what he did. It's an unusual combination, but it may have resulted in a few of his colleagues sending Andrew Clennell a few SMSs giving opinions about the shadow Treasurer. We shouldn't laugh. The shadow Treasurer can put forward all of his wacky theories. He's going to do that.

We on this side of the House are always going to stand with the hardworking people of this country. We're going to take our budgetary responsibilities extremely seriously. We are going to keep working until inflation comes back down to appropriate levels, and we will keep backing hardworking Australians each and every day, because that's what a good government does.

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