Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Australians face scams every day—scams that are there to deceive Australians. The scammer makes a promise to give something or to do something or pretends to be something other than what they are. Often they deceive people into believing that the scammer is actually helping them. Despite the red flags, the scammer keeps promising there's nothing to fear and there's nothing wrong. People put their trust in the scammer, and then it's too late: the scammer has taken them for a ride and disappeared.

Today we're not debating an online scam but an electoral scam. Anthony Albanese promised the stage 3 tax cuts over 100 times. Labor had voted for these tax cuts in this parliament. The tax cuts were taken to the Australian people by both sides. In 2019, under Bill Shorten, Labor was very honest about its tax plans, and Australians rejected them. Had Labor under Anthony Albanese in 2022 been as honest, they may have been rejected again. But Australians believed Labor, and they believed Anthony Albanese when he said, 'My word is my bond.' Then his word wasn't his bond and he pocketed $28 billion in extra taxes. To be fair to the Prime Minister, he wasn't the only one. His ministers all lined up to celebrate the broken promise. The teals also broke their promises. I've heard many of their arguments. The word 'fairness' comes up a lot. Do you know what the fairest thing you can do is? Keep your word and keep your promises to Australians.

Australians are right to feel disappointed in a prime minister and in a government that says one thing and does another. Australians have learnt that you can't trust the Labor Party when it comes to taxes. Paul Keating had his l-a-w law tax cuts that were never delivered, and Julia Gillard said there would be no carbon tax under the government she led. Now Anthony Albanese has broken a word which he once said was his bond.

No-one questions that Australians are facing difficult times. Because of this government, Australians are facing the most financial pressure since the Keating recession of the 1990s. True, unemployment continues at historic lows; yet the economic hamster-wheel is getting faster and faster. Under this government, real net disposable income per person has fallen 8.6 per cent. The official figures reflect what Australians are feeling in their wallets. Under this government, food's gone up nine per cent, electricity's up 23 per cent and gas is up 29 per cent. This is despite the fact that we have a Prime Minister who'd promised to reduce power bills by $275.

And it's the home where the pain is. For home owners, it's the pain of a dozen interest rate rises under this government, meaning that a family with a $750,000 mortgage are paying an extra $24,000 a year. Renters—who are often young or the most economically vulnerable—are feeling the pain of the largest increase in almost 15 years.

Bracket creep, interest rate increases, energy costs, inflation and falling real wages have all taken their toll. For an average income earner, this is a decline in take-home pay of the order of $8,000. It's worth recording that, under Labor's policy, a worker on an average wage would receive only $804 a year—a fraction of what they lost.

It must be noted that, under this package, in its entirety, taxpayers lose. Labor's tax package increases the tax take over 10 years by $28 billion.

We know that this tax package is a test case for Labor breaking further promises after the next election. Over the last two years, we have seen very deliberate language around the stage 3 tax cuts: 'There are no plans;' 'It's legislated;' 'Our position hasn't changed'—cute forms of words, always delivered with a touch of indignation when the ministers or the Prime Minister would be questioned. Now we'll hear the same form of words for negative gearing, for superannuation, for family trusts and for death duties over the next 18 months.

The opposition knows how much Australians are hurting. It's why we will not stand in the way of these tax cuts. But Australians are paying a terrible price for the inflationary largesse of state, territory and federal Labor governments and the lack of any long-term economic plan from the Treasurer.

I applaud people studying and learning. The Treasurer might have studied and written a thesis on the reforms of the eighties and nineties—and I applaud that, too; I really do—but he hasn't done any thinking about the 2020s and the 2030s. We must look forward, not look back.

Today, I want to add two reflections to this debate about where we're heading. The first is that we need to recentre the economic debate of this country on the matters that will grow and prosper Australia. All too often we've let the economic policy levers be driven by a desire to alleviate economic symptoms Australians face, rather than to address the causes. This is a government focused on dishing out panadol for pain rather than surgery for a cure. It's about winning a news poll rather than building for a generation.

Let's speak the truth that too few want acknowledged. The Australian economy's not working as it should. The fact that Australian wages aren't buying as much as they used to is not a cause of our economic malaise; it's a symptom. It's a symptom of our loss of competitiveness and productivity. The fact that power bills are going up and up won't be answered by temporary relief, but by a reform of energy markets and a serious debate about our energy mix where nothing, including nuclear power, is off the table. There's the fact that investment in major projects is being stymied because this government has fed and encouraged activist groups. Lawfare is stymieing jobs, investment, productivity and national income. The Attorney-General won't resolve issues around legal standing, which is enabling political activists to disrupt the economic progress of this country.

There's also a truth whispered among parents. Though most of them love their children's school and appreciate the care and dedication of their teachers, there's a deep fear our education system—primary, secondary and tertiary—is not preparing young people for the workforce they will face. Australia's skill needs are not being met. In so many places we've settled for a status quo economy that worked for the 1980s but is not working for the 2020s and will fail in the 2030s.

Our biggest businesses—be they supermarkets, telcos, banks or airlines—are settled up in cosy relationships which hinder growth and innovation. We need the ACCC to continue to put the supermarkets, the telcos, the banks and the airlines under the microscope, studying market structure, barriers to entry and how we can encourage more market players. Competition drives prices down and it drives innovation up. And we need a workplace relations system that doesn't treat those who create jobs like enemies and criminals instead of partners in building a positive, high-wage economy. We need to reset the economic discussion and build for a new economic future.

Policies are always underpinned by values, and those values matter. When it comes to the economy, we must always encourage aspiration, because it's aspiration that encourages every Australian to participate, to contribute, to give it a go and to do their best. Aspiration is a virtue. It's the optimism expressing itself through our labour, which is the gift we all bring to our workplaces. From young people contemplating decisions about skills and study, to older people thinking about taking on extra work, aspiration matters. When an Australian makes a decision—

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