Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

The same guy who can't get two questions in a row on national accounts today wants to talk about relevance. I was asked a moment ago about productivity. I pointed to the fact that we want productivity growth to be stronger, but the weakest 10 years was the time that they were in office. I was asked about living standards, and I pointed out real wages are growing again, and they were falling under those opposite. I was asked by the shadow Treasurer in his scripted intervention a moment ago to talk about the budget.

I'd love to talk more about the budget in this place because we have delivered a cumulative improvement of $215 billion from the big Liberal deficits that we were left. We've turned two of them into Labor surpluses. And next year's big Liberal deficit we turned into a smaller deficit. So our record is there for all to see when it comes to our improvements to the budget—the fact that inflation is almost half of what we inherited, the fact that real wages are growing again, the fact that over two out of the last three quarters we've seen productivity growth go up. But it will take longer than that to turn around the record that we were left with.

The shadow Treasurer has the MPI shortly—ten minutes looking at himself in the camera like a budgie looking in the mirror, but without the insight. (Time expired)

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