Angus Taylor (Hume, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I connected it to a senior Labor figure. I certainly hope it wasn't the member opposite who said these things. I certainly hope not! Perhaps he can clarify that at some point. I certainly hope it wasn't either of the members opposite who said this, but they did say the Reserve Bank was a bunch of 'barbarians and weirdos in thrall to a bizarre groupthink' and they did call the governor a 'nutter'. It's truly extraordinary.

It is clear that the attacks on the Reserve Bank were led by the Treasurer. That's the time sequence. He led them out. Out went the surrogates and out went the proxies; out they went, attacking this institution. At the end of the day, we know what they're really on about. What they're really on about is two things. One is shifting the blame for their failures. There's been a nine per cent reduction—a collapse—in the Australian standard of living. No other OECD country has seen it. Michael Read at the AFR laid this out just a short time ago. No other OECD country in the world has seen a collapse in its standard of living like Australia has in the last two years.

It's extraordinary how unlucky Labor governments always are, isn't it. They're terribly unlucky. They wreck the economy every single time. We're the worst in the OECD. We've got inflation which is stuck. Core inflation since January has not moved, and there is not a single advanced country in the world, other than Australia, where inflation hasn't moved since January this year. We are the only one. We are at the back of the pack every single time. Our inflation is higher than any other advanced country in the world. We're at the back of the pack in dealing with it. The answer, for the Treasurer and for those opposites, is to shift the blame to the RBA and then try to seize control, which no doubt will lead where it always leads with Labor—wrecking the institution and wrecking the economy. Labor's plan is clear to see.

Let's look at the economists' reaction to the war that Labor is waging against the RBA. Well-respected RMIT economics professor Sinclair Davidson said:

All the economic indicators are going the wrong way, and what is the government doing? Fighting with the RBA.

Highly respected former RBA board member Warwick McKibbin said:

You want to think that the government and the central bank are working together in the same direction for the benefit of the country. To make those sorts of comments—

the sorts of comments made by the Treasurer and others—

suggested that maybe there's some other agendas at work—

we know what they are—

and that's not helpful.

Another former RBA board member, Graham Kraehe, said:

For the treasurer to then be coming out and saying, 'Well, this is the Reserve Bank's fault'. I don't think another serious economist in the country … would agree with that.

I can assure you, Deputy Speaker, this Treasurer is not a serious economist. He is a doctor of spin, not a doctor of economics. 'Doctor' he likes to call himself, but it's not of economics, and Graham Kraehe has made the point that there's no serious economist that would back in what the Treasurer has said.

The truth is what's sitting behind this is Labor's failed economic management. We only have to look at the facts to see how bad it's been for Australians. Those opposite like to pat themselves on the back and say how good Australians have it. Every single day we hear them say that, but let's look at the facts. Living standards and real disposable incomes have fallen by 8.7 per cent since Labor came to power. Albo's little gold coin is worth almost 10 per cent less than when those opposite came to power. That's what you get with Labor—aspiration dies and hope dies. Australians are, understandably, seeing less and less light at the end of the tunnel as things continue to get worse. Labour productivity has collapsed by 6.3 per cent. There is no pathway to prosperity without labour productivity. Paul Keating understood that, but Paul Keating is at war with this Treasurer. Everyone is at war with the Treasurer now—the Productivity Commission, the RBA and most economists around the country. He, on the other hand, has failed to win the war against inflation and certainly hasn't won the war on productivity, which has collapsed by 6.3 per cent. Household savings are down by over 10 percentage points. Australians are giving up hope. They're cracking open the big piggy banks because they've run out of anything else. So they've essentially stopped saving under this government. They have to to make ends meet. Personal income taxes are 25 per cent higher than when Labor came to power.

Chris Richardson makes the point that we have had raging inflation over the last two years, which has been at its highest level since Labor has been in power. Shame. The Prime Minister should take note of that. Inflation is terrible for households. It drives up interest rates, it drives up the cost of living, it drives up taxes being paid and it drives bracket creep, which means the tax rate goes up as well.

Interest paid on mortgages has almost tripled, and the economy is experiencing the slowest GDP growth since the 1990s. Indeed, there have been six quarters of GDP per capita going backwards. That's a household recession. Households have seen their GDP per person going backwards for six consecutive audits, which is absolutely extraordinary. In the 50 years since we've been keeping that data we haven't seen that before. Fifty years ago was a long time ago. Abba had just put out 'Waterloo', the Rubik's cube had just been invented and the Fonz had just appeared on our TV screens in Happy Days. They were happier days. They were under Gough Whitlam, but they were happier days, I have to say. But the truth is it's a long time in which we haven't seen anything like what we are seeing today.

You see a lot of economists talking about the desperate situation with our economy that came out of the national accounts just last week. Warren Hogan said: 'We are going backwards in terms of our living standards. Our productivity is falling. Our government is growing. If this is our new economy'—it might be the fourth economy—'then the standard of living of one of the world's wealthiest countries is going to go away.' The KPMG chief economist Brendan Rynne has this to say: 'The public sector has a foot on the accelerator and the Reserve Bank's foot is on the brake. It's stalling the economy. In effect, we are in no man's land.' He is saying it, too. It's a good line. He said: 'Government spending is not sustainable and is effectively taking from Peter to pay Paul.' Brendan Rynne goes on to say: 'Whilst there's this idea that government spending has saved the economy, what it's effectively done is just move the deck chairs around.' That's what those opposite like to do. They certainly want to do that with the Reserve Bank, don't they? They want to move deck chairs around there and get rid of the people they don't like and put some of their mates in. EY Chief economist Cherelle Murphy has said the lack of coordination between fiscal and monetary policy means the path to low and stable inflation and therefore lower interest rates is slower than it needs to be.

We want to see this economy get back on track. We want to see Australians' standard of living restored. We want to see inflation back within the target band. We want to see interest rates getting back to the level where they are sustainable for Australians. We want to see real wages rising, not falling the nine per cent they have for working families under this government. We want to see the productivity that drives prosperity getting back on track. But the only way to do that is to get back to basics. That means cutting red tape, securing our energy future and reforming our tax system so that it's simpler and fairer, with lower taxes, particularly for small business. We've announced a substantial expansion of accelerated depreciation. It means restoring sensible workplace laws that are good for both workers and employers, for both sides, something that those opposite used to believe in. It means encouraging small business and enterprise and supporting a strong financial sector. All of that leads to a situation where Australian families see hope restored, their standard of living restored and their aspirations restored and Australians believing again that Australia is the greatest country in the world to live in. That's what we stand for. That's what we will be fighting for all the way through to the next election.

See this speech in context