Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is directed to the Treasurer. Has the Treasurer seen comments from the Australian’s national political editor, Paul Kelly, who has said that the government’s attacks on Labor’s broadband proposal are ‘nonsense’? Has he seen those of the Australian Financial Review journalist David Bassanese, who has said the proposal is ‘smart, pragmatic economic policy making’? Has he seen those of the Daily Telegraph, which has said in its editorial:

It’s time the Government got with the program. The digital age has arrived and it’s impossible for governments to opt out.

Treasurer, don’t these comments show that your attacks are overblown and just plain desperate?

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before I call the Treasurer, I remind the member for Lilley that he should not use the word ‘you’ in his question.

Peter Costello (Higgins, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let me assure the member for Lilley of one thing: my attacks on his raids on the Future Fund are going to go on every single day until the next election. If the Labor Party were not worried about attacks on their policy to raid the Future Fund, they would not be demanding that they stop. I have never heard the Labor Party actually demand that we do something which they believed to be in their interest. The reason why the Labor Party are sensitive on this issue is: not only do they know it is wrong; they also know that if a private sector employer tried to raid the superannuation funds of their employees it would be illegal. The last time this was tried it was done by a bloke called Robert Maxwell, the newspaper owner, in the UK. Robert Maxwell had a great plan to raid—

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Was he in the ALP?

Peter Costello (Higgins, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Was he in the ALP? Yes, I think he was in the ALP. The member for Grayndler asked me whether he was in the ALP. I think he was, from memory, but I will go back and have a look at that. I must thank the member for Grayndler. He always thinks up my best lines for me. It is quite possible that the whips sent this dorothy dixer around to the member for Lilley by mistake.

The member for Lilley has been out there, day after day, demanding that the Future Fund be a locked box so that it cannot be raided. He is on the record, day after day, saying that. We have now got the member for Melbourne on the record, as late as today, saying that it has to be independent from political interference. His defence is that he gave that answer a week ago. If this opposition believed that this was such a great investment for the Future Fund, presumably they would believe that the guardians would see that for themselves. But no. They have stepped in themselves, they have done no financial due diligence, they have overridden the independence, they have raided the fund, they have said that this is not a loan, they have said that this can be done subsequently, and they have said that they reserve the right to do it over and over again.

Let me make this point: in relation to the inner cities and the suburbs where broadband is commercial, we now have at least two consortiums—Telstra and the G9—that want to build it because they think they can make a profit out of it. Nearly 50 per cent of the population can access even higher speeds of 12 to 20 megabits per second from ADSL2. Where it is not commercial for a private sector operator to do it is out in rural and remote Australia. The government has anticipated that and has set aside a communications fund of $2 billion to look after rural and remote Australia. The Labor Party wants to use taxpayers’ funds in an area where the private sector can make a profit out of it and take away taxpayers’ funds from the area where the private sector cannot make a profit out of it—out in rural and regional Australia. This is why I say that you cannot trust the Labor Party with money.

John Murphy (Lowe, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, you can.

Peter Costello (Higgins, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Who said, ‘Yes, you can’? Murphy’s Law! Everything that can be said that’s silly will be silly at the most inopportune time. Yes, you can trust the Labor Party with money—Murphy’s Law. The telecommunications operators would have seen the Leader of the Opposition coming. They have said to him, in relation to proposals they already have on the books, ‘Raid the Future Fund and give us the money.’ Eddy saw him coming; Eric Ripper saw him coming. You cannot have somebody who is a patsy for state premiers and commercial interests running Australia’s economy.