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

My question is to the Prime Minister. Does the Prime Minister agree with me that interest rates were too high when they reached 17 per cent in 1989, just as interest rates were too high when they reached 22 per cent in 1982 when the Prime Minister was Treasurer? Is this why the Treasurer has said that ‘the Howard treasurership was not a success in terms of interest rates and inflation’?

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I suppose, on occasions, I agree with the member for Lilley. I agree with the member for Lilley when he agrees with me in relation to my action over Queensland. The member for Lilley is a great follower. He belongs to the school of ‘echonomics’, which, it seems to me, will rival the Chicago School soon. We have the Chicago School of Economics, we have monetarism, we have Keynesianism and we now have ‘echonomics’ coming from those who sit opposite. There is something that the member for Lilley said this morning that I certainly did not agree with. He said that, if Labor had won the election, there would not have been any interest rate rises. Can you imagine that? What a fool I have been. All I have to do to stop interest rates ever going up in this country is to sign a piece of cardboard paper, which is what Mark Latham did in the last election campaign. But there he is, there is the member for Lilley, the shadow Treasurer—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They are getting very carried away with themselves at the moment. Hubris has taken over the frontbench of the Labor Party. I would have thought that he would have drawn the line somewhere. But basically what the member for Lilley is suggesting is that, if Mark Latham had become Prime Minister, he would have been able to stop any increases in interest rates. Let me say that occasionally I do agree with the member for Lilley. Maybe we might barrack occasionally for the same football team or one or two things like that, but, I tell you what, to try to suggest to the Australian people that Mark Latham, if he had become Prime Minister of this country, would have put a permanent lid on interest rates is really stretching things a bit too far.