Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Treasurer. I refer the Treasurer to his previous answer and the government's decision to depart from longstanding budget conventions in its Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook by changing the underlying economic assumptions in that document. Can the Treasurer advise the House how much this government decision has added to forecast budget deficits?

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The fact of the matter is that the forecasts do obviously have an impact on the budget bottom line.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

How much, Joe, how much?

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Moreton will remove himself under 94(a).

The member for Moreton then left the chamber.

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He is not the only clown in that circus over there. The fact of the matter is that the forecasts obviously have an impact on the budget bottom line. But the fact is that Labor got every forecast wrong and therefore ended up getting the budget bottom line consistently wrong. You could almost forgive them for getting their numbers wrong, but they are showing no sense of contrition about this.

Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker, on a point of order on direct relevance, it was a very clear question: how much? If the Treasurer does not know, I am prepared for him to seek the advice and report back, if he has forgotten.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a very wide-ranging question. The Treasurer has the call.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

How can something as specific as that be ruled as a wide-ranging question? How?

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question went to the question of the parameters set by Treasury. The Treasurer has the call.

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The forecasts that were presented in MYEFO did not have forecasts presented to us under the alternative scenario presented to Labor. Therefore, you cannot have a number that is the difference, you clown. You cannot work it out, because the numbers that were presented were on the forecasts presented by the Treasury.

I was reading the transcript of the shadow Treasurer in his speech to the Deutsche Bank International Investor Mission, 12 March 2014, when he said:

We believe in returning the budget to surplus over time, and we showed that we have the ability to make the types of decision necessary to bring it about it.

You actually did not bring a surplus about. But that is contrary to what the then Treasurer, the member for McMahon, said to Fran Kelly when he said that Labor:

… have returned budget to surplus three years ahead of schedule and ahead of any other major advanced economy—

I am getting questions from someone who not only promised a surplus but claimed to have delivered a surplus when, in fact, nothing of the sort ever happened. Why? Because now we know that the Labor Party's true legacy was to leave us with the burden of the fastest growth in spending of the 17 major IMF economies in the world. That is Labor's legacy. They have left us with the third-highest growth in net debt in the world, and on top of that: $123 billion of deficits, $667 billion of debt, rising unemployment, falling terms of trade and below trend growth. Labor should be very proud of that legacy—oh, what a feeling!