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

My question is to the Treasurer. I refer to the 17 new taxes and charges in his budget. Isn't it the case that these tax hikes will help push up tax as a percentage of the economy, higher each and every year over the next four years and higher than at any point under the previous, Labor, government?

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

I wish I inherited the budget that the previous Labor government inherited. I wish I inherited a $20 billion surplus, $40 billion in the bank and unemployment with a four in front of it. But I did not inherit that. So we have got to deal with what we inherited and we have got to make sure that we improve the situation. The fact is that we are endeavouring to improve the situation. The problem is that Labor locked in expenditure growth of 3.6 per cent. So let's go through it. They had a foreign aid budget that they never paid for, they had a foreign aid promise that they could never pay for, and now the shadow minister for foreign affairs wants to increase aid by $18 billion. Where is the money coming from? And then they had bonus payments for schools which they promised but never paid for. I say to the shadow minister for schools: where is that money coming from? And then they had bonus payments for hospitals, in the out years; somewhere out there they made promises about hospitals. We have the shadow minister for hospital running around saying, 'We'll do that.' I ask: where is the money coming from? And they have put off decisions about submarines, they have put off decisions about defence expenditure—tens of billions of dollars of expenditure. The shadow minister for defence is out there saying, 'We'll deliver that.' I ask that shadow minister: where is the money coming from? And then there is the National Disability Insurance Scheme. The Leader of the Opposition says, 'We'll deliver that in full. Don't worry, we'll find the money for it somewhere.' I ask the Leader of the Opposition: where is that money coming from?

This is the problem with Labor: they make these big heroic political promises. They stand at the top of the mount and say to the Australian people, 'We'll give it to you.' But the problem is they do not have the money. As Margaret Thatcher said, sooner or later the thing about socialists is that they run out of other people's money. Somehow, somewhere, there is this money tree which I have not yet found. I have searched high and low all over Canberra. I have walked through the parks and gone down to Treasury. I have searched for this magical money tree and, Madam Speaker, I can report to you that there is no money tree. There is no gold at the end of the rainbow. I say to the honourable Leader of the Opposition that, sooner or later, the truth will catch up with him. Sooner or later, he will have to explain to the Australian people where the money is coming from.