David Coleman (Banks, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yesterday the government showed their incredible weakness on the cost-of-living issue by claiming credit for automatic pension increases. The government, of course, have nothing to do with those increases, which have been set in legislation for decades. It's kind of like the government announcing, 'The sun will come up today,' 'The day will consist of 24 hours equally divided into 60 minutes,' or, 'The laws of gravity will continue to apply,' and then claiming credit for it. It is just extraordinary, and it shows their extreme insecurity on the cost-of-living issue.

You don't claim credit for something if you have a catalogue of things to point to, but the government have nothing to point to because the government have achieved absolutely nothing on the cost-of-living issue. Before the election, they were going to cut power prices by $275 per family, and they were going to put downward pressure on inflation and put downward pressure on interest rates. None of those things have happened. None of those things are happening. If you go through the so-called 36 outcomes of the jobs summit, which I had the misfortune of doing yesterday, the only one which actually relates to cost of living is the one that the opposition proposed back in June—which is to give pensioners the opportunity to work more whilst still claiming their pension. That's actually practical. It will have an impact. There is a deep, deep insecurity on this issue because of a complete lack of action, and they're claiming credit for things which they had absolutely nothing to do with.