Rod Kemp (Victoria, Liberal Party, Minister for the Arts and Sport) Share this | Hansard source

I was interested in Senator Milne’s comments. Senator Milne covered a range of issues, and let me deal with those issues in roughly the sequence in which they were raised by her. Senator Milne was unpersuaded by the statistics I gave on the performance of the Australian economy. I would have to say that she would be one of the few people who hold themselves to be economic commentators that would not be impressed by the general performance of the Australian economy.

Senator Milne is one expert, but let me quote another expert: Rodrigo de Rato, who is the head of the International Monetary Fund. We will contrast Senator Milne’s comments with Mr de Rato’s comments. He said, among other things, that the Howard government’s success in paying off its own debt gave it a very big cushion in managing a world recession. Senator Milne talked about a possible downturn in mineral exports—I will return to that in a minute—but she also mentioned the current account deficit. This is what the IMF said about Australia’s current account deficit, in contrast to Senator Milne’s comments. Mr de Rato stressed that the IMF did not regard Australia’s deficit as a threat to its economic health. I will quote what Mr de Rato said:

Australia’s external deficit reflects high investment, rather than inadequate domestic saving, and investment is especially strong in the resources sector, which boosts prospects for future exports.

So one expert, Senator Milne, drew our attention to the current account deficit and another expert, who just happens to be the person who is the head of the IMF, has a completely different view to Senator Milne. This is an independent view; it is not a view that is written by the Australian government—