Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the senator for what is a very important question. The Rudd Labor government’s first budget delivered on its election commitments. It delivered on the commitments it made to people in terms of tax cuts, child care, education tax rebate—every one of our election promises was delivered as part of our budget strategy. The Australian people appreciate and notice the difference. From 1 July a range of those measures, if passed by this Senate, will come in.

The other commitment we made was to be fiscally conservative. The opposition attacked us, saying, ‘You couldn’t possibly be fiscally conservative—we cannot accept that.’ Despite the fact that we inherited a high inflation rate, despite the fact that we came in in a period when interest rate rise after interest rate rise had occurred under the previous government and despite the international uncertainty, we delivered a budget surplus of $22 billion. We said we needed a huge surplus in order to keep downward pressure on inflation, to keep downward pressure on interest rates. So we delivered on the things we said we would do during the election campaign—delivered on our commitments, delivered on our fiscal conservatism—to make this economy strong and to protect Australian families from inflation and interest rates.