Scott Ryan (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Their only achievement. An ACCI business survey showed that business confidence had collapsed to its lowest point in 14 years—and those people who were involved in running businesses 14 years ago, particularly in my home state of Victoria, remember just how bad that was.

There have also been similar collapses in consumer confidence. In July the OECD’s standardised consumer confidence indicator showed that Australia experienced the largest collapse in consumer confidence in the OECD and the second lowest level of consumer confidence in the OECD overall, just behind Spain. This result is mirrored by the ACNielsen global consumer index, which reported that in the first half of 2008 Australia had an 11-point collapse in consumer confidence. This fall over the last six months was far worse than the global average of half that, at 5.6 points. And why is all this happening? This is all happening because our Treasurer has been talking the place down. The Chief Economist of Westpac, Bill Evans, was reported as saying recently that confidence was now only slightly above the low point of the recession in 1990. I suppose at some point we will soon hear that this was ‘the crash in confidence we had to have’.

The fact that business and consumer confidence has been in this swan dive for the entire term of the Rudd government is no coincidence. It should come as no surprise, because the Labor Party has form on economic management. The Prime Minister and Treasurer have failed to accept that they are now leaders and have responsibilities. They need to move out of opposition and commentating mode. The coalition left government with solid economic growth, low unemployment, negative net public debt and $96 billion in future surpluses, which beats the hell out of the $96 billion of Kim Beazley’s black hole.

Rather than easing the pressure on working families, this government has failed them. The increase in unemployment forecast in the budget papers, as outlined by Senator Fifield, is of 130,000 fewer jobs. Late last month an analysis in the Sydney Morning Herald came up with the number of 58,000 people actually losing their jobs, and that was described as ‘the number that dare not speak its name’. Quite frankly, that is a number this government should be ashamed of. To introduce policies and forecast an increase in unemployment in the environment they inherited has absolutely no excuse.

Higher interest rates represent a significant increase in living costs for all Australians. As Senator Fifield also outlined, when a government goes out and talks up the prospect of inflation, it is giving the Reserve Bank encouragement and a green light to increase interest rates, which hits every mortgage owner, hits every person who has borrowed money to buy a car and hits farmers and businesses on their overdrafts. This situation is compounded by the fact that we are in a challenging economic environment at the moment—but a challenging economic environment is no excuse for the government’s failures, because the environment is always challenging. The previous government saw off the Asian financial crisis, the dotcom crash, the recession in the United States and terrorist attacks in 2001, yet our economy went through 10 years of constant growth—something our trading partners are jealous of. For this government to be constantly looking for an excuse shows the vacuum that is at its policy core.

Just months into the job, the Prime Minister said he had done everything he could physically do to reduce the pressure on families. In fact, apart from putting prices on the internet and saying, as Senator Fifield outlined, that he had done all he could, he has done nothing. Far from lowering the price of petrol, we know—because independent analysts have looked at the model—that Fuelwatch will force out independent retailers and increase the price of petrol. It is unfathomable, when we are talking about an inflation challenge, that the Labor Party would not consider reducing fuel excise. Cutting fuel excise will cut inflation. GROCERYchoice—and we all know its true name was actually ‘grocery watch’—does nothing other than tell consumers what the prices were a month ago. It will have a negative impact on independent retailers, particularly in smaller communities and in rural areas. Potentially, it will force them out of business because it misrepresents what independent retailers can actually sell their products for, because they are grouped together.

We come to the final point of this motion. We understand that the Rudd government’s economic reform strategy actually has no detail. They are all talk and no action. We hear talk of productivity, but they are introducing an industrial relations system that the Treasury itself has described as less flexible and likely to reduce productivity growth. We hear talk of reform, but there is no reform program. They refuse to release the modelling so we can look at the detail behind the Garnaut report—because it upsets the plan to have a brochure, a sticker and a slogan. Labor’s Building Australia Fund was supposedly designed to provide flexibility in the funding of infrastructure. We have no idea what sorts of things are going to be built, what criteria they are going to be tested on, whether an economic test is going to be applied and whether they are going to be cost-effective. The government have no idea what they intend to build. All they know is that something should be built, but why and for what purpose eludes them. The state Labor governments have squandered the boom that they have experienced and we know that this will be used to cover up federal Labor’s failure.

‘Nation building’ is actually also partly code—and we heard this from Senator Cameron earlier—for picking a lucky industry. I come from Victoria, as I outlined in my first speech the other night. We saw firsthand what happens when a government goes around trying to pick winners. When governments go around and try to pick winners, taxpayers and workers lose out. Having a slush fund for government to do that will only encourage people down that particular path. The government is oblivious to the main drivers of innovation. I am glad Senator Cameron mentioned it, because innovation does not come from government. Innovation comes from small business. Innovation comes from big business. It comes from someone with an interesting idea, and Australia has a fine tradition in it. Innovation is not something that comes out of a 200-page report or something that the government can direct. Innovation comes from people actually running their own businesses, coming up with a good idea and convincing other people to back them.

The coalition’s record over 10 years stands in proud contrast to what this government has achieved over nine months. We paid off Labor’s $96 billion of debt. We put $60 billion away into the Future Fund—away from this government’s fingers, thankfully—to make sure that all the liabilities of government in the future were covered. We put $5 billion in the Higher Education Endowment Fund. We provided Australians with $214 billion in tax relief and made reforms to superannuation to reduce the massive paperwork headache that was forcing everyone at the age of 55 to hire professionals to deal with something that should be a lot simpler.