Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

The seventh, sorry. It would be the seventh biggest economy in the world. We do not have Silicon Valley. We do not have Hollywood. We do not have diamonds in our economy. But we do not seem to understand the problems that we have got ourselves into.

My statement to Treasurer Swan and Prime Minister Rudd is: ‘For goodness sake, you must start to do something substantive to turn this around, because if you don’t it will go to the tipping point of no return, and do not think that that tipping point does not exist. We are getting very close to it.’ Even Dr Gruen of the Treasury was quizzed and quizzed and asked: ‘What is the point, when people, even in their wildest beliefs, never thought that the Labor Party would get to a position where they would be asking for beyond $200 billion?’ I asked: ‘How much debt can Australia have?’. The Treasury officers said, ‘We cannot really give the number to you.’ I asked: ‘Can we have a trillion dollars?’ They laughed and said, ‘Don’t be ridiculous. That would be outrageous.’ I said, ‘Let’s get to a rough number. What is the extent of debt that would mean that it is all over; it is all finished?’ They finally said, ‘About 80 per cent GDP.’ We are a $1.2 trillion economy, so we get to $900 billion in debt and it is all over. Let us start adding them up. You have $300 billion. You have underwritten the states for another $150 billion. You have the Ruddbank with a possible contingent liability of $38 billion. You have Broadband Connect, which is $42 billion, most of which you will have to get from the government in bonds. That is incredible. Within the term of one government—and we are not even to the end of it—you are halfway towards ‘lights out’ and we have not even got to the next election.