Gary Humphries (ACT, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship) Share this | Hansard source

It is hard, after that confused mishmash of information and half-truths, to identify exactly what Senator Hurley asserts are the significant improvements effected by the Rudd government in the area of household incomes and the cost of living. Whatever the significant improvements are, they seem to be overwhelmed by the evidence that in fact the standard of living is declining for Australians and the cost of living is rising at an unprecedented rate.

We are told, on the evidence of bodies such as the Australian Bureau of Statistics, that household costs such as for groceries are rising precipitately. We have seen, according to the ABS, that the cost of a standard basket of groceries in Sydney has risen by something like $10 in just three months. Exactly which of the Labor Party’s significant improvements, in the areas of which Senator Hurley spoke, are impacting on that kind of rise? We have seen rises in house prices, we have seen rises in rental prices, we have seen rises in the cost of fuel and we have seen rises in almost every area in which the consumer might measure the standard of living that they enjoy. What exactly is the basis on which Senator Hurley argues that there have been significant improvements? What is more, we not only are seeing at this stage significant increases in the cost of living across Australia in most of the indicators we care to look at but have the prospect of further increases coming down the line with the advent of the Rudd government’s ETS and the admitted extra costs that that will impose on Australian consumers across the board as an intrinsic part of it.