John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

No, we are not going to change it back. We would all go broke! I want to refer to Senator Cameron’s contribution about the cost of living. He mentioned interest rates—so did Senator Hurley—and how they were 8.55 per cent under the Howard government. They had risen to 8.55 per cent. They must think that we do not have memories. They must think I cannot remember back to the 1992-93 days when I was paying 25.25 per cent under the so-called ‘World’s Greatest Treasurer’, then to become Prime Minister, Mr Keating. And what did it bring on? It brought on the ‘recession we had to have’, as Mr Keating said. ‘We have got to have it,’ Mr Keating said, when we buried the nation in debt, when unemployment rose to 11 per cent and when we were trying to survive in drought and times of low commodity prices on 25.25 per cent.

Senator Cameron talks about the so capable way that the Labor Party can manage the economy. Perhaps he thinks we have forgotten back to the late 1980s when the state of South Australia went broke, as did Victoria, as did Tasmania and as did Western Australia, while Canberra was going down the tube of debt as well. Who managed all of that huge debt-building policy right through then? It was all under Labor governments. Then we had the $96 billion debt the Howard government inherited. After that time what happened? We were debt free. The Rudd government wins in November 2007. It inherits a debt-free government with a $22 billion budget surplus in the first year and record employment with unemployment at the four per cent level. What have we got now? The federal government now owes $120 billion—$120 billion in that short a time. Let us do some figures: $120 billion at seven per cent—$8.4 billion a year interest only. To make it a little bit simpler, $700 million a month to pay the interest only. And they say what a great job they have done with the economy. Of course, that has contributed to the rise in interest rates of late as well.

Let us get back to the real crux of the motion today moved by Senator Parry. Let us go back to before the last election when Mr Rudd said to the Australian people, ‘In government we will fix our hospitals and the buck will stop with me, and if it is not fixed by the middle of 2009 we will take the correct action to fix it.’ Righto, we will move on to the next issue: ‘When in government we will put downward pressure on grocery prices.’