David Feeney (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The fact is that the opposition wants Australia to forget that they opposed our stimulus measures. Those opposite voted against our investments in infrastructure and against our schools building program. As we can now see very clearly, it was those projects that have served to preserve over 200,000 jobs and save thousands of small businesses from bankruptcy. If those opposite had had their way, unemployment would now be at eight or even 10 per cent, as was forecast when the crisis first struck and as is now the case in many comparable countries. The opposition criticises our stimulus spending but ignores the fact that 70 per cent of the government’s stimulus spending consisted of investments in infrastructure, projects that the previous government failed to fund because it was too busy wasting money on regional rorts and middle-class welfare for its own supporters. The Rudd government’s stimulus consisted of investment in roads, rail, ports and bridges—investments that will pay for themselves over the coming decades through higher productivity. As we can now see, it was that prompt response which kept this country out of recession, preserved Australian jobs and preserved Australian businesses.

Let us look at the allegation by the opposition that this is a high-taxing government. This assertion is just plain wrong. This government cut income tax in its first budget, as we said we would during the 2007 election campaign, and we have not increased income tax in subsequent budgets. At this budget, we are delivering the third instalment of those income tax cuts. This year’s cut is worth $450 a year for someone earning $50,000 a year. As Tim Colebatch pointed out in this morning’s Melbourne Age, income tax on individuals as a share of GDP is at a 40-year low. In this budget we are cutting company tax by two per cent, from 30 per cent to 28 per cent, to help give further assistance to Australian small businesses.

When one looks at the facts, when one looks at the history, one can see that those opposite are relying on tired slogans and stereotypes. It might suit them well. It might be comfortable for them to complain about the fact that Labor is the party of big government and big taxation, but the facts tell a very different story. The facts tell a story that when you were in office the rise of big government conservatism was in full flight. We had a Prime Minister who in an election speech spent $94 million a minute desperately paying off every single interest group he could lay his hands on. I am sure Senator Fifield, if he was ever struck with a bout of honesty, would be able to stand up in this place and tell us some hair-curling stories about a Treasurer who desperately tried to prevail on a Liberal Prime Minister to spend less, who desperately tried to prevail on John Howard to protect the Australian taxation base rather than fritter it away in his extravagant promises and in his orgy of pork-barrelling. These are the stories Senator Fifield could give us if he was so inclined and I would encourage him to do so.