Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Crook, the member for O’Connor, is not here to reverse the rip-off. He is helping Labor get rip-offs like this one through the parliament. Yet again the new member for O’Connor stood shoulder to shoulder with the Labor Prime Minister voting for, and not against, another Labor rip-off. Without the member for O’Connor, people across Australia, across Western Australia and across O’Connor would not be hit with this additional income tax grab. Without the member for O’Connor voting for it, this tax would have been defeated in the House of Representatives—and the people of O’Connor need to understand this very clearly. Wilson Tuckey would never have voted for a rip-off like this. He stood up for O’Connor and would never have voted for a Labor Party tax grab like this one. In fact, no Liberal member for O’Connor would have voted for this rip-off. So our message to the people of O’Connor is very clear: if you want to end Labor’s rip-off moving forward you need to vote for a change of government and the only way to achieve a change of government is to support your Liberal candidate for O’Connor at the next election.

I will conclude my remarks on this latest Labor Party tax grab. It is a tax grab by a desperate government that has been spending recklessly and has wasted taxpayers’ money. It has put our public finances in such bad shape that it feels it has been left with no choice other than to whack on yet another ad hoc tax. The time for ad hoc tax grabs should be over. We should be taking a strategic approach to our tax system. We as a parliament should be committed to lower, fairer and simpler taxes. Rather than come in with one tax grab after another outside of any strategic context, the Treasurer should commit himself to a fair dinkum tax summit. That was actually a very important achievement that the two key Independents got out of the negotiations with the government. I am disappointed that they are not working harder with us to ensure that this Labor government delivers on it. How many more ad hoc tax grabs will this government put forward between now and whenever this tax summit might finally happen some time in 2012? The Australian people deserve better. The Australian people deserve a government that does not whack on one new tax after another.