Matt Thistlethwaite (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The strength of the Australian economy at the moment is directly related to the reforms made by the Hawke and Keating governments. They were the ones who built the bridge over which the train driven by Peter Costello travelled. They were the ones who opened up our economy, floated the dollar, reduced tariffs and opened up our banking sector and our bond market to competition. All of these were reforms introduced by the Labor government.

The great irony is the posturing of the Leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott. He claims that he can balance the budget; cut income taxes; reduce the company tax rate; increase pensions; spend more on infrastructure; deliver new social programs, such as an unfair and unfunded parental leave scheme, a national disability insurance scheme and a Medicare dental scheme; and restore the private health insurance rebate for high-income earners whilst at the same time cutting carbon emissions in our economy by five per cent by 2020—without a market based mechanism. He claims that he will scrap the minerals resource rent tax and he claims that he will do this while still providing reductions in the company tax rate. He will not say how he will fund any of these promises. And he will not say that he will support an independent process to cost their budget promises through the Parliamentary Budget Office.

This MPI is another admission from those opposite that they are not interested in debating the issues that really affect Australians—keeping our economy strong and providing adequate services that support working families in this country. We are happy to discuss policy on any occasion in this place. We are happy to discuss hope, reward and opportunity for Australians. We talk about hope, opportunity and reward; we delivered that during the global financial crisis. We protected jobs in our economy. When we talk about opportunity, we need look no further than the government's Building the Education Revolution program. It provided $16 billion worth of investment in better education facilities. I have visited some of those facilities, and the greatest irony of all is the coalition MPs turning up at them and sneaking their heads in the photos being taken when the plaques are unveiled. They were not too shy to come along to the openings of those new facilities. (Time expired)