Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Hansard source

That is right. As Senator Joyce says, you cannot be too careful, because we would not want the government to start borrowing more money now, would we? They have never done that before in Australian history, have they? No. Every time they leave office they leave Australia further in debt.

As my colleagues said this afternoon in this debate, the real reason this legislation is being rushed forward, as Senator Cormann put it eloquently before, is to fudge the figures, the sleight of hand, the dodgy budget figures, to bring forward the spending so it does not operate next financial year and upset the government's surplus. That is the truth.