Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

The government made a decision to put in place a supplementary allowance, and that is the figure that the government has chosen. As I said, I appreciate that the senator does not believe that is appropriate. If she believes it is so inappropriate, perhaps she should advocate for us not to pay it. But we took the view, when we diverted the company tax cut funds and directed those to middle-income and low-income Australia, that it was important for three particular groups to obtain support: families on the lowest incomes, middle-income families and income support recipients. So the government determined the various allocations and increased payments to those groups. That is in the budget. As I said, you are looking at around $1 billion over the forward estimates.