Ursula Stephens (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to take note of answers to questions asked today of Minister Wong in particular. I was quite taken by Senator Cormann's alliteration. He loves to use the expression 'fiscal fiasco'. I do not know if he has heard of the latest fiscal fiasco in New South Wales where the Treasurer has discovered a $1 billion mistake in his budget which means that many of the cuts that the New South Wales government has made to community services and schools could be challenged and addressed. I will be taking that up with my local member around the issue of community services.

The questions today go in many respects to the fact that the opposition continue to talk down the economy. They fail to acknowledge the fact that we are doing so well. Last week I was at the IPU in Canada. In every bilateral meeting the question was: what is happening? What is the recipe for success in Australia? The recipe for success is responsible government spending as well as responsible government savings. We have made a serious effort and we are the envy of the world. It frustrates me to think that for people who listen to questions in question time and the discussions in our parliament, they do not understand how well Australia is performing in terms of the global the economy and the measurements that are taken by organisations like the OECD.

Senator Wong today reminded us of 21 years of economic growth. That is very significant, a stunning achievement that has not been matched by any other economy in the world. People want to know how and why we are doing it. Solid growth against the odds and low unemployment—significantly lower than in other developed countries. These are achievements we should be very proud of. We have also contained inflation. In Argentina last week we heard many discussions on the real concerns that inflation is increasing. Some people estimate that it is up to 25 per cent in Argentina. We do not have to deal with anything like that in Australia. We have strong public finances and strong public and private savings. We have solid consumption and we have investment growth. This is all very positive news.

We have low official interest rates. Again, Minister Wong spoke about how those rates compare internationally. We now have official interest rates lower than at any time under the last Liberal government. These low rates are of direct benefit to millions of families and to millions of small businesses. We have just overtaken Spain as the 12th largest economy in the world. But what we hear from the opposition is continued carping and negativity about Australia's economic situation. Anyone would think we are all going to be ruined, and it drives me insane that this is the case. We certainly will not be ruined by the outcome of the MYEFO and the decisions that were taken by Treasury to make sure that the economy maintains stability and that the budget is returned to surplus, because our fundamentals are strong, despite the global turmoil. We only have to think about what is happening this week in the US and how the costs of a natural disaster like that are going to impact on the US economy—

Senator Feeney interjecting—

No, not the US election; I am talking about the US economy. The extensive devastation and the break in productivity that will occur after this US disaster are things that we really do need to be very mindful of. This will have an impact around the world and it is certainly something that we need to be thinking about.

We need to make sure that we are doing the responsible things that we need to do as a government. That is what we saw in MYEFO. We saw responsible savings that will continue to ensure that we are performing well. The Treasurer and the economic team have continued to forecast the message that we as a government are going to do everything we can to ensure that low- and middle-income people benefit from a strong budget and a strong economy—and we will continue to do that. (Time expired)