Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It certainly wasn't because of your NBN! The four reasons were these: firstly, Labor went in with a $20 billion surplus; secondly, there were very good prudential regulations in place because of the efforts of the Howard-Costello government; thirdly, the Governor of the Reserve Bank had the opportunity to significantly reduce interest rates because, peculiarly, Australia had been in such a strong economic position that he could do that; and, fourthly, we had this place called China which so lavishly wanted to buy our resources—our coal, our iron ore and, eventually, our energy resources. Far from incurring debt on assets and activities that would add to the wealth creation of this nation, what did the Labor government spend Australia's wealth on? What did they incur debt on, borrowing money from overseas? Pink batts that led to deaths and house fires, and we are still paying; school halls which are now falling down and which did not add one element to the educational value for young people in Australia; and $900 cheques, followed by $1,200 cheques, which went straight to casinos, alcohol, drugs and Chinese television sets. There was nothing spent on adding to the wealth of this nation, nothing on mining exploration, nothing at all to add value to the future of Australia. (Time expired)