Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

I think we are going round and round in circles. As I have indicated, the government has obviously made some assumptions in relation to the uptake of this measure in order to determine the impact on the budget bottom line. The government never considers second round effects—you only ever consider the first round effects in relation to these sorts of measures for budget purposes. The discussion that Senator Whish-Wilson wants to have here today is a discussion that is more appropriately had once the measure has been in place for a period and we can review how, essentially, this measure has performed against forecasts. That is not a conversation for today; that is a conversation for this time next year and even further down the track. As Senator Whish-Wilson has already indicated, this is a measure that is now proposed to be in place until 30 June 2017, so it is for a period of just over two years initially. At the end of that period we will be able to review how successful it has been in practice and we will be able to make informed judgements on what the appropriate way forward might be from that time onwards.