Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Vice-President of the Executive Council) Share this | Hansard source

Let me just make this point: we are totally focused on making sure that the Australian economy is as strong and as resilient as possible in an uncertain world. We are an open trading economy. We are a globally focused and globally exposed trading economy. As we have seen in recent times, what happens in the world has an impact on our domestic economy. Because of that, as part of a plan to build a stronger and more resilient economy, one very important feature is to ensure that government lives within its means so that our funding for welfare services, health, education and national security is on a fiscally sustainable basis. The reason we are committed to paying down the level of debt is to ensure that we protect future generations from that burden of additional taxes and deeper spending cuts in order to ensure that our balance sheet can withstand future economic shocks that could come our way because of what happens in the world. (Time expired)