Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Hansard source

What we see in Senator Gallagher's question is that, of course, the Labor Party doesn't seem to learn anything over time. We're accused of starving funding—that refusing to provide funding is a starving of funding—even though funding is going up each and every year into the future in the budget. We have the Labor Party here who comes into this chamber and seems to think that, if an agency just asks for money, they should automatically get the money. It seems to say that it's a starving of funding, even when that funding goes up. The reality is that we have the Labor Party, who hasn't learnt any of the lessons of the past when it comes to how to say no occasionally—to how to manage the budget, in ways. We face the most challenging budget environment in the nation's postwar history. We are providing record levels of temporary and targeted assistance to Australians. That doesn't mean that every agency gets a yes to its additional spending request. (Time expired)