Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

We inherited an energy crisis; we had inflation running at six per cent; we had deficits; we had debt as far as the eye could see. We have turned it around, and we are providing cost-of-living relief, where it's affordable and responsible to do so, to take some of the pressure off those bill increases that we've seen. That's what a responsible government does. That's what a government does that puts the people at the centre, as opposed to the politics. And I will be looking forward to the Leader of the Opposition's budget in-reply speech, to see what he actually says about these energy bill rebates, because it seems to me there's a mixed view amongst his team about whether or not you're going to support them. And, if you're not going to support them, you can go and explain why energy bills should be higher than they would otherwise have been without this subsidy.