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

So you're going to cut pensions, are you? You're going to cut pensions. There we have it. Pensions are going to be cut. Senator Hume has just confirmed that pensions will be cut. I wasn't expecting that, but Senator Hume has now confirmed that that is their approach. In that $315 billion, there are investments in Medicare, so that's going to be cut too, I presume. The energy bill relief, the money that we're putting in to ensure that childcare costs are cheaper—childcare costs will come down 11 per cent with our investment. Are they going to be cut? This is where you can't talk out both sides of your mouth, like they do every single day. They complain about spending, but they won't explain what they are going to cut if they were given the chance.

As the RBA governor said last week, when she confirmed that we were doing the job we needed to do and they were doing the job they needed to do—let me quote for you, if you hadn't heard, what the Reserve Bank governor said:

… governments have job to do and I have a job to do. My job and the Reserve Bank's job is to get inflation down. The governments have a different job. Their job is … to get inflation down, and they acknowledge that, but it's also to provide services and infrastructure for the Australian people.

Unless of course you have a Liberal government, in which case you cut those services and infrastructure. She goes on to say:

So, they need to do that at the same time as they need to focus on keeping inflation down—

here it is—

My personal view is that they're doing what they can do in that area and I'm doing what I can do in that area.