Jess Walsh (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Despite the inevitable shouting from the Greens and the grandstanding and fearmongering from the coalition, our plan is actually working to put downward pressure on inflation. Inflation is moderating because of our government's plans, and that is just a fact. When we took office, inflation had a six in front of it. Now it has a three in front of it. The pain and the bite of high inflation is actually easing. The data shows us that it is tracking down. It is a fact. But we know that, while progress is being made, there is still a lot of work to do. We are rolling up our sleeves and we are doing just that.

Importantly, there is real work to be done to make sure that the moderating inflation and the impacts of that are truly felt across Australian households, because we know that Australians are doing it tough. We know that they are feeling the pressure right now, and that is why our government is doing so much work to ease the cost-of-living pressures that people face. It's why our budget, our cost-of-living measures and our economic plan have all been needed, and they are working. Our targeted and careful spending is balancing the need to keep the economy ticking all while we are bringing inflation down and delivering responsible cost-of-living relief too.

We've done the hard work, and we've found savings in the budget. We are being responsible. We are being restrained where it's needed, and we are doing that in a way where we are keeping the economy moving at the same time. We're generating hundreds of thousands of jobs in the economy, and we are getting wages moving. We are getting the wages of women moving and boosting women's workforce participation too. All of this is needed, and it is all a priority for us. It's work that we are getting on with. We are getting on with the job while others scream and fearmonger. We are actually delivering our economic plan and putting downward pressure on inflation.

We've seen from the national accounts just why our plan is so important, because we know that the RBA's interest rate rises are putting real pressure on families and households. They are putting real pressure on business and the economy as well. We know that households are cutting back their spending. We know that without our careful, targeted cost-of-living investments the economy would have slowed even more, and that's exactly why we're delivering real cost-of-living relief to households that is bringing down inflation, like our energy bill rebates, cheaper child care, cheaper medicines, our investments in Medicare and significant increases to rent assistance. All of this cost-of-living relief is directly tackling the inflation challenge, and, of course, our tax cuts for 13 million taxpayers mean that workers are keeping more of what they earn—earning more and keeping more as well. Our tax cuts for every taxpaying Australian are easing cost-of-living pressures, and that's why we made those changes to the stage 3 tax cuts.

We know that if those opposite were in power we could absolutely guarantee that things would be a lot worse. Not only would those opposite have failed to put downward pressure on inflation; they would have slammed the brakes on the economy, because they've opposed our cost-of-living measures when they had the option to support them. They have opposed measures that are actually directed at bringing down inflation. They basically came to this place and tried to vote for higher inflation. They have also told Australians that they'll cut the budget to the degree of around $300 billion and that they'll do that at a time when the economy is barely growing. At this challenging time, they want to slash, cut and burn the budget in a way that we know would hit the economy even harder.

We will get on with the job of providing targeted cost-of-living relief to Australians that actually puts downward pressure on inflation. We will get on with providing the support that the economy needs to keep moving forward, and we will do that in a responsible way. We have banked two surpluses already in a way that the RBA governor said put downward pressure on inflation, and we will keep our responsible plans moving forward.