John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

What the member for Kingsford Smith was doing in that interview was saying that it would be a good idea if we set ourselves a target of 20 per cent reduction by 2020. I wonder if the member for Kingsford Smith has any idea of what that would do to the Australian economy. I wonder if the member for Kingsford Smith has any idea of what that would mean. He cannot deny it. He tried to deny it on the Laurie Oakes program on 1 April this year and he dug himself in even deeper when, amongst other things, he said:

Now, what the figure is, you know, different reports say but it’s somewhere in the 20-25-30 percent figure.

For a reduction of that magnitude by 2020—that is, in 13 years time—he is arguing that it should be a 20 per cent reduction to show real progress. I do not think the member for Kingsford Smith has the faintest idea of the damage that would do to the Australian economy.

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