Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to his previous answer to me. Is the Prime Minister seriously denying that he said on SBS TV on 6 September in that famous interview:

… no cuts to education, no cuts to health, no change to pensions, no change to the GST and no cuts to the ABC or SBS …

Is the Prime Minister denying that he gave that promise to the Australian people?

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let's look for a moment at school education funding increases—eight per cent this year, eight per cent next year, eight per cent the year after that and six per cent the year after that. For public hospitals it is nine per cent this year, nine per cent next year, nine per cent the year after that and six per cent in the final year. So school funding is going up and public hospital funding is going up.

Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I seek to table the Budget Overview, which says on page 11 that $80 billion will be cut from health and education.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no point of order. The member will resume her seat, and I ask the Minister for Health not to interject.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is true that after the next election we are changing the indexation method for pensions to bring it in line with the indexation that Labor replied to the family tax benefit. But every year pensions will go up twice. They will go up in March and they will go up in September. The statement that I made—

Ms Macklin interjecting—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Jagajaga will desist.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I stand by my statements, including statements to this parliament. As for the ABC, what this government is doing with the ABC is applying for the first time in 20 years an efficiency dividend. That is what we are doing. We are applying an efficiency dividend to the ABC. Members opposite thought that the ABC was the one institution that should not be subject to an efficiency dividend. We think it should be subject to the efficiency dividend. The ABC should not be exempted from the kinds of measures that are being applied to almost every other part of government. When we inherit debt and deficit disaster from the Labor Party, when we are faced with $123 billion of cumulative deficit and $667 billion of projected debt, no-one is exempt from the search for savings, including the ABC and SBS.