Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What we are witnessing here in this place is a government that has an obsession with a consumption tax. The goods and services tax is, of course, a Liberal tax. Let's remember it was the Liberal party that introduced the goods and services tax to this country. John Howard said there would 'never, ever' be a GST, and then of course he did a dirty deal with the Democrats and introduced a consumption tax across the nation. Across the country, everyone felt it. And then the Liberal Party said, 'We will never increase the GST.' But what we know is that Malcolm Turnbull has a plan to raise and broaden the consumption tax in this country, to hurt ordinary working families in this country.

In my own electorate many families will be badly hit by the plans of the Prime Minister to introduce a tax on goods and services including fresh fruit and health services. Every time you visit the doctor, every time you visit the supermarket, you will be paying more tax because of Malcolm Turnbull. Malcolm Turnbull could end this debate today. He could go to the dispatch box and say, 'I rule out increasing the GST.' But he will not do that because he has a plan—a plan to inflict pain on ordinary working families. That is the Liberal way.