Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Treasurer. I refer to the Treasurer’s warm endorsement of state governments’ financial management generally and their business enterprises in particular, and his assertion that their borrowings were being incurred to ‘invest in capital projects, not to fund recurrent outlays’. I also refer to the fact that over the last three years the New South Wales Labor government has ripped out of Sydney Water as tax and dividends 91 per cent of its entire profit before tax. Given the urgent need to invest in water infrastructure, does the Treasurer seriously contend that the management of Australia’s largest water utility as a cash cow is a model of sound financial management?

See this speech in context