Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I say to the honourable members who have asked this question about tax: the previous Liberal Party government was the highest taxing government in Australia’s history. Why do we say that? We say that because tax as a proportion of GDP reached 24.9 per cent in both 2004-05 and 2005-06. When we took over office it was running at 24.7 per cent. For the benefit of those opposite, get these numbers straight: 24.7 per cent in 2007-08, 24.6 per cent in 2006-06, 24.9 per cent from 2004 through to 2006, 24.5 per cent from 2003 to 2004, 24.6 from 2002 to 2003. The first budget brought down by this Australian Labor government reduces tax as a percentage of GDP to 23.8 per cent. That is the mathematics. You might find it very disconcerting, but that is the mathematics. And if you look to the forward estimates, it remains lower right out to 2010-11.

I would conclude my answer by suggesting that those opposite reflect on this: if we were to sustain in this budget—the one that the Treasurer brought down in March—the same tax to GDP ratio as we inherited from you with the last budget, do you know how much more we would be collecting by way of tax in the period ahead? We would be collecting $30 billion in more tax. If we sustained the Liberal’s tax as a percentage of GDP at 24.7 per cent, as opposed to the 23.8 per cent we had hit, that would be a further $30 billion tax hike on Australian working families.

I would say to those opposite, given their deep addiction to taxation, to do one thing for working families: tell your senators in the Senate to get behind the government’s program on the Medicare levy surcharge, as $1,200 extra a year means something to working families at the moment. If the Reserve Bank can give us an interest rate cut which produces for working families a reduction of $600 in their interest rate bill each year, the Liberal Party should at least not add to that by providing an additional $1,200 tax hike a year, which their current action in the Senate is contemplating.

See this speech in context