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

No, I have got that. And the third one was the interest rates. First of all, the government’s Economic Security Strategy was announced last October. It was delivered in December. As the honourable member would know, the full employment impact of that would not be known for some time. But, as the honourable member struggled yesterday with the most recently produced retail figures for the nation, to their collective dismay and disappointment, this country outperformed practically every other country in the world in terms of retail sales at that time. Obviously there will be some form of spillover of that investment into the support packages for households into the year 2010 as well.

Secondly, as the honourable member knows, the package that the government announced two days ago of some $42 billion represents, as we have said, a total employment impact in terms of supporting jobs of up to 90,000. On the breakdown of the individual components of that: I will of course provide those to the Leader of the Opposition later. I do not have them with me, but I will be happy to do so.

Thirdly, he asked a question about debt. On the question of the impact of the borrowings which would flow, I am advised that the interest payments would equal something in the vicinity of an additional 0.2 per cent of GDP at the time that they begin to be paid. If there is any variation on that, I will come back to the honourable member before the end of question time.

Could I also say to the honourable member who has asked the question that, as they seek, as is their democratic right—and they are members of this parliament—

See this speech in context