Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

They were originally supposed to apply from 1 July 2008. They were announced in the coalition budget of 2003. That is the first thing that happened—and it happened when the member opposite was a minister in that government. And he had the hide to get up and ask a question yesterday as if this was an initiative that had been put forward by this Labor government. It was not. The former Howard government subsequently deferred this until 1 July 2011 in the 2004 budget. Those changes have been an ongoing feature of government budget estimates ever since that time. I cannot believe that we are getting this question today from that frontbencher over there after the bungle yesterday.

The industry has been aware of all of this since that time. This was an initiative that was agreed with industry at that time. The agreement was that the taxation arrangements would be gradually phased in over four years—a feature of budgets since the time that they were in government. And they have the hide to come in here and claim that somehow it is a government initiative. This has been a feature of budgets and has been incorporated in estimates since that time. You should be ashamed of yourself.

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