Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

The budget makes $43 billion of savings across the forward estimates, continuing a legacy of making responsible savings so that we can fund necessary investments. The government has chosen a sensible path of consolidation, maintaining strong growth and low unemployment while ensuring that Australia's debt levels are among the lowest in the developed world. Through these investments in the National Plan for School Improvement, DisabilityCare Australia, the National Health Reform Agreement and aged care, the government is ensuring that Australia is a stronger and more socially cohesive nation.

On the topic of aged-care investments, it was my pleasure recently to join the Minister for Mental Health and Ageing in my own electorate to speak with local residents about the importance of aged-care reform. This is just one of many consultations the government has held on aged-care reform.

The government's investments keep to our medium-term fiscal strategy, a fiscal strategy that has remained unchanged since the government's first budget in 2008-09—and that is, to achieve budget surpluses, on average, over the medium term; to keep taxation as a share of GDP, on average, below the level from 2007-08; and to improve the government's net financial worth over the medium term. While we have seen significant hits to revenue, the government has continued to hue to that path.

For the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, there are three new measures in the 2013-2014 budget, with a total fiscal impact of $112 million over four years. The government will provide $13.8 million over four years to the department to maintain existing organisational capacity and to support the government's critical initiatives and reform agenda. There will be $97.5 million over three years to support the G20 meetings in Queensland, in 2014, and there will be $0.65 million over three years to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet to support Australia's membership of the United Nations Security Council.

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