Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for Wright for that question. He is an indefatigable advocate for good economic policy. He has been in the door on regular occasions and has been a strong advocate for government to live within its means. As the Prime Minister just said, this is a very fair budget and a very honest budget. I know that comes as a rude shock to the Labor Party given they delivered six budgets in a row from the member for Lilley, that were both unfair and dishonest. No budget could be more dishonest than the one delivered by the member for Lilley when he claimed that he was announcing on that night four budget surpluses in a row. We miss you, Swannie! Now of course he is writing a book—or actually, the Parliamentary Library is writing a book on his behalf—and we look forward to the wisdom that comes from that book.

The legacy of six years of Labor was $667 billion of debt, if no action is taken. Somehow they tend to believe that a number like that is pretty irrelevant—$667 billion with no surpluses on the horizon. The interest that the Australian people would pay on that $667 billion would be $3 billion a month. Currently, we are paying $1 billion a month, but the legacy of Labor waste and expenditure lifted it to $3 billion a month, and 70 per cent of that goes to people living overseas because they are the people that have lent us the money.

There has been a lot of debate about whether it is a budget emergency or a budget crisis, so I want to go—

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