Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

It will demonstrate very clearly the responsible economic management which is required to balance the budget to reduce the burden of long-term debt and deficit. The opposition, in contrast, has already failed this test of competent economic management. As I observed a moment ago, Treasury analysis shows that Labor's best practice tobacco policy will raise fully $19.5 billion less than it claims. It is a $19.5 billion black hole in Labor's policy costings. The Leader of the Opposition and the member for McMahon cannot hide, as they seek to do, behind the Parliamentary Budget Office.

An opposition member interjecting—

Let me set out why. Their best practice tobacco policy was released on 24 November last year. It stated it would raise $47.7 billion over 10 years, which was based on May 2015 budget assumptions. As every member in a House is aware, in December last year the government released the Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook, MYEFO, that contained the latest state of the budget's books. MYEFO explicitly noted:

Excise and excise equivalent customs duty has been written down by $4.1 billion over the forward estimates, mainly reflecting lower tobacco and alcohol excise collections and weaker forecast consumption of these goods.

That was on page 40.

Ms Plibersek interjecting—

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