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

I hear a note of dissent. We'd love to know what it is. They shouldn't keep it a secret; they should let us know what their plan is to create jobs, because they haven't shared it with anybody else. The Leader of the Opposition wants to increase taxes on the very businesses that employ the majority of Australians in the private sector—that is, business where we have reduced taxes, businesses with turnovers up to $50 million a year. These are not huge corporate giants; these are not massive multinationals. These are overwhelmingly small and medium Australian family owned businesses. They employ most of the private sector workforce. The Leader of the Opposition wants to put the tax up on those companies and those businesses. And we know what will happen—they'll invest less and they'll employ less. He has a plan for higher taxes—$165 billion—and we know that that will have the effect of reducing investment and employment.

But it goes further than that. We have now seen him exposed doing the bidding of the CFMEU. In October last year, he told striking CFMEU workers that Australia's industrial relation laws were—and I use his term—'like a cancer'. That is a remarkable description given that these laws—the Fair Work Commission, in particular, and the Fair Work Act—were introduced by Labor. What did he say about the Fair Work Commission at the time, in December 2008? He said:

This legislation aims to create workplaces where our children will do better, not worse, than we used to and in which prosperity expands and embraces us all.

Now he calls it a cancer.

Speaking of children, he does this at the behest and in the presence of people who attacked workers, who are going to work— (Time expired)

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