Steve Irons (Swan, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Just yesterday those opposite chose to rip billions out of businesses that have a turnover between $10 million and $50 million, but then had the audacity to claim that they are not antibusiness. Labor think these companies that are in the $10 million to $50 million range are 'the top end of town'. Considering many of the Labor members probably have never had to worry about paying payrolls, they are unlikely to understand turnovers between industries will mean vastly different sizes. And, just because you have a high turnover, it doesn't mean you have a high profit. This is what the Labor people don't understand. When they talk about $50 million companies, they think that is $50 million profit. That is the wisdom of the Labor people who have never run businesses. This will hit 20,000 businesses, employing 1.5 million Australians, with a tax sledgehammer. The fact the Labor Party cannot even bring themselves to guarantee the tax relief already legislated for small businesses with turnovers of up to $10 million tells Australians everything they need to know.

There are over 100,000 small and medium, often family owned, businesses with turnovers between $2 million and $50 million. Together these businesses employ over three million Australians. The member for Mackellar is here. I've got about 19,000 businesses in my electorate of Swan. I'm sure he has plenty in his electorate, and I'm sure the member for Solomon has plenty of businesses in his electorate. I'm going to enjoy going to enlighten these businesses about the dangers they're going to face and the money they're going to lose because the member for Maribyrnong is going to rip the tax cuts away from them and make them realise that they cannot keep more of the money that they have actually earned. They earned it. It's their money. It doesn't belong to the government.

This is yet another job-destroying, economy-wrecking higher tax from Labor and confirms yet again the one certainty about Labor—when they run out of money, they will come after yours. The most galling part of Labor's stubborn antibusiness and anti-economy stance is that they used to believe in this stuff. We've heard the Prime Minister relaying all those quotes. They used to believe in it when it was convenient for them, but now all they want to do, as we know, is to harm businesses in Australia, which will harm jobs and harm the economy.

Sitting suspended from 11:59 to 16:00

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