Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Mackellar for his question, because I know that he is working hard to support the 28,000 seniors in his electorate—more than 28,000 people over the age of 65 in his electorate. Those seniors in his electorate, like all people in his electorate, are benefiting from the stronger economy under the Liberal and National government, a stronger economy which has seen GDP growth of 3.4 per cent through the year, at its fastest rate since the height of the mining boom, a stronger economy which has seen our AAA credit ratings reaffirmed by the three leading rating agencies, a stronger economy which has seen us recently announce the smallest budget deficit in a decade, on track to come back into balance a year earlier than expected in 2020, a stronger economy, which has delivered on our promise to the Australian people, to create more than one million new jobs, or more than a thousand jobs a day. That is the record of the Liberal and National governments.

We know that those opposite have a plan to tax and spend, a plan to tax more on your income, more on your company, more on your savings, more on your property and more on your electricity bill. But it really is the retirees' tax that is punishing those senior Australians in the seat of Mackellar and around the country who have worked hard and prepared for their own retirement. We know the Labor Party's retirees' tax will hit 900,000 individuals across the country, and will affect 200,000 self-managed super funds and 2,000 super funds.

It's not the rich that the Labor Party are targeting; it's actually the hard-working seniors who have saved for their retirement. I wonder if the Leader of the Opposition knows that 84 per cent of those affected by his retirees tax have a taxable income under $37,000. I wonder if the Leader of the Opposition knows that his retirees tax affects 96 per cent of people who have a taxable income under $87,000? I thought it was put best by this respondent to the Wilson Asset Management survey—an inconvenient truth for those opposite—who said, 'Why bother working hard and saving for retirement? I might as well spend and enjoy life and then go on the pension.' That is what's going to happen: more Australians are going to go on the pension, more Australians will be worse off and the Labor Party will tax aspiration, they will tax hard work and they will tax hope.

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