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

This budget is about driving more people into work, creating more jobs, getting more competition for labour and therefore delivering higher real wages. The reality is that real wages under our government are higher than they were under Labor. Indeed, in Labor's last year in office, real wages fell. Today the unemployment rate, at 5.5 per cent, is lower than when we came to government. That is after a recession. I explained earlier, with respect to real wages in 2021, that that was a function of particular policies that helped drive better outcomes for Australian families—with free child care, lower rents, cheaper petrol. That saw the consumer price index have its steepest fall since 1931, which then meant that the inflation rate was higher in 2021. That has meant that the inflation rate has been above wages growth for that year. But, as I said, real wages continue to increase. While there are forecasts of 1¼ per cent through the year to the June quarter 2021, they are upgraded to 1½ per cent through the year to the June quarter 2022 and they reach 2¾ per cent over the forecast horizon, in 2024-25.

But the way to enable more Australians to keep more of their hard-earned money is to support the tax relief that we have legislated through this parliament. If the honourable member wants to support Australians keeping more of their hard-earned money, then they should support our stage 3 of the legislated tax plan, which will see somebody on $80,000 being $900 better off, somebody on $90,000 being $1,120 better off and someone on $100,000 being $1,370 better off. That will be the amount that Australians will be worse off if the Labor Party ever get their way and walk away from stage 3 of our tax plan.

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