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

I thank the member for Boothby for her question and acknowledge her experience as a journalist working for the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry before coming to this place. She is a strong advocate for small businesses across her electorate. Indeed, around 70,000 taxpayers in the honourable member's electorate will benefit from tax cuts that we on this side of the House have supported, and around 20,000 businesses across the electorate of Boothby will benefit from and be eligible for the expanded instant asset write-off that we as a government have introduced in order to boost investment and the strength of our economy.

While we in this chamber are sitting here, many in masks, millions of our fellow Australians are in lockdown, businesses are closed, kids are being homeschooled and families are apart. These are really, really difficult times—tough times, very tough times. But we, by sticking together as a nation, will get through this, as we have done before when facing a once-in-a-century pandemic. Our economic support has totalled more than $300 billion in commitments and the delivery of extensive economic support that saw Australia's unemployment rate come down to a decade low of 4.9 per cent. We are providing COVID disaster payments that are tax-free, at $750 for people who've lost 20 or more hours of work per week, and payments of $450 for those who've lost between eight and 20 hours of work. We've entered into partnerships with state governments to provide small business support, like in the honourable member's home state of South Australia where thousands of small businesses are getting $3,000 grants as a result of the partnership between us and the Marshall government. We've entered into similar arrangements across Victoria where a combined $800 million from the federal and the state governments is going to Victorian businesses. Of course in New South Wales, on a fifty-fifty arrangement, businesses can get up to $100,000 a week, depending on their turnover as a result of this pandemic.

In terms of alternative approaches, we know that those opposite continue to talk the economy down. In the face of this pandemic, they continue to talk the economy down. They have policies that will drive the economy down: cash splashes to millions of Australians who've already had the jab; higher taxes that the member for Rankin took to the last election; and they continue to talk down the success of the JobKeeper program, which has helped to save the economy. (Time expired)

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