Garth Hamilton (Groom, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Interest rates are up. There was a decision today from the RBA to raise interest rates after inflation had been going up. Today, headline inflation is sitting at 3.8 per cent. Today, our treasurer told us that the prime driver for inflation was from the private sector, but I want to challenge that—as have many economists—and provide some facts about it. I think it's important that we challenge these numbers.

Growth from federal government spending, today, accounts for 32 per cent of GDP growth. The only time that figure has ever been higher was in the midst of COVID. To provide some context for how much federal government spending now accounts for GDP growth, I'll compare it to previous administrations. Under Hawke and Keating, that growth was less than 10 per cent, it was about 10 per cent under Howard, and, throughout the term of the last coalition, it sat at about 20 per cent—excluding the COVID period. So, at 32 per cent, this is as high as we can get outside of an extraordinary period.

If we look at the breakdown of what has been driving inflation, we see really clearly that the largest area, the biggest increase, has been in energy prices. There has been 21 per cent growth in energy prices across Australia. This growth is because we've now seen the removal of the bandaid subsidies that were put in place to try and artificially lower these inflationary numbers. Now that they've come off, inflation is back up to what it would've looked like more naturally, unfortunately. When you take that subsidy removal out of those numbers, the growth is still at 4.6 per cent, and the only other sector that beats that is housing. So we have these two areas, both of which the government has an ability to impact, and we are still seeing incredible growth in these areas. Housing demand is not being addressed, particularly when it comes to the role immigration plays in that.

If we were to further interrogate energy prices and what the intent of this government is—we heard today in question time the Minister for Climate Change and Energy refer multiple times to the home battery program and how well it has been taken up. It is being taken up well, but, unfortunately, we've learnt that it has blown out from its original planned budget of $2.3 billion to over $11.6 billion. That is an incredibly large increase in the cost of this program, and it has to be paid for somewhere. It has to be paid for by someone, and that someone is taxpayers and Australians suffering under this inflation crisis. But, worse, this is just a part of the largest ever budget blow-out in MYEFO history that was reported over the summer, a $48 billion blow-out, the largest we have ever seen, and our Treasurer today told us he takes responsibility for it. I would like to see him take responsibility for it, and more—act on it and actually take accountability for where this money comes from.

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