Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

No, they've never done better. Organised crime has never done better than under this government. So, yes, some people are doing well, but they are all the wrong people.

Australians, the mums and dads of this nation, are going to their local supermarket and they're putting items in their red basket or their trolley and increasingly they're not just checking the price, as they might always be if they're prudent and balancing a budget, but turning up to the checkout and getting through the price scanner and having to take things out of the basket or out of the trolley and put them back. That's because what this government is doing is not just inflating out the value of money. It doesn't just mean you get less when you go to the supermarket checkout. What this government is doing is inflating out Australians' dignity. This is the most despicable and disgraceful act that a government can do.

Then they come into this chamber and pretend like everything's rosy and that Australians are not doing it tough. Their only answer is: 'What we should do is issue more bonds. Let's get more debt and let's pour it on to the inflation fire. Let's let it rip.' They seem to have no understanding of what's driving inflation. The member for Kennedy whispered sweet nothings of inflation in my ear about what is happening during question time. The Treasurer has a form of delusion about the fact that private demand is being stoked by public demand. This has been explained by the Reserve Bank governor, but, according to this government, what would they know? They're continuing to spend and stoke expenditure every step of the way from the taxpayers' purse so that they can stoke private demand to hide an economic reality.

Australians' wages are going backwards, they're being outstripped by inflation and costs—

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