Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) | Hansard source

I was asked about debt interest, and I'm pointing out to those opposite that because we've got their debt down so substantially, we are paying $70 billion less in interest than in their last budget. That's because we have delivered two surpluses that those opposite were incapable of. We have got the deficits down, we are finding savings, but we know that there's more work to do.

There are two things that, if they want to be credible in this space, those opposite have to fess up to. First of all, if they had their way, debt would be much higher today. Their policy at the election under the now Leader of the Opposition, always failing up, was for higher income taxes, bigger deficits and more debt. That's the first point. The second fact that they need to acknowledge today is that most of the trillion dollars of debt in the budget was racked up by those opposite between 2013 and 2022. In fact, they even doubled the debt before COVID-19. We are managing the economy and the budget in a responsible way; they racked up most of this debt. They should admit that if they want to ask us questions about it.

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