Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was Winston Churchill who said:

… for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.

As absurd as this sounds, this is exactly the kind of governance we saw under Labor between 2007 and 2013: a mining tax that restrained one of our biggest industries; a carbon tax that increased electricity prices for small and medium business, Australian families and pensioners; and a multitude of other taxes and regulations. What did this achieve? It achieved a slump in employment, reduced economic growth and a bucketload of debt. It also increased youth unemployment in the Petrie electorate close to 20 per cent in 2013. There is so much debt that we are currently paying $300 million a week on the interest of this debt.

It has been tough cleaning up Labor's mess, but we are getting there because, on this side of the House, our priority is to grow the economy, generate jobs and secure the future for all Australians. We understand that we cannot do any of these things if businesses and people cannot function effectively, because they are bogged down in taxes and red tape.

So what have we done? We have scrapped the mining and carbon taxes. We have cut more than $4.8 billion worth of red tape and just last week we delivered income tax relief for hardworking Australians. We have extended to 32½ per cent the marginal tax rate from $80,000 to $87,000 from 1 July this year, benefiting more than three million Australian taxpayers. So those families who are on $75,000 net per year and perhaps earn $12,000 a year in bonuses, commissions and so forth will now see some $315 a year extra in their hands rather than the government's.

Also our Treasury Laws Amendment (Enterprise Tax Plan) Bill 2016 has been introduced into the House. What we are doing here is reducing the corporate tax rate for small and medium businesses with an annual turnover of less than $10 million to 27½ per cent for this financial year. We will extend this lower rate to all corporate tax entities by the 2023-24 financial year and we will keep reducing this rate in stages so that, in 10 years from now, it will be 25 per cent for all entities.

Since 2001, Australia has gone from having one of the lowest corporate tax rates in the world to having one of the highest. By doing this, we will see more jobs growth locally in all our electorates, particularly amongst medium businesses. Thank you.