House debates Questions without Notice
Cost of Living
Michelle Landry Capricornia, National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing
2:31 pm
My question is to the Prime Minister. Before the election, the Prime Minister promised Australians that they'd be better off and have cheaper mortgages under a Labor government. But NAB yesterday reported increases in the number of households reporting financial difficulties, with households 'starting to feel the pinch' and getting more worried about their financial future. When will this out-of-touch Prime Minister finally admit that Australian families always pay more under Labor?
Anthony Albanese Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister
I thank the member for her question. And she asked a question about the commitment that we had at the WA election launch, there at Optus Stadium, on the shared equity scheme. It's a shared equity scheme—
Opposition members interject ing—
Anthony Albanese Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister
based upon the WA model. It's one that the Perrottet government was implementing in New South Wales.
Milton Dick Speaker
Order! The member for Barker is warned. If he interjects one more time, I promise I'll—
Anthony Albanese Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister
The Andrews government in Victoria—
Milton Dick Speaker
Just pause. The continual interjection by the member for Barker, every single day, is not—
An honour able member interjecting—
Order!—helpful or respectful at all. If it continues once more today, he'll be asked to leave.
Anthony Albanese Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister
The member suggests, somehow, that, when the Liberals are in government, people don't pay more. But the fact is that the peak of inflation, in terms of the largest ever jump in any quarter this century, was in March 2022, and the jump was 2.1 per cent. The fact is also that the Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison government was the second highest taxing government in modern Australian economic history. The highest, of course, was the Howard government.
Anthony Albanese Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister
The fact is that interest rates, when this man was the Assistant Treasurer—
Anthony Albanese Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister
were 6.75 per cent, which is higher than 3.6 per cent—6.75 compared with 3.6. And the fact is that the budget papers accompanying Josh Frydenberg's final budget confirmed not just that there were no surpluses over the forwards. Instead, the coalition was on track to rack up $224 billion in additional borrowings over four years, and the Intergenerational Report produced by them showed that no budget would be in surplus in any year between now and 2060. That's in spite of the fact that, in the lead-up to the election in which they attained office in 2013, the then shadow treasurer and the then Liberal Party said they would have surpluses each and every year, going forward. They never delivered. They stopped the 30 years of consecutive economic growth thanks to the Hawke-Keating economic reforms. The fact is that those opposite talk a big game but they never ever deliver.