Sean Edwards (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It would be interesting to know how many hands would go up if I was able to ask any on the other side if they had ever gone back to a banking institution with a capital repayment program. I notice no hands go up, Mr Deputy President.

We are a party that understands business on this side. As my good colleague, Senator Humphries, referred to, it is endemic and enduring in the Labor Party that they cannot understand, and do not understand, what surpluses are. A surplus, for the edification of those opposite, is where you have an operating profit. That is what it is termed in private practice, an operating profit which you can then return to your shareholders, in this case, the people of Australia, in the way of more services. However if you deliver a deficit, that means you have to borrow more. In the case of Australia, that means that you have to compete with Australians for borrowings from offshore, putting the price of money and capital for the small businesses that you protest you are looking to protect, beyond reach, doing them great harm with these deficits. The capital raising that you are doing out there to fund this project, the $37 billion debt that you talk about, will come at a great cost to all Australians.