Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

The public can absolutely trust us to represent liberal values, because right now taxes as a share of GDP are well below what they would have been if Labor had stayed in government. We delivered a tax cut for small business in last year's budget. We abolished Labor's disastrous carbon tax—many, many billion dollars worth of taxes taken out of the economy to help make our economy more competitive internationally and to help families and small business—and, of course, we got rid of Labor's disastrous mining tax. We have made a whole series of changes to our tax system to ensure it is more growth-friendly. We always would like to do more. We always would like to deliver even more tax cuts. But, of course, in the end, we have to make judgements. Given the fiscal mess that Labor left behind, we have to make judgements on how we can best get our budget back on a sustainable foundation for the future. These are judgements that we are making all the time.

We are focused on controlling expenditure. We are focused on making sure that the expenditure is as high as it needs to be; as low as it can be; and as efficient, as effective and as well-targeted as possible so that the taxes can be as low as possible. We are focused on making sure that the necessary revenue for government is raised in the best, most efficient and least-distorting way in the economy and in a way that is also fair. We are always focused on lower, simpler, fairer taxes. And, of course, at the next election the Australian people will have the opportunity to pass judgement on who they trust with managing the economy and who they trust with managing the budget. Those on the Labor side, who left behind a fiscal mess? Those on the Labor side, who are making unfunded promises galore again? Those on the Labor side, who have got more than $50 billion in unfunded spending promises on their books and who have a strategy of taxing more to spend more and always playing catch-up with their high levels of debt? Or those on our side, who are working in a steady, orderly and methodical fashion to get our budget back on track and get spending under control? (Time expired)