Marise Payne (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

It must be hugely diverting to be a New South Wales Labor senator, because you obviously don't have a great deal to do with your time and you can ask questions of the foreign minister which have nothing to do with their portfolio responsibilities. So I presume that I can respond in kind. I presume that that is the threshold which Senator Cameron has set. So let's talk about Mr Morrison and the message that Mr Morrison will deliver to the Australian community in the coming weeks and months, working up to the budget that he has announced for April of next year. He will advise the Australian community that Australia's economy is growing at 3.4 per cent, more strongly than at any time since 2012, which was, of course, during the height of the mining boom. He'll advise Australians that the economy is growing at a stronger rate than the world's seven largest advanced economies—the USA, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, UK and Japan—and the OECD average. And, because Mr Morrison is from the fine state of New South Wales, he is always welcome in that fine state. He will talk about the commitment which we have kept in relation to ensuring one million new jobs were delivered by this government after 2013, which was delivered ahead of schedule.

Those opposite have no idea how to manage an economy so as to set up a nation to support the sorts of things that we support with our strong economy: small business, the operation of the NDIS and workers in this country that have been completely deserted by those opposite because they're more interested in political games.