TREASURER:
Now that we are beginning to see a bit more of what Labor is on about, it is clear it’s the old Labor. Nothing’s changed. Big spending, big taxing, big deficits, big debt. All Mr Beazley can tell you, is a whole lot of garbled promises, none of which add up. On the one hand he’s going to rollback GST, then he’s going to make up the money to the States, then he’s going to spend more money on Medicare, then he’s going to spend more money on regions, then he’s going to spend more money on education and he can’t tell you where it’s coming from because like the Labor of old, it all comes from two places, higher debt and higher taxes. Now Mr Beazley hasn’t learned a thing. When he was Finance Minister, he ran a Budget deficit of $10 thousand millions of dollars in one year and $13 thousand millions of dollars in his other year. And he’s back at it. Bigger deficits, bigger debt, bigger spending, bigger taxes. Labor hasn’t learnt a thing.
JOURNALIST:
No mention of rollback in his speech. Do you accept that perhaps he is going to let it slide through to the keeper?
TREASURER:
Well look, he can’t let his rollback slide through to the keeper. For the last three years he’s been running around saying he’s opposed to GST. And he’s been saying he’s going to roll it back. Now the critical question is – does he roll it back 50 per cent, does he roll it back 60 per cent, does he roll it back 70 per cent? You’re not telling me, are you, that rollback isn’t even as serious as a 50 per cent. After three years of doing everything he possibly could to defeat the Government and defeat its legislation. Kim Beazley is embarrassed by rollback. Obviously he’s embarrassed by rollback. But if he has any shred of decency at all after three years of promising the Australian people that tax reform was a bad thing, surely he’s got to roll it back. And one very simple question for Mr Beazley today. What percentage? What percentage of rollback? Because if he’s not even prepared to rollback these tax reforms by half, by only half, what it shows is for the last three years he’s been engaged in elaborate fraud. Elaborate fraud pretending that he’s against something which he won’t rollback and which he always secretly intended to keep.
JOURNALIST:
Kim Beazley said yesterday that the Prime Minister was doing a lap of honor, is it time for you to come in and grab the reins?
TREASURER:
Oh look, I am going to make sure that good economic policy in this country continues. Nothing, nothing would threaten economic policy more in this country than a Labor Party which has learnt nothing. Which has learnt nothing. Its last Budget deficit, after it raised taxes, it spent all of them and ran up ten thousands of millions of dollars of debt for one year. And they have learnt nothing. They’re back at it. They’re down at their conference making a whole lot of promises which they can’t fund. They’re going to drive the Government back into debt. They’re going to put up peoples’ income taxes and I’m not going to stand by and let them have an easy run at it.
JOURNALIST:
Are you going to do that as Treasurer or as Prime Minister?
TREASURER:
I’m going to do that as the Government’s economic spokesman as Treasurer.
JOURNALIST:
But it’s clear that Labor is going to run on the fact that maybe Mr Howard won’t be around for too long after the next election and that maybe there will be some sort of succession put in place.
TREASURER:
No, I think Labor ought to run on policy, myself. And that would be a new thing wouldn’t it?
JOURNALIST:
…(inaudible) the policy at their conference though?
TREASURER:
Well the policy that they’ve had for the last three years was that they were going to rollback the GST. They go down to their conference and rollback is now the policy which dare not speak its name. You know, Kim Beazley on rollback, it’s like John Cleese, don’t mention the war. It’s Kim, don’t mention the rollback. But the rollback’s being going on for three years. They have been wasting the time of this Parliament for three years saying that tax reform was bad and should never be undertaken, and if they ever got into office, they would roll it out. Right. We’re what, 30 days into the new tax system, and rollback is the policy which dare not mention its name.
JOURNALIST:
But why do you need detail? The Coalition did the same thing in the lead-up to the ’96 election.
TREASURER:
Hang on, hang on. The Coalition didn’t spend three years opposing a policy, vowing to roll it back and telling Australia it could never be made fair and then fall dumb.
JOURNALIST:
But you didn’t cost your promises or anything did you?
TREASURER:
Hang on, hang on, no no no. Paul Keating wasn’t running in the lead-up to 1996, the greatest tax reform in Australian history.
JOURNALIST:
Neither were you. You said never, ever.
TREASURER:
Hang on. We didn’t spend three years opposing the greatest tax reform in Australian history, saying it should never be done, promising to roll it back, right, and then when you get the first occasion to actually say how, when and where, fall dumb, fall silent. I mean this is the most spectacular silence that we’ve seen in Australian politics. You would have thought that rollback was our policy. That Mr Beazley now seems absolutely incapable of talking about his own policy. It’s John Cleese all over again, you know, don’t mention the war. Kim, whatever you do, don’t mention your own policy of rollback. You know, I’m beginning to wonder that maybe they have adopted the Della advice. You see, what did Della say to them? Della said to them, rollback’s no good Kim. Give it away. Now two weeks later, what do you hear from Kim Beazley? It’s given away. There’s no mention of it. There’s no identification of what it’s going to be on. And there’s no promise in relation to it. I think John Della Bosca probably has had his advice taken. Two weeks ago, Della Bosca said give it away. Today, nobody can mention the word rollback in the Labor Party. I think they’re secretly trying to follow Della Bosca. In fact, Della Bosca probably knew more than a lot of us thought at the time.
JOURNALIST:
…inaudible…
TREASURER:
Well, you know, this is the trouble for Beazley isn’t it? For three years he’s been programmed to say rollback and now he can’t mention it. Now, I think, I think the best, the best example of Labor’s new credentials on the economy was when they called for speakers on the economic debate yesterday and no-one stood up. If you wanted to bring order and silence to a noisy room at the ALP Conference, what would you say? You’d say let’s discuss the economy. And all of a sudden you’d get absolute silence. Or if you were, you know, wanted to bring order and silence to an ALP Conference, you’d say, let’s start naming rollback. And you’d get these embarrassed looks as everybody runs for the door. Look, rollback is the policy which dare not speak its name. But if Beazley has any credibility, after three years of wasting the time of this Parliament, saying tax reform should never be done, it could never be made fair. And if he ever became Prime Minister, he would roll it back. After three years of wasting the time of this Parliament saying that every single day, he owes the Australian public the decency of telling them what percentage, what items, what cost and how we will make it up. And if he can’t do that, if he’s trying to bury his own policy, as Della Bosca advised him should, then the last three years has been elaborate fraud, as one of Australia’s premier journalist’s accused Mr Beazley of undertaking. Thank you.