Topics: Major fuel price relief for Australians under a Coalition Government, Labor’s cruel hoax tax changes, Labor’s bloated bureaucracy

 

E&OE  

 

JAMES GLENDAY:

Now the Coalition has promised to halve Australia's fuel excise for one year, shaving off 25 cents a litre at the bowser after rejecting Labor's surprise income tax cuts. Late last night the Senate passed the Albanese Government's $17 billion so-called top-up tax cuts with the support of the crossbench and the Greens.  

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

The Opposition has labelled the tax cuts an election bribe and says its $6 billion petrol plan would save families hundreds. The Shadow Treasurer, Angus Taylor joins us now from Canberra. Angus, good morning. Thanks for joining us.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Great to be with you.

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

Isn't this cut to the fuel excise just your own version of an election bribe?  

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

No, absolutely not. I mean, the people who are under the most stress across our economy are those with a mortgage in our suburbs and regions, really struggling to make ends meet, often double income families with two cars and one of the challenges they're facing is paying the bills for transport. Transport to go to work, to drop off the kids at school, to visit friends. This is a huge source of pressure, and these are the very families we see who are increasingly under enormous stress. We see them at food banks struggling to put food on the table. So, this is temporary. It's very targeted. It's responsible and it's focused on that group that we think are under the most pressure at this time given Labor's cost of living crisis.

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

Okay, so it's temporary, 12 months, is that going to be enough?  

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, the aim here is actually to solve the underlying cost of living crisis and standard of living crisis we've got in this country and that's why it should be temporary. I mean, what Labor is doing by doing something permanent is telling us we're going to have a permanent cost of living crisis. Well, that's not what we intend if we get into government. Our intention is to fix this crisis. This is temporary relief for some of the most stressed Australians when it comes to their financial situation, but it's material too. I mean if you're a family who has to buy two tanks of fuel a week, it's $28 bucks, $1500 a year and that will make a real difference at a time when they're really struggling under Labor's cost of living crisis.

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

Now we understand that you've just told one of our colleagues that you're going to repeal Labor's income tax cuts which were passed through Parliament. If people are struggling, why not let them have the extra $5 a week?  

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, at the end of the day, you've got to get the balance right between relief, which is targeted, but being responsible as well and the truth of the matter is that Labor has lost all sense of responsibility, $170 billion of deficits over the coming years. And frankly, that's putting in Australia in a position where we've got no shock absorbers, no capacity to deal with a very uncertain world and one way or another Australians are going to pay a high price for a government that has lost control of its budget.

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

Okay, well you've matched a lot of the government's spending initiatives. This policy in particular is going to cost $6 billion for a year. So how are you going to pay for it?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, let's be clear. Labor's policy is going to cost $17 billion. So, this is substantially more responsible, but the important point is it can be because it's very, very targeted and it's temporary. It's also immediate, so, it'll be July 1. You'll be waiting 15 months for Labor's policy to come through, but more broadly, we've opposed $100 billion of Labor spending that we think is inappropriate at this time and I can assure you we'll put our costings out before the election. It will be a more responsible position than Labor’s and importantly we'll re-establish those fiscal rules that households have to abide by, that businesses have to abide by, but that government has thrown out since Labor came to power, which has meant we've got an extremely irresponsible budget where frankly the Treasurer has driven the budget off a cliff. He's shown his complete economic incompetence in this Budget.

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

Okay, so Peter Dutton's Budget Reply speech is tonight. Can we just clarify and confirm, will there definitely be no income tax cuts as part of the Coalition's plan?  

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, what we're talking about tonight, amongst other things, is relief for Australians at the petrol bowser, relief for some of the hardest working Australians with the greatest mortgage stress who have suffered badly under Labor's cost of living crisis. That'll be our focus. We will also be talking about the need for affordable, reliable energy more generally, the need to fix our housing crisis in this country, more supply of housing, breaking those infrastructure bottlenecks, beating inflation more generally, boosting growth, backing small businesses with accelerated depreciation, encouragement of investment from small businesses, something this government has never supported. And we'll also, Peter, will also be talking about the importance of keeping Australians safe at a time when we are in a more uncertain world, according to the Prime Minister. The most uncertain world we've faced since 1945. A Prime Minister who can't give the support and investment to the defence forces that are desperately needed.

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

Angus Taylor, you're talking about fiscal rules. One of the areas that you obviously need to look at is making cuts and one of those areas is the public sector jobs. Now yesterday you said with the 40,000 public sector jobs that a lot of those will be done through natural attrition and through a hiring freeze, but how long would that take? 40,000 is a big number.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Yeah, but the public service has got a lot bigger under Labor and the point is that the attrition numbers are quite high now because of the size of the public service. Look, we think the public service was big enough to serve Australians when we were in power and the increase that we've seen under Labor of 41,000 is not necessary and at the end of the day we've got small businesses  out there wherever I go struggling to make ends meet, their margins are being crunched, they're really struggling to put people on.  We need to make sure that the responsibility that small businesses and households are having to deal with in their budgets is also reflected in a more responsible approach to the size of the public service here in Canberra and you know, Australians are taxpayers, and they deserve their government to be very careful with their money and it is their money after all.  

 

EMMA REBELLATO:

Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor thanks very much for joining us this morning.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Good to be with you.

ENDS.