Page 3958 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 23 November 1993
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of press releases, saying, "Spend more, spend more, spend more", they also put out their press releases saying, "Tax less, tax less, tax less". They are going to knock off - - -
Mr Kaine: Or spend less, spend less, spend less somewhere else.
MR CONNOLLY: No. I have never heard you say where we should spend less - apart from the buses; but that is another story. You are going to knock off payroll tax, you are going to knock off petrol tax, you are going to knock off just about every tax that is unpopular - most taxes are unpopular, so that means that you are going to knock off every tax - and then you are going to increase expenditure across the board.
Mrs Carnell: That is just rubbish.
MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, it is just rubbish. Perhaps Mrs Carnell is learning. Mrs Carnell, that is quite right; your program, when analysed, is rubbish. Eventually the scribes in Canberra are going to start looking at all these Liberal Party press releases that get put on the spike. They are going to notice that it is always spend more, spend more, tax less, tax less. Then they are going to start adding up the promises, as I did the other afternoon as I was listening to Mr Humphries: "We are going to build a gaol, buy a helicopter and spend more on the police".
Madam Speaker, this is, of course, arrant nonsense. It is regrettable that the Liberal Party have departed, in their new passion for populism, from their once quite responsible attitude. When they were in government and when they are in opposition - I have given Mr Kaine credit for this in the past, both when I have been in opposition and when I have been in government - Mr Kaine has always said, "You cannot spend money you do not have. If you have less money you have to have reductions across the board". That is what we have been doing. That is what Mr Wood has done in his program, with the full support of all his Cabinet colleagues. That is what Mr Moore got up in this place and said you must do. Mr Moore said, "You cannot single out one program; everybody has to have their fair share of cuts". That is what you are moving no confidence in this Government over.
Madam Speaker, it is a foolish motion. It is cheap populist politics at its worst. It will bring no credit to the Opposition for jumping on Mr Moore's coat-tails on this, the dog being wagged by Mr Moore's tail. Look at Mr Moore's comments of a couple of years ago in relation to a different issue, an issue that another member felt passionately about. Mr Moore was able to stand back from that a bit. Mr Moore said, "You have to have savings that are fair; you have to apply a savings measure to all programs; all programs have to take their fair share of cuts". He said then what we say now. What is more, he said that members who were trying to say otherwise, who were getting up in here and saying, "Spend more on your favourite little program", were just posturing, and that such resolutions were, in his words, "entirely inappropriate". Madam Speaker, Mr Moore's motion today is entirely inappropriate. It is cheap populist politics and it reflects little credit on Mr Moore, or Mrs Carnell, who seems to be supporting it.
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