Topics: RBA decision; Labor’s addiction to spending; student debt; Goulburn Council

 

E&OE   

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, more pain for Australian families as interest rates stay on hold today, as the Reserve Bank put it, underlying inflation remains too high as Labor's homegrown inflation continues to rage across the nation. Australians aren't seeing light at the end of the tunnel. They aren't seeing the hope they want. Indeed, we've seen interest rates under Labor go from 0.35% up to 4.35% over the time since they've been in power, and we are absolutely at the back of the pack and seeing reduction in interest rates. We've seen them in the US and the UK and Canada, New Zealand, Europe, elsewhere, but not in Australia. Inflation continues to rage, as I said, prices up over 10% since Labor has come to power, and importantly, the expectation is that next year we will be at the back of the pack in terms of our level of inflation, indeed, ahead of every other country, other than one of our peers. Real disposable incomes have been in free fall, down 8.7% since Labor came to power, and this is the standard of living of Australians and every Australian is feeling this. I see this wherever I go, I see it in households, I also see it in the businesses where businesses are seeing their customers struggling to make the purchases that they were making only a couple of years ago and of course GDP per capita has been negative for six quarters. We've been in a household recession for 18 months in this country, and all of this is adding up to continued pain.

 

Now, the Treasurer tried to make much of forecasts, and it's worthwhile making a couple of comments about the Reserve Bank's forecast today. [inaudible] They have not solved the underlying problem here, the government is way short of solving that underlying problem and of course, core inflation is not expected to get back to the target for two years, for two years, so much more pain to go in terms of price increases. Now it's clear to me that the government is out of its depth in dealing with this problem, and it's also clear that reckless spending is central to Australia being at the back of the pack in solving the problem, and to quote, again the Reserve Bank today, “growth in government spending is higher than expected” and they've had to adjust their expectations, the Reserve Bank's expectations in as a result of that increased government spending. We've seen that even in the last few days. There is no such thing as a free lunch. The $16 billion debt write off that the government announced on the weekend has to be paid by Australians and the average Australian household will pay $1,600 for that. That will come in either higher taxes or even more immediately in in higher inflation, one way or another, it will be paid for by Australians. There is no such thing as a free lunch. And the reality is that spending now is higher than it was even during the pandemic. This is a government that has decided to play a political game, to put band aids on bullet wounds, to not deal with the underlying source of the problem here and the result is Australians are losing hope, and it's understandable that that is the case. Happy to take questions.

 

JOURNALIST:

Mr Taylor, a lot of Australians wouldn't say no to some more assistance from the government, such as an energy subsidy. Let's face it, a household wouldn't turn that away. Is your message to households that that simply can't be done and it's not affordable. Are you going to the next election saying you've got to stop that kind of spending and cut other spending?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, the truth is that the best relief of all for Australian families is lower inflation. That's the relief that helps absolutely everybody, David. That's the relief. We learnt this, you know, we went through this in the 70s and 80s. We've seen it before and when inflation is stuck, when it's persistent, and it has been persistent. I mean we saw services inflation go up in the last quarterly data. It went up, and I understand the Reserve Bank Governor has pointed that out in her comments just a few moments ago. The truth is that relief comes from getting inflation down, and it helps everybody. But do you accept that households, every single …

 

JOURNALIST:

… but do you accept …

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

… every single, David, I know …

 

JOURNALIST:

But do you accept that that's a very tough message for households because you're saying to them, sorry, the Commonwealth Government cannot help you with a higher payment here. You're going to have to turn them away.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

The message is that inflation should be lower, and I think that's the message every Australian wants to hear. They want to see a government that knows how to get inflation down to where it should be, that knows how to restore the standard of living that has absolutely collapsed under this government. That's what they want. That's the message, and that is a crucial message that this government can't deliver because it's failed. Three failed budgets. Three failed budgets, one after the other, and we see this continue on. And you know, relief, it's not in sight, because at the end of the day, when your real disposable incomes have collapsed by that much, the only way to fix the problem is to fix the economy and this government will just keep putting band aids on bullet wounds. It won't fix the economy.

 

JOURNALIST:

Mr Taylor just on the … you’re talking about spending a lot. You're about to go into an election campaign now given that you've been talking about ending spending these sort of things, would you … should we expect your sort of platform in this election to be cost neutral? What should we expect? Sort of cuts to match the spending that you're going to announce over the course of the campaign?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, you won't see reckless spending from us and I've made that point for two years. I've made the point that the economy's got to grow faster than your spending. That's not about cuts as you say. It's about managing your spending, spending on things that you can afford, that you can afford, but for every Australian household to pay $1,600 for lawyers and doctors and people who have MBAs. I mean Chris Richardson put it well, he said, it's a “fairness fail”. That’s a “fairness fail”. This is a government that sees that the answer to every problem is more government spending. It has the wrong toolkit for the time. We live in a time where governments have got to, have got to manage their spending carefully, just as every household and every business across this country is having to do right now.

 

JOURNALIST:

Do you want your costings to show a better budget bottom line than Labor when you get to the election? Is that what you aspire to?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well we’ll announce our costings in advance of the election.

 

JOURNALIST:

What’s your goal though? 

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Let me make this point, though, David, and it's a really important one. Even prior to the latest announcement of the government, we'd opposed $92 billion of government spending through the Parliament. Tell me another Opposition that's done that in any recent time. These are and each time … 

 

JOURNALIST:

You’ve asked me a question, can I answer? I’ve got an answer. 

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

I would like to finish it. I would like to finish it.

 

JOURNALIST: 

But you know that a lot of that is the off-budget stuff. So you can oppose the off-budget.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

A lot of it's on budget.

 

JOURNALIST: 

Some of it's on budget. So I still would be interested in your aspiration on the on the deficit or surplus bottom line during the campaign. 

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well we've made it very clear. I made it very clear even in a speech I made a couple of weeks ago, what our fiscal guidelines will be. The first thing we'll do is re-establish them because the government threw them away on day one. They got rid of them. They'd been there since Peter Costello put them in place back in the 90s. Got rid of them. We'll re-establish those guardrails, and right central to those guardrails is a comment I made earlier, you grow the economy faster than your spending. That's what you do. It's pretty simple. It's pretty simple stuff, but it works, and it's that kind of practical back to basics approach that ensures that we have the strong economy that Australians need. There is no way to restore Australians’ standard of living to the devastation that Australian household budgets have suffered under Labor than to have a strong economy, an economy that delivers for Australian households. It is not, it is not happening under Labor. We see it in all of the data and the result is we continue to see Australians suffering, particularly those with a mortgage, young, hard working families who are trying to get ahead, trying to pay the mortgage. It's diabolical. It's diabolical and I hear them say, I go to the supermarket and I try to work out how I can actually manage my budget, and I can't do it. I can't do it. Well, that's what happens when you've got a government that can't manage the economy. And that's exactly where we are right now.

 

JOURNALIST: 

I’ve just got one more on TAFE. Obviously, you've talked a lot about how the TAFE, TAFE, the university, TAFE, debt system is not …. this new policy doesn't work for you. But obviously Australia is facing a massive skills shortage, and how do you get your way out of that without spending a bit on these people, on universities, on students, to encourage them to study more?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR: 

Yeah, yeah, well look, let's be clear here, we've seen a collapse in labour productivity in this country of 6.3% in the last two and a bit years since Labor's been in power. It’s diabolical. I mean, we haven't seen that before. That's why we've had a collapse in real disposable income. That's why the standard of living of Australians has gone backwards, and that's a big part of the reason why we have skills shortages too and this is a government that has empowered unions with deep links to criminal gangs by taking their donations, by getting rid of the tough cop on the beat. I mean, this is how you end up in this sort of situation. As I keep saying, this government's instincts are all wrong for the time. This government's instinct is we'll put the watchdog back but to finish the answer to this question and I was going to take one over here next, David. You've had lots. We will put that watchdog back in place.

 

JOURNALIST:

Does this mean you want to put fees back on TAFE?

 

JOURNALIST:

I don’t want to get in the middle of you two so I will wait.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

We’ll announce … we’ll announce David, we’ll announce all our policies well in advance of the next election. But the point I've made today very clearly, $16 billion of spending on top of the $92 billion that we've already opposed in the Parliament. This is a government that can't control itself. It puts bandaids on bullet wounds. It thinks that that's the way to solve the problem. It has the wrong toolkit for the times and Australians are paying a higher price.

 

JOURNALIST:

I appreciate this Angus. Um the Goulburn Council CEO resigned butting heads with the new Mayor over the financial situation. She got in after fighting against rate hikes. Do you have concerns about the council’s financial situation?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well I have deep concerns about the council raising rates by 50%. That's not what Australians need and people in Goulburn need in the middle of a cost of living crisis. It's the wrong policy for the time and I made my view on that very, very clear, and that will continue to be my view. That kind of rate hike was completely inappropriate for families who are struggling to pay the mortgage and, you know, big spending, big spending government ends up having to either hit people with higher taxes or they get hit with inflation, which is a terrible tax, but it's a tax at the end of the day and that's why, that's why I've said what I've said today. Thank you very much.

 

ENDS.