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Well thank you very much Bill Taylor, to Ian and Karen Macfarlane,
to Cameron Thompson, the Liberal candidate for Blair, to the Mayor,
other distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen. It is for me,
a great pleasure, a particular pleasure to be back in what I regard
as the most attractive inland city in Australia.
And if you think that's one of those campaign trail things
which is adjusted for every inland city I go to, I can produce some
evidence that it's not. But it really is great to be back here
in Toowoomba and I do want to start by thanking Bill Taylor for
the ten years of tremendous public service that he's given
to the people of Groom. This electorate which used to be called
the electorate of Darling Downs, has not had a harder working more
dedicated member, and he's brought to his parliamentary representation
very great integrity, very great commitment. He's always put
the interests of his party and his country ahead of his own personal
interests. And sometimes in political life you come across people
who don't always behave like that, but in the case of Bill
he has been a very honourable, as well as a very effective representative.
And I, on behalf of the Government, and all of my colleagues, warmly
thank him for the contribution that he's made to our Party
and I warmly thank him for the contribution that he's made,
not only to the people of Toowoomba, but also to the people of the
whole Groom electorate.
And may I also on another local note, and particularly for some
of the older members who are present today, tell you that I had
the enormous privilege when I visited the Hellfire Pass area of
Thailand, to open the Hellfire Pass museum, which commemorates the
terrible suffering of the Australian men who died in captivity in
WWII building the notorious Burma Thailand Railway. I invited along
with my party, three former Federal Members of Parliament and Ministers
two Liberal, and one Labor as befits an occasion that
belongs to all Australians, and not to one side of politics. And
all of them had been prisoners of war of the Japanese, and one of
them of course was the former Federal Member for what was then called
the electorate of Darling Downs, Sir Reginald Schwartz. And at the
age of 87, Reg Schwartz was still in great spirits, in great heart
and the privilege of talking to him and sharing with him some of
his recollections of those terrible days, and the suffering involved
was a very moving part of my visit and one of the moving things
that I've experienced since becoming Prime Minister.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I don't know when the next election,
federally, is going to be held. I know there is a State election
here in Queensland on the thirteenth of June. I said out at the
woolshed, when we announced our contribution to the Federation Fund,
I said that I stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Rob Borbidge and Joan
Sheldon. I said what I believed and that is that Rob Borbidge has
been an extremely good Premier of Queensland. I also said that there
was really only one choice that Queenslanders had to make on the
thirteenth of June and that was whether or not Rob Borbidge or Peter
Beattie would be the Premier of Queensland after the thirteenth
of June, because they are the only two results that are possible.
There is no other result possible. It is very easy for minor parties
to promise the earth, to run populist campaigns offering simplistic
solutions. Government in modern society is complicated and difficult.
There are no simplistic, easy, populist solutions, because if there
were they would have been tried by our political predecessors years
and years ago.
I can tell you there is one thing that I believed when I came into
Government and my belief has not altered and that is that there
are never in relation to the difficult problems facing the country
or a State, there are never easy, simple populist solutions. And
I say beware of people who offer easy populist solutions, because
they could never deliver them. And I suspect they offer them because
they know they will never be called on to deliver them, and that
observation applies in relation to minor parties of any description
and minor parties that have no real prospect of wielding power and
exercising authority. Because it is only the prospect of actually
having the responsibility of implementing what you say you are going
to achieve that really brings about a sense of reality and sense
of responsibility in political leaders and political parties. So
I would simply say to the people of Queensland that the choice is
Borbidge or Beattie and nobody else, and that choice ought not to
be complicated by listening to the insubstantial inducements of
populist solutions which in reality offer no solutions at all.
I mentioned that when I became Prime Minister I realised that there
were no easy solutions. And so has been the case over the last two-and-a-quarter
years. But I'm immensely proud of what my Government has been
able to achieve during that period of time, and in the economic
area, that's been achieved against the background of something
that we didn't know would happen, and nobody knew it would
happen, when we were elected to Government in March of 1996, and
that is the economic downturn in the Asia-Pacific region. Nobody
was telling us in March of 1996 that that was going to happen, or
if they were telling us, they didn't take the care to write
it down, so they could now prove that they were telling us. The
reality is that the Asian economic downturn has overtaken our part
of the world and overtaken the world without any forewarning. And
despite that, despite the fact that that downturn was unexpected
and despite the fact that it has imposed some strains and some pressure
on the Australian economy, we have really performed in our part
of the world, infinitely better than any other country. And I would
say to the Australian people all over our country, that what we
have been able to do, particularly through our economic management
is to deliver three things. We've delivered security, we've
delivered safety, and we've delivered stability against the
background of an enormous amount of economic turbulence.
And I can just very briefly take you through some of the evidence
in support of that statement. We do now have thankfully, the lowest
housing interest rates that this country has had since the late
1960s. We've now got the lowest small business interest rates
that we've had since the early 1970s. The average homebuyer
in Australia is now the equivalent of $330 a month better off than
what he or she was in March of 1996. Now, that is real money. That
is unassailable, after tax money. And it is the equivalent of a
$100 a week payrise, for a person paying off the average loan around
Australia. Now, it does represent a very significant increase in
the living standard and the economic security of people who are
borrowing to pay off their home. Now, I recognise that low interest
rates has different effects of different sections of the population.
I know that it is terrific news if you are a borrower. The news
is not so flash if you are a lender, and in recognition of that,
of course, the Government undertook a number of measures. One of
them we promised in the last election campaign for self-funded retirees,
in relation to their tax threshold, and I'm also very happy
to say that in the last Budget, we announced a major extension of
the Seniors' Health Card for self-funded retirees. And the
impact of that is that a self-funded retired couple earning up to
the very large sum of $67 000 a year between them, or about $40
000 a single person that those people will qualify in future for
the Seniors' Health Card, they will qualify with effect from
the first of January of next year. And that is a recognition that
they are a section of the population who have very carefully saved
for their retirement and understandably feel on occasions that perhaps
there has been insufficient recognition of the contribution that
their thriftiness has made to the overall economic welfare of the
nation.
SO, on the interest rate front, there's some very good evidence
of what we have achieved. On the inflation front, we have now the
lowest inflation rate in the industrialised world. And very importantly
on the Budget front, we inherited a deficit on an annual basis from
Mr Beazley and Mr Keating, of $10.5 billion and in just over two
years, we have converted that into a surplus this year in prospect
of $2.7 billion. Now that surplus won't mould away in the bank.
That surplus will be used to pay off the accumulated debts over
a period of years that we inherited from the former Government.
I mean, without burdening you with statistics, it was calculated
that when we came into office we inherited about $95 to $100 billion
dollars of accumulated Federal Government debt and that represented
a few years ago about 20% of our annual wealth generation as a nation.
And on our calculations, if all of our policies are implemented,
including the privatisation of the remaining two-thirds of Telstra,
we will by the turn of the century have reduced that 20% to a bare
1.5% of our annual wealth generation. Now, that is a remarkable
achievement because as you all know, just as a household, a farm,
a small business, or indeed a large business, cannot go indefinitely
living beyond its means. So it is with a nation. And the debt burden
hanging over a country is really a representation of the pawning
of our children's future and our children's economic livelihood
and stability years into the future. And I would like to think that
my Government will be seen in time as the Government that delivered
a relatively debt free 21st Century to future generations
of Australians. Because a debt burden is a burden of enormous proportions.
It is a burden that eats up income that you earn. It's a burden
that prevents you doing things and the more debt we pay off and
the higher the surlpus we generate, the more capacity we have to
do two things. To spend money needy areas, be they in the social
area or the infrastructure area, and also of course to deliver reductions
particularly in the areas of personal income tax. SO in those three
areas, we have achieved an enormous amount. We've cut interest
rates, we've got a record low inflation level and we've
tackled, in a very successful and a very systematic way, the debt
burden that we inherited.
So it is fair to claim, as I do very frequently and very proudly,
but against a background of unanticipated economic turbulence, we
have delivered that security, that stability, and that safety. But
in other areas, we have also tackled fundamental reform that we've
need to address for a very long time. And one of those areas of
course is Industrial Relations reform. I've been campaigning
for Industrial Relations reform in this country for a very long
period of time. It was probably the policy issue for which I was
best known when I became Leader of the Opposition again in January
of 1995. And if there was one thing above all that I wanted to achieve
when I got into office and that was to implement the promises that
we'd made in relation to Industrial Relations.
And I am very pleased that that has occurred. We now have a much
better Industrial Relations system. One of the areas, of course,
where we've been very active is reform of the Australian waterfront.
We need a more efficient waterfront. We need change in the industrial
relations of the Australian waterfront. Not because we want to destroy
a union, not because we object to trade unionists working on the
waterfront. That has never been our policy. We want to change the
Australian waterfront because it will be economically beneficial
for Australia. And I think the industrial obscenity of the present
arrangements on the waterfront are best epitomised by what is now
happening in relation to that ship on the west coast of the United
States. It goes over there with the frozen meat and because the
American Union is mates with the MUA and the ALP, won't unload
it. It's got to go back to New Zealand and it's got to
be reloaded by what is regarded as acceptable labour and then go
back to the West Coast in the United States.
We all know what conditions that export is going to be in by the
time it is finally taken off that ship. Now that, ladies and gentlemen,
is an outrage. That, ladies and gentlemen, represents in a classic,
unarguable case study, that represents what we are trying to change
about the Australian waterfront. That is a metaphor for all of the
things that are wrong with the Australian waterfront at the present
time. And I know we have encountered the distance. I know we've
incurred criticism from the media and from other sections of the
Australian community. But I want you to know we are absolutely determined
to continue pursuing fundamental reform to the Australian waterfront.
And we are going to do it not because we have some ideological hang-up.
We are going to do it because it is good for Australia. That's
why we are doing it. It will make Australia economically more efficient.
It will help our exporters. It will stop Australia's waterfront
being a laughing stock for the rest of the world. And I want personally
to compliment Peter Reith my Industrial Relations Minister on the
very steadfast and courageous role that he played in the face of
some fierce and vicious criticism, intimidation and attack. And
I admire very much the job that he has done. But when I talk about
doing something in the national interests that, of course, brings
me to the other steps that must be taken to further deliver the
safety and security and the stability of the Australian economy.
And that, of course, is the reform of our taxation system. And once
again the goal to reform this system because it will be good for
Australia. That's the reason we want to do it. I believe very
strongly and it's based on almost 25 years of experience in
public life, that you can persuade the Australian public of the
need for reform and change if you satisfy two conditions. You must
first of all persuade the Australian public that the change you
want to make is in Australia's interest. In other words, it's
in the national interest of our country that we bring about the
change. And secondly, you've got to persuade them that the
change you intend to make is fair.
Now, I am applying that by theory to the cause of taxation reform.
We do have an old-fashioned tax. We do have a tax system that penalises
our exporters. We apply wholesale sales tax at various rates on
some goods and on other goods we don't apply any rate of wholesale
sales tax. Some of the rates are very high. We have a lot of anomalies.
We charge 32 per cent for a television set. We charge 22 per cent
for a family car. We charge nothing for caviar or if you are wealthy
enough to buy a Lear jet, we don't' charge anything for
that either, in sales tax that is. And so the list goes on and there
is anomaly after anomaly in the system we have at the present time.
But as a community that draws so much of its wealth to some of the
great export industries of Australia, the economic sector most affected
and most penalised by our present tax system is, of course, the
export system. Because if we had a better indirect tax system we
wouldn't tax the input to the goods that we send overseas and
we'd be far more competitive in the trading activities of other
countries.
Our taxation policy will be released in plenty of time for the
Australian people to examine it in detail before the election takes
place. It will address the concerns people have about it being fair
and equitable to low income earners. And all I would say in relation
to our political opponents is that, like everything else, we know
what they are against but we don't know what they are for.
And I have searched in vain over the past few months to find one
single new policy that the Labor Party has generated in the two-and-a-quarter
years it's been in opposition. Now, I am prepared to accept
for a year or eighteen months that a party that had been in power
for 13 years couldn't be expected to reinvent the wheel in such
a short period of time. I was prepared to accept that they had to
go through some period of introspection and self examination and
some period of policy renewal. That happens to any political movement
after it goes into opposition from a long period of government.
But that period of consultation and naval gazing to the Labor Party
is now finished. They now have the obligation that they are putting
themselves forward as an alternative government. They have an obligation
of telling the Australian public what they believe in and what they
stand for. We know they left us with a deficit of $10.5 billion
and then to add insult to injury where they tried to stop us through
the Senate from fixing up the mess that they concealed to the Australian
public and left behind.
We know that they tried to stop industrial relations reform. We
know that they support the MUA's stranglehold on the Australian
waterfront. We know that they are in favour of compulsory unionism.
We also know that they are against taxation reform. Mr Beazley said
last week that he wanted to keep the present wholesale tax system.
So we know a lot of what they are opposed to but we have now real
idea of what they are for. And part of the process to the lead up
to an election is for the Government to say what it believes in
and for the Opposition to say what it believes in. And then people
have a look and they make a decision and they start the debate.
Well only one player has come upon the stage so far and that is
the Government. We are the only actor on the stage. We are the only
show in town at the moment that is telling the Australian people
what it believes in. We believe in making Australia strong and stable
economically. We believe in fixing the industrial relations system.
We believe in fixing the tax system. We believe in a sensible program
of privatisation. We believe in having good relations with our neighbours
based on the principle of mutual respect but thus far we don't
really know what our political opponents stand for.
Ladies and gentlemen, can I finish by thanking all of you as members
and supporters of the Liberal Party and others of whatever basis
you come here today for the support you've given to Bill Taylor.
Can I take the opportunity of commending Ian Macfarlane to you as
the Liberal Party candidate for Groom of the next Federal election.
Ian is very well known in this part of Queensland.
Can I take this opportunity of commending Ian Macfarlane to you
as the Liberal Party candidate for Groom at the next Federal election.
Ian is very well known in this part of Queensland. He, of course,
has been as I understand it a resident of this district for a long
period of time. There wouldn't be anybody who has a better
understanding of agri-politics in this country than does Ian. He
has a very strong background because of his association with and
leadership of the Grains Council. He does understand some of the
difficult problems that are faced by primary producers in Australia.
Although we've brought a lot of change and a lot of improvements
and a lot of reforms and happily in many parts of Australia weather
conditions have turned a lot better for primary producers, it is
still very difficult. And later on in a few moments I'll be
talking to representatives of the pork industry to listen to the
concerns that they have and to listen to the views that they wish
to put to the Government.
So it's more important than ever that we put into Parliament
men and women who understand primary industries. We do need people
who've got a deep background in the rural industries of Australia.
There will always be a very large place in the ranks of the Coalition
parties for men and women who have rural backgrounds. We must always
remember that the Liberal Party represents more rural seats in Australia
than any other party. And the Liberal Party's understanding
of and representation in rural Australia is immense. So in every
respect I think the Liberal Party has made an outstanding choice
in selecting Ian Macfarlane as the candidate to run under the Liberal
banner at the next Federal Election. He will have my total support,
my total confidence and after the election I will very warmly welcome
him as the new Federal Member for Groom. Thank you very much.
ends