E&OE...
Australia Rising to a Better Future
It's a great pleasure to be here for this Millennium Forum function, supported by the Menzies Research Centre.
The global financial volatility of recent days simply underlines why steady, reliable, safe economic management is the bedrock of good government.
It reminds us that economic management can never be put on auto-pilot. There is no room for complacency. And prosperity can never be taken for granted.
Fiscal conservatism is a long-term governing philosophy, not a label you pick off the shelf for short-term political purposes. And future-oriented government is about not just managing the good times, but also providing prudently for inevitable uncertainty and adversity.
This, Ladies and Gentlemen, goes to the heart of why the Australian people put their faith in the Coalition 11 and a half years ago.
They wanted a government prepared to take the long view; and to govern with the needs and aspirations of mainstream Australia upper most in mind. They also wanted us to bring renewed ambition to our national life.
Today we can see the fruits of a great, yet unfinished, transformation in Australia. An Australian renaissance, with a new synthesis of aspiration and fairness, has taken shape off the back of the strongest economy in our nation's history.
More people are in jobs than ever before. The number of Australians on welfare is down. Household wealth has more than doubled. Business investment is strong.
Australia is working again - moving ahead after decades of falling behind.
The contours of national debate have changed too. We've shown:
* how to slash unemployment without blowing the lid off the economy;
* how real wages can grow by more than 20 per cent without union bosses calling the shots in the workplace;
* how income taxes can be cut without sending the budget into deficit;
* how welfare reform can go hand-in-hand with a strong safety net and record support for low income families.
We've shown how to strengthen Medicare while supporting private health insurance. We've shown how to expand school choice while investing record amounts in government schools.
We've demonstrated how to protect our borders while running a large and welcoming immigration program. We've illustrated how Australia can build closer ties with Asia while also strengthening relations with traditional allies.
Australians can now see that many of the choices under the old Labor narrative are really false choices.
That's why Australia's choice at the next election is so important. It's not just about who will govern this country for the next three years. It's about how Australia chooses to define its ambitions in the next decade and beyond.
People have asked me: Why do you want to be prime minister again? Surely you've achieved all you set out to achieve.
I want to lead this country again because I believe Australia can now set its sights even higher. Because the new Australian synthesis of aspiration and fairness is everywhere in progress, but nowhere complete.
Because in the face of big challenges - like the ageing of the population, climate change, new pressures on families and communities - the task is not simply to preserve today's prosperity but to build tomorrow's.
And because a strong, resilient Australia could quickly disappear at the hands of an inexperienced Labor outfit, dominated by former union officials and hand-cuffed to the Labor states.
Now more than ever the economy needs strong, experienced and careful management.
And let no-one in this room be in any doubt about what is at stake on industrial relations. If the Coalition wins the next election, our reforms will never be lost. They will be so much a part of Australia's aspirational culture that no future Labor Government will be able to dismantle them.
Equally, however, if Labor wins they will throw out our laws and bring back a veritable camel train of workplace rigidities - unfair dismissal laws, union monopoly bargaining, new right of entry rules and, of course, the abolition of Australian Workplace Agreements.
And I confidently predict that no future Coalition Government will see political merit in reinstating our reforms in the years to come.
Ladies and Gentlemen, today I want to talk about my priorities for a fifth term in government. Not out of any false sense of entitlement or complacency. But because the Australian people deserve to know what will be front and centre of my mind if the Coalition is entrusted to govern again.
My five goals for a fifth term are these:
* to keep the nation strong, secure and united, engaged in the world and at ease with itself;
* to build a new era of growth, prosperity and opportunity here at home;
* to embrace a sense of aspirational nationalism to guide relations between different levels of government in Australia;
* to ensure a rising tide of prosperity lifts all boats, with every child getting a solid start in life; and
* to get the balance right on the big challenges around climate change, energy security and water scarcity.
I'll be talking more about these goals in coming weeks. I'll be spelling out policies to secure them. And I'll be reminding my fellow Australians that all our goals and hopes for the future - as individuals or families; as communities or as a nation - rest on keeping our economy strong and competitive.
It's no accident that today our economy is experiencing the longest economic expansion in our history. Or that unemployment has now been below 5 per cent for 17 consecutive months. Or that Australia's trillion dollar economy has clawed its way back up the international economic league ladder.
But we are entering new territory. Australia can move further forward, but it's not inevitable. The challenge is to keep the economy growing with full employment while keeping inflation and interest rates low.
Our willingness to go the extra mile on economic reform is crucial.
I take the old fashioned view that someone who wants to be Prime Minister should have worked out beforehand some core economic convictions. I defy anyone to identify Mr Rudd's. Leadership is about more than printing some t-shirts and calling yourself an economic conservative.
A strong, secure and united Australia
Nowhere is the need for strong leadership more vital than in securing and defending the nation - my first goal and the first duty of government.
My government is committed to protecting the national interest and ensuring Australia remains an anchor of peace, stability and prosperity in a turbulent world. Equally important, we must remain a cohesive and united society in an era when national security begins at home.
A strong, secure and united Australia is a nation engaged in the world and at ease with itself in the 21st Century.
In 2007, Australia confronts a mix of old and new security challenges. Globalisation means the range and number of events affecting our security and prosperity will continue to grow.
Shifting power relations will bear heavily on our security environment. Islamist terrorism will remain a threat to Australia and her interests in the next decade.
Under a future Coalition Government, Australia will stay on the front foot to ensure threats to our security are met before they reach our shores.
This year's Budget provided $22 billion for defence. Our commitment to increase annual defence spending by 3 per cent in real terms out to 2016 will guarantee Australia's leading-edge military capability in the next decade.
A clear strategic vision for the Australian Army - lacking under Labor's old defence doctrine - has been a signature commitment of this Government. Our initial $6 billion investment in an Enhanced Land Force means we now have a larger, better protected, more mobile and harder-hitting army. Our recent decision to acquire new amphibious ships and air warfare destroyers means the Army will be able to be deployed more readily.
In August last year, I announced an increase in the Army from six to eight battalions. Strong recruitment means that we are well advanced to forming the first of these two battalions. Today I can announce that the