Doorstop interview: 7 million Australians to pay higher income tax

CHRIS BOWEN, SHADOW TREASURER: Thanks for coming everyone. Another instance today of Malcolm Turnbull proving that he’s the ultimate hollow man of Australian politics. Malcolm Turnbull talking about income tax cuts is like the English cricket team bragging about  winning the Ashes. Here we have Malcolm Turnbull in his Toowoomba declaration today bragging that he will cut the taxes for Australians when he's increasing the taxes on 7 million Australians. If Malcolm Turnbull is fair dinkum in Toowoomba today he'll talk in his speech about he and Scott Morrison wanting to increase the income tax on every Australian who earns less than $87,000 a year. That's Government policy.

 

All this talk, all this hype, about income tax cuts that Malcolm Turnbull trots out every time he's in political difficulty ignores the reality that this a Government that wants to increase income tax and the Labor Party stands against that in the Parliament. The only thing stopping Australians earning less than $87,000 a year paying more income tax today is the Australian Labor Party's opposition to this Government's stated and declared policy.

 

Now, the fact of the matter is that in the Liberal Party's world, people earning $60,000 a year will pay $300 more in income tax thanks to their policy. That's the fact. Malcolm Turnbull can engage in all the rhetoric and spin that he likes. The fact of the matter is his Government believes and is trying to increase income tax.

 

So, if Malcolm Turnbull wants to be fair dinkum he'll today in Toowoomba admit that he wants to increase income tax on those Australians, and if he's really fair dinkum he'll drop those tax increases. All talk of tax cuts while this Government wants to increase income tax through the Medicare levy is just hollow rhetoric.

 

More than happy to take any questions.

 

JOURNALIST: Labor’s minimum wage plans have been criticised as being dangerous to small businesses (inaudible). Do you have any response to that?

 

BOWEN: Well, Bill Shorten at the National Press Club outlined what is a real concern in the Australian economy, which is the fact that those Australians on low incomes are really struggling to keep up with the massive increases in their cost of living. And the minimum wage is a factor in that. Now Labor has made submissions to the last several minimum wage cases as Brendan O'Connor made clear yesterday. We continue to consider a range of options, we consult with people across the board. But unlike the Government we recognise that this a problem. The Government policy is to reduce penalty rates. That’s their answer to low wages growth. We recognise the problem. And as Brendan made clear we continue to consider the various implications of all sorts of policies when it comes to minimum wages in particular and we will continue to do that, including consulting with business.

 

I noted earlier in the year, in January, senior business people said the biggest problem facing the economy in their view is lack of demand due to low wages growth. So they've identified the problem themselves. Labor's been talking about it for some time before that, but what Bill did at the National Press Club is make one big serious, significant announcement of the National Integrity Commission and then outlined a whole range of other areas which have been on our mind in the Opposition. We've been concerned about and we continue to work on policies which we'll announce in due course.

 

JOURNALIST: On another matter, is David Feeney about to quit?

 

BOWEN: I would leave David Feeney to make any statements about his future. David's a friend of mine and he has been a very good MP and it's not my place to make any announcements on his behalf.

 

JOURNALIST: The ABC has just confirmed that he will resign. Can you give us any information about his reasons?

 

BOWEN: Look it's up to David to make his statement. It's not a matter for me to make on his behalf.

 

JOURNALIST: Have you got a replacement for him?

 

BOWEN: That's a matter for the Victorian branch and for Bill and I'm sure we'll wait for David's announcement first, let's not get ahead of ourselves.

 

JOURNALIST: You say that you're opposed Mr Bowen, to a Medicare levy to fund the NDIS. How would you fund it?

 

BOWEN: Well of course the Government runs the great scare campaign that the NDIS is underfunded. Now this is completely irresponsible on their behalf. Every time they say that, they worry and scare every Australian who relies on the NDIS. Now the fact of the matter is the previous Labor Government, when establishing the NDIS, put in place a range of measures to fund the NDIS going forward, responsibly. The Government themselves admit there’s no blow out of the cost. Christian Porter when he was the relevant minister, said the costs are matching what they were predicted to be.

 

There’s been no blow out, in fact some of the improvements in the Budget deficit have been due to underspends for what was budgeted in the NDIS. So there is no cost blowout so the Government should drop this ridiculous scare campaign about the NDIS and they should drop the Medicare levy increase below $87,000 as well. I mean Australians who are going to be paying more through the Medicare levy don't care whether it is called a tax rise or a Medicare levy rise, they just know they are paying more and when the justification for that falls apart, Malcolm Turnbull as I said to be fair dinkum should drop that. As Bill Shorten said, Labor is already one ahead of the Government when it comes to tax cuts for those earning less than $87,000 a year

 

JOURNALIST: Mr Bowen I know you have declined to comment on Mr Feeney’s resignation and I respect that but on a broader level does this suggest that perhaps there is a bit of a shaky ship for Labor in the Senate? I mean clearly it is not good news.

 

BOWEN: In the Senate? Sorry I don't follow.

 

JOURNALIST: Well he is resigning from the Senate.

 

BOWEN: He's in the House. David Feeney is the Member for Batman in the House.

 

JOURNALIST: Oh I'm sorry. But is this a sign of instability?

 

BOWEN: No. Again I don't want to pre-empt anything David has said out of respect for David. I'm not going to make any announcements on his behalf. It is his career, he can update the Australian people and the people of Batman on his thinking, not me. But anything that he says or does of course will be dealt with by the Labor Party and we will respond accordingly and we will say to the people of Batman whenever they next have their say, whether it's a general election or any other form like a by-election that we have the right policies for Australia going forward. We are the ones with the alternative vision for Australia and we are the ones who will provide them with the best representation in Parliament. But I stress that David who has been a very good MP, a friend of mine and he is entitled to make announcements.

 

JOURNALIST: The Rudd-era Cabinet documents show that Labor was expecting a huge private investor interest in the NBN. Was Labor in what you could call a fantasyland as the now Federal Government is suggesting?

 

BOWEN: Let's take this leak of Cabinet documents in a few tranches because there is a few issues here so just bear with me as I stepped through some of these matters.

 

Firstly this is a very serious breach of security, national security and I think the Government needs to hold a quick and thorough investigation into how this could possibly happen. I mean this is embarrassing for the country. It is embarrassing to our allies who share intelligence with us and assume that we will be able to keep it. This is a blunder of massive proportions, it would be funny if it wasn't so serious, it is comic but yet unbelievably serious. Point one.

 

Point two: there has been obviously a number of issues traversed. I've seen the home insulation matter traversed. Now the Royal Commission which was set up by the Abbott Government into home insulation had all the Cabinet documents at their disposal including these ones and made no adverse findings against Kevin Rudd. Despite the fact that some would argue that's exactly what it was set up to do, they could find nothing adverse against Mr Rudd, they had these documents.

 

The other thing that we now know is that Tony Abbott explicitly refused to accept Prime Minister and Cabinet advice not to provide the Royal Commission with Cabinet documents, he overturned many years of Westminster precedent that one Government does not release the Cabinet documents of the previous Government. He did that against the explicit advice of the Department of Prime Minister so he has some explaining to do.

 

Now I haven't seen the exact documents that you are referring to in relation to the NBN. What I do know is that Malcolm Turnbull as Communications Minister has utterly failed in the implementation of the NBN. I mean you can see that going around the country even during the break in parts of New South Wales that I was holidaying in I could see that first hand. It is an utter failure in terms of the way Malcolm Turnbull was implementing the NBN and he has got a lot of accounting to do for that.

 

JOURNALIST: So you don't believe that Labor was wrong to expect significant (inaudible)?

 

BOWEN: Well I haven't send the documents that you are referring to in fairness so I don't feel that I can comment on them in any detail.

 

Okay, all in, all done? Thanks very much.