Mr HOCKEY (North Sydney) (15:45): How interesting it was that, of the five amigos, the fabulous five who were named yesterday in an AFR article about challenging the Treasurer on spending priorities, only one today decided to stand up and say the claims were untrue. Mr Tehan: Only one! Mr HOCKEY: Only one. What about the other four? I am sure that, over in the Senate, Senator Cameron as the chief flamethrower for the member for Griffith is right now saying, 'It's outrageous—I didn't challenge on spending priorities; I actually challenged on the basis that I want more taxes'! That is what Labor is about: more taxes. The member for Bass gave it his best shot. He said, 'Let's double the Medicare levy.' The Treasurer said, 'No, we're not going to do that.' That is a more effusive, more direct and more comprehensive answer to the member for Bass in the Labor Party caucus than anything this Treasurer has ever given to the Australian people in this place. But it gets better. According to the article yesterday: One Labor MP, who asked not to be named, told The Australian Financial Review that some MPs were concerned about Labor's recent raft of funding commitments. ''They want to talk about these all encompassing programs, but they don't want to talk about how they are going to fund it,'' the MP said. "It’s probably a sign of maturity in caucus— it has only been around for 113 years, caucus, but finally there is a sign of maturity in caucus, according to this Labor MP!— that people are not just prepared to go along with this wishful thinking.'' I repeat: 'this wishful thinking'. It is like The Wishing Well, one of the books I read to my kids, a story about making wishes, or The Magic Pudding, The Magic Faraway Tree, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and all those stories. They are all great stories but they are all fantasy—all fantasy, like the economic credibility of the Labor Party. It is all fantasy. They know how to spend money and, boy, are they good at it. We have had pink batts that have burnt down houses. We have had $900 cheques go to dead people to stimulate the economy, which is a big ask of a dead person! We have also had the government spend outrageous sums of money on massively overpriced school halls. But, if you thought for a single moment that Labor might have learnt its lesson on waste, you are wrong; we have found a couple more examples. The Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities—actually, I think it is a bit of a waste to have a title with five different roles in it— Mr Tony Smith: What's the acronym? Mr HOCKEY: DSEWPaC! The Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities has a $462,000 contract to deck out just two offices with indoor plants. That is just fantastic! It's a cracker. Just listen to this one: Labor has handed out $72,000 to the Auburn Community Development Network—in the member for Reid's marginal electorate—to host an 'enviro tea salon'. Thanks to the funding—this is the worst!—participants can now take part in a weaving workshop using native lomandra grass. I wonder what they are doing with that lomandra grass! Listen to this: participants 'will be encouraged to share their energy efficiency tips in exchange for a free seedling, re-potted into a recycled coffee cup sourced from local businesses'. That is taxpayers' money, $72,000 worth. Every taxpayer out there has been wondering where their taxes go under Labor. And, just in case the wrong impression is given, Labor currently spends $150 million a year on an army of spin doctors. There are 1,600 people employed in the Public Service in media, communications, marketing and public affairs. The Australian Taxation Office has 271 spin doctors—I would say that is 271 who have failed at their jobs—while Defence has 175 and Human Services 124. This is Labor. Mr Bradbury interjecting— Mr HOCKEY: You might say, 'Come on, Joe, you're being a little tough here. You're being a little tough when you're down to talking about $72,000 or even $467,000.' But do you know what the cracker is? The federal government paid $1 billion, no strings attached, to electricity generators before 31 June this year for nothing—for nothing. They were going to close down some of those power stations, or they were going to keep them open; they cannot quite tell. But it was $1 billion. Remember the flood levy? The flood levy upset so many Australians who had given so generously privately to try and help Queenslanders in particular but also Victorians affected by floods. The government said, 'No, we've got to be responsible with our budget. We've got to have a limit on the deficit. The deficit will be $22 billion, therefore we're going to have a $1.7 billion flood levy.' That had a real impact on consumer confidence. It had a real impact on the discretionary spend of consumers. You know what happened? The government did not care about the budget, because what they promised was a $22 billion deficit and it has now turned out to be a $44 billion deficit. Mr Bradbury: So how would you have funded it? Mr HOCKEY: Now that I am being interjected on by the member for Lindsay, it takes me to the waste on boats. You are familiar with boats, aren't you, coming from Western Sydney? Before the last election the member for Lindsay went all the way up into Northern Australia, jumped on one of our naval vessels and, to the best of my memory, said, 'We are going to stop the boats.' Commander Bradbury said that—a long way from Penrith and Western Sydney. The only boat the Labor Party has stopped is a legal boat that tried to go fishing in Australian waters after three approvals from the Labor Party. That is the only boat you have stopped, sunshine. Mr Tony Smith: His electorate's landlocked. Mr HOCKEY: No, he has got the Nepean River. He will have his own little navy out of this, I am sure! But it does get very serious. Why? Because, in order to shore up the Prime Minister's leadership, the Labor Party have gone on a spending spree of unprecedented scale. They have promised to deliver a National Disability Insurance Scheme, for which they have promised a huge amount of money, involving $10½ billion a year once it is fully operational, but they have not found the money for it. There could be no crueller hoax on some of the most vulnerable people in the community than to raise expectations and not deliver. Yet that is what the Labor Party have done. They have allocated $1 billion over the next four years for a program that, into the future, is going to cost $10½ billion to run. There is no money for it. They are trying to create the impression there is money for it. They said they are going to increase aged-care funding by $3.7 billion over the next five years, but there is no money for it. They said: 'Don't worry. Low-paid workers are going to get an extra $1 billion.' In fact, we have now found out it is an extra $3 billion for low-paid workers, which the Labor Party said was a pay rise for social and community sector workers. So it was originally $1 billion and now it is $3 billion. They are going to subsidise private sector wages, and of course that is money that is not in the budget. Offshore processing—gee, that's going well! It will be $2.1 billion at least for reopening Nauru and Manus Island. On the increase in the refugee intake, the government said they are increasing it to 20,000. They cannot stop the boats. We have had more than 25,000 people come here on boats under the government in recent times, yet they are increasing the refugee intake to 20,000, which is going to cost $1.4 billion. You keep reminding me of defence and border protection. On defence, the government has committed to 12 new submarines—not six. They have one that urgently needs work sitting on a dry dock in South Australia. They are not prepared to spend the money on that, but do not worry, South Australia. Opposition members interjecting— The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Ms Grierson ): Order! I do not think the member for North Sydney needs that assistance. Mr HOCKEY: This government claims it is going to build 12 new submarines at $36 billion, and there is $16 billion for the Joint Strike Fighter, which it delays; it says the money is somewhere in the forward estimates. Well, it is not there. Then we have the dental care program—the one going through the parliament now—with $4 billion. But the mother of them all, if you like, is the Gonski review, with $6½ billion, but probably really more—$8 billion a year. The Prime Minister said: 'Don't worry. Every school in the country will be better off.' We would love to promise that. We would love to say that every school in Australia is going to get way more money than the six per cent annual increase already budgeted for. We would love to say that. You know what? They will not say where it is coming from. But we know where it is coming from, because there is someone running around out there saying: 'Hang on. We should break into the government Future Fund, the money that was set up and put away by the coalition for the future challenges—the superannuation needs into the future—so that our children and grandchildren will not have a debt burden.' We put that money away. We did not spend it. We put it away, and what do Labor want to do? They want to break into that. You know what that is the equivalent of? That is the equivalent of saying to a parent: 'It's okay. Don't worry about your retirement. Don't worry about funding yourself and your family into retirement. You can break into your superannuation now in order to fund your children's education.' You cannot apply one rule to the government and not apply the same rule to everyday Australians. You cannot break into people's savings for one purpose and not another. We asked the Treasurer explicitly in question time today: 'What is the answer? Yes or no? Are you going to break into this Future Fund, which Australians have put aside to deal with the challenges into the future and to protect our children?' You know what? He would not answer the question. He was prepared to answer the member for Bass in the caucus yesterday. He was prepared to answer a question on death duties in this place, but he was not prepared to answer the question about breaking into the Future Fund. You know what comes out of all of this? The government's total indifference to the welfare of Australian families. How can you say to a family on a household income of $68,000 a year, 'Guys, you're going to have taxes that increase your cost of living by at least $1,000 or $2,000 a year'? How do you say that to them in this environment, when so many people are uncertain and nervous about the future? How do you say to those people, 'We're going to make it much harder for people into the future under Labor, but don't worry; it's all accounted for'? It is not accounted for. That is the Labor way. They said before the last election, 'There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.' The Prime Minister looked the Australian people in the eye and pledged there would be no carbon tax, and the Treasurer looked the Australian people in the eye and said it was a hysterical allegation that there would be a carbon tax. So too do they look the Australian people in the eye today and say, 'Don't worry; it will be all right.' It will not be all right under Labor, because they are A-grade hypocrites. They are indifferent to the welfare of Australian families. They are indifferent to the welfare of Australian businesses. They just do not understand that taxpayers' money belongs to taxpayers. It is not theirs to splash around for the re-election of the leader of the Labor Party, Julia Gillard. It is not their opportunity to try and hold government based on taxpayers' money. It is their solemn responsibility to protect taxpayers, to give Australians hope, to allow Australians to gain the reward from their effort and their hard work and to ensure that as a nation we have the opportunity to do better. The handbrake of Labor must come off. It is time for them for once to be honest with the Australian people. (Time expired)