The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has today downgraded economic growth expectations for Australia on Scott Morrison’s watch and raised several risks to our future outlook.

With heightened global challenges on the horizon the IMF is urging countries to build up ‘fiscal buffers’ and urgently adopt policies for strong and inclusive growth.

The Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison Government has made growth less inclusive and abandoned their own rules for Budget repair.

Instead, on the back of very favourable global conditions and billions of dollars of extra revenue rolling into the budget the Liberals have managed to substantially worsen the Budget position with:

• The deficit for 2017-18 blowing out to almost four times worse than forecast in the Liberal’s first Budget;
• Gross debt crashing through half-a-trillion dollars for the first time in the nation’s history and now sitting at a record $540.1 billion;
• Net debt has doubled since they came to office; and
• Both kinds of debt are growing faster under the Liberals than under the previous Labor Government, which had a Global Financial Crisis to contend with.

The global economy has strengthened, risks have heightened, and yet the Liberal’s Budget discipline has weakened at the worst time.
 
Labor will deliver bigger cumulative surpluses over the forward estimates and will have a better plan to pay down debt putting the budget on a more structurally sound footing with reforms to negative gearing, capital gains tax, dividend imputation and trusts.

These reforms will ensure a Shorten Labor Government can make sure economic growth is inclusive and from the bottom up; by investing in people’s capacity and productivity, targeting tax cuts for those most likely to spend in the economy, and prioritising tax breaks for businesses that invest onshore.
 
Australians need and deserve a Government focused on growing the economy in an inclusive way, boosting wages and addressing cost of living pressures.
 
Instead, Australians are stuck with a divided, dysfunctional rabble led by an illegitimate Prime Minister that nobody voted for.
 
TUESDAY, 9 OCTOBER 2018