Interview with Rena Sarumpaet

SBS

Tuesday, 10 May 2005
Pre-Record

SUBJECTS: Budget

SARUMPAET:

Well Treasurer thanks very much for joining us. The Budget’s already

been described tonight as irresponsible. What makes you so sure that this $21

billion handout won’t rebound as an interest rate rise?

TREASURER:

Well it’s not a handout it is a tax cut. And if you have a strong economy

and more people are in work then more people paying lower tax raises the same

amount of money as fewer people paying higher tax. And I think it is important

that where we can we keep our tax rates as low as possible and we had the opportunity

with low unemployment to do that. And I think it’s a very responsible

thing to do. It will get a lot more incentive into the Australian taxation system.

SARUMPAET:

Aren’t the tax cuts once again targeting the better-off? I mean it’s

a $6 milkshake and sandwich for low income earners but a three course dinner

for those on higher incomes.

TREASURER:

Well it is a cut in the rate from 17 per cent to 15 per cent for lower income

earners. Many lower income earners do not pay any tax. You can not cut tax if

you do not pay it. And if you have a low tax rate, even a significant cut means

that in dollar terms it does not look that big. But in percentage terms the

highest tax cut go to low income earners. They have the biggest percentage tax

cut out of this policy.

SARUMPAET:

What about your Welfare to Work programme – doesn’t your carrot

and stick approach assume too optimistically that there are enough jobs out

there and enough employers willing to hire blue collar workers often, who often

have low skills?

TREASURER:

Well unemployment is the lowest it has been in 28 years so if we are ever going

to try and reform our welfare system and help people on welfare get into work,

now is the time to do it. We have not had a better chance in 28 years. Now I

think with training and with help many of these people will be able to get work.

We want to have a situation where every able bodied Australian of working age

has the opportunity to look for work and find it. And that is my goal. That

is my ambition. And now is the time to go after it.

SARUMPAET:

You are an ambitious man. You have said that you were hoping for extra marks

from the media and from the public for this Budget. How much credit do you personally

deserve for it?

TREASURER:

Oh well the Treasurer is responsible for the Budget. It is my obligation to

put it together and to deliver it. And that is what I have done.

SARUMPAET:

Do you want to present an 11^th Budget?

TREASURER:

Well let us just concentrate on the issue at hand, the issue at hand is what

we are going to do for Australians, for our tax system, for our Future Fund,

for Welfare to Work. I have only brought it down about an hour ago and now we

have got to go through the business of enacting it.

SARUMPAET:

Well Treasurer thanks very much for joining us.

TREASURER:

Thanks for your time.