"Twenty years on from 'Debt free day' marking the Coalition paying off Labor's debt, the Coalition has had to launch a digital debt clock as Federal debt teeters near $1 trillion, with Labor's only plan to double-down and borrow further", said Shadow Treasurer, Tim Wilson.
"Labor claims higher taxes are good for young Australians, but the truth is the opposite. Every dollar of debt Labor accumulates today is a tax on a young Australian tomorrow. That is not intergenerational equity it is intergenerational theft. Only by getting spending under control and paying down debt can we restore fairness for the next generation", said Shadow Minister for Finance Senator Claire Chandler.
Mr Wilson and Senator Chandler's comments follow the release of the debt clock. The debt clock, publicly accessible at https://debtclock.au, tracks the total Australian Government Securities on issue. Following the maturity of $40 billion in debt today, the total stands at $957 billion. The clock also tracks the cumulative interest bill under Labor already over $80 billion in just four years in government.
"The Federal debt is now equivalent to ten credit cards per Australian, and with every dollar of debt it is just more petrol on the inflation fire", Mr Wilson said.
"The greatest intergenerational policy is to let the next generation of Australians decide their own destiny with opportunity, not be born into debt servicing servitude and a zero sum race to the redistribution bottom".
"Jim Chalmers' active inflation agenda depends on continuing to borrow, and young Australians are hit three times over: painful inflation, debt servicing, and then repayment through higher taxes".
"In the economy Labor built for them, small and family businesses and the self-employed are punished today, and young Australians pay in perpetuity".
"At $25 billion a year in debt servicing, and rising, Labor's interest bill could fund 200,000 additional nurses, or 400,000 aged care home packages, or one thousand kilometres of major regional highway upgrades, or a tax cut worth $1,600 a year for every taxpayer. Instead it is going to debt servicing because Labor cannot stop spending", Mr Wilson said.
Alongside falling real wages, higher tax bills, and surging interest rates, this is the genuine cost of Labor's out-of-control spending, which is now at its highest level in 40 years outside the pandemic.
Under the budget settings the Coalition left Labor in 2022, the budget would have been in surplus in every one of the last four years. We would have been paying down the debt rather than growing it. Instead, Labor has no plan to return the budget to surplus at any point in the next decade. National debt is on track to hit $1.2 trillion in three years and $1.5 trillion within a decade.
"The Howard-Costello government inherited 18.1 per cent of GDP in net debt from Labor in 1996. Through a decade of disciplined management they brought it to zero. That strong foundation prepared Australia for the Global Financial Crisis. The Coalition that followed the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd years did the same, bringing discipline back to the budget and preparing us for the COVID-19 pandemic", Senator Chandler said.
After just four years of the Albanese Labor government, net debt is already at 20.1 per cent of GDP more than Labor left the Coalition in 1996. Even before the Iran crisis it was set to reach 22.6 per cent of GDP within three years. Labor's recklessness has left us exposed at exactly the moment when we need fiscal strength.
"Only a Coalition government can restore the fiscal discipline needed to bring debt under control and stop the never-ending burden being placed on Australians. Our mission is to restore living standards, cut the cost of living, and protect the Australian way of life and none of that is possible while Labor keeps spending money Australians do not have", Mr Wilson said.
