The last week of an election campaign is always the economy week... Governments have no money of their own, other than what they take from us. Nothing in an election campaign is more important than economic management; and economic management must involve growing the economy, not shrinking it.
And growing our economy is exactly what the Conservative Party is determined to do.
Alan Jones writes in The Australian:
"If we can't grow the economy, all this boring talk about hospitals and schools, and what will happen to cancer patients and dental patients, is meaningless.
Sadly, the Labor Party, ahead in the polls, is all about redistribution, entering every corner of our lives and taking money from us to spend where it thinks it should be spent.
I have been a speech writer to a prime minister. I was always instructed to write that people know best how to spend their money, not governments. It is, after all, our money. All of it. So we are entitled to ask what these endless promises, without detail, will cost.
But when Bill Shorten was asked on the ABC about the cost of his energy policy, he said the question was "dumb".
When Scott Morrison asked him in the last debate about the cost of his energy policy, he said the question was "dishonest".
Labor must think it has solved the "cost" issue by announcing last week its "costings". But really, they tell us nothing. What will it cost the economy when you take from people, or tax them, to the tune of $387 billion?
Mr Morrison told me last week that if he was riding Winx, she would not win a race. There would be too much weight on the horse.
Well, just as weight can stop the best horse in the world, so it can destroy a winning economy.
Look at the weight piled on this economy if Labor wins. The $387bn is just the start of it. Stand negative gearing on its head and rents will go up. How much will that cost young people?
The negative gearing changes will mean fewer investors in the housing market. You try to sell your house and the price will go down. How much will that cost the person in Struggle Street?
Where were these "costs" mentioned in the costings?
Take franking credits from a million Australians, attacking their retirement incomes. Do they go on to welfare? What will that cost?
And if this franking credit theft only applies to shareholders in Australian companies, won't this stop Australians investing in such companies? What will that do to the share price for every other shareholder? What will that cost?
What will be the cost when you jack up the salary of childcare workers by 20 per cent and every other service provider wants the same deal? Where is that "cost" spelt out?
And then the uncosted energy policy. What other leader would get away with describing any question about the cost of the energy policy as "dumb" and "dishonest"?
Does anyone think that a 50 per cent renewable energy target won't involve profound cost?
The Greens, in coalition with Labor, want a 100 per cent target.
If you are going to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 45 per cent, what will that do to the agriculture sector and the transport sector? They are responsible for as much carbon dioxide emissions as the electricity-generating sector. Are we going to kill off dairy cows and beef cows because they break wind? Are we going to take planes out of the sky and cars off the road?
Can someone answer these "dumb" questions?
What is the cost to struggling Australians when 300,000 of them could lose their jobs because of the uncosted energy policy?
What is the cost when your wages sink and you still have to pay the bills?
What is the cost to business, to investment and to households when your electricity price could increase by up to 60 per cent?
What is the cost to the economy when American energy prices are a quarter of ours, so business migrates to America and takes the jobs with it?
What is the cost to Australians who scratched and saved for their retirement via superannuation only to find Mr Shorten is going to rip $34 billion from them?
We have seen the cost to one Australian in Gladstone when he asked Mr Shorten for tax relief for workers earning $200,000. He knew the cost to him of his marginal tax rate going from 47 per cent to 49 per cent, under Labor, once you hit $180,000. Mr Shorten did not have the guts to tell the fellow he was going to tax the tripe out of him. Instead he said: "We're going to look at that." The bloke says he was suspended from work the following day.
Mr Shorten's coalition partner is the Greens. They want death duties. Imagine the cost of that to battling Australians. As David Scully of Marrickville wrote yesterday: "Say it for what it is, Bill - a tax on aspiration, inspiration and perspiration. The more successful you become, the lower the incentive for achievement. The negative gearing of success."
Or as Terry McCrann summed it up brilliantly in this paper on Saturday: "Even on the most generous interpretation, what a Shorten-Bowen government promises to deliver makes the Whitlam-Cairns government of the 1970s infamy look like a model of conservative, careful and limited government in comparison."
If we are voting for Australia on Saturday, you couldn't possibly have a bar of any of this."
Whoever you vote for in the lower house, vote "1" Australian Conservatives in the Senate on the white ballot paper.
