Goods and Services Tax

The SPEAKER: Supplementary, member for Stuart.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (15:12): The Treasurer in his answer said that he has argued for the Premier's plan to increase GST to 15 per cent and he supports it wholeheartedly. Why did he tell this chamber on 2 July last year that he and Labor would not support an increase to the GST?

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Treasurer, Minister for Finance, Minister for State Development, Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy) (15:12): Unfortunately for members opposite, they have very little experience in governing. Governing means that sometimes, when you are confronted with the size of the fiscal gap that we have, we need to be responsible. When a successful Liberal like Mike Baird stands up and has the courage to say, 'Let's have a debate about taxation in this country,' we were not prepared as a government to let him sit on his own, so we stood with him. We said, 'Okay, let's have a debate, because there is a massive fiscal gap,' and we had that debate while members opposite sat silent, offering no alternative, no policy development, no new revenue measures, no savings measures, nothing. They have not offered a single alternative. We are able to look to make sure that we can fund the services that we need, and it is a bit rich to have the opposition criticise us about a problem their political party created.