Angus Taylor
Hume · Liberal Party · Australia
“It was in 1927 that the federal parliament moved from Melbourne, where it had sat for 26 years. It's a much better location here; I'm in agreement. It did take up a beautiful sheep station, but it has become a great city. It came to a provisional building, as we just heard, in the new capital of Canberra.”
“I'm sure that all in this place look forward to that special sitting of the parliament in Old Parliament House to commemorate the occasion, and I warmly welcome that opportunity.”
“On behalf of the coalition and the federal opposition, it gives me great pleasure to support the motion moved by the government. We warmly welcome the establishment of the Joint Select Committee on the Centenary of Parliament in Canberra.”
“He captured the aspirational spirit of the Australian people when he said: One's own life would hardly be worth living without its dreams of better things, and the life of a nation without such dreams of a better and a larger future … Prime Minister Stanley Bruce delivered an address in which he said: May those who enter this open door go…”
“Given the shortage of accommodation in the new capital, I think it was largely restricted to tents at that point. Consequently, the overcatered event reportedly saw a large quantity of Sargents meat pies left over. Legend has it they were disposed of in a pit where the Treasury building now stands.”
“My question is to the Prime Minister. Under Labor, aged care wait times have blown out to over a year. More than 200,000 Australians are waiting for care. Today, Labor was defeated in the Senate, which passed the coalition's bill to put people back in charge of aged care decision-making.”
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“My question is to the Treasurer. The Albanese Labor government will bring in over 1.8 million immigrants over five years, whilst Labor's housing crisis escalates. When will the Treasurer come clean on the real impact of Labor's big Australia plans?”
“My question is to the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister's cruel hoax of a budget offers cash-strapped Australian families 70c a day in 15 months time. Prime Minister, when Australians with a mortgage are $50,000 worse off under Labor, isn't this a budget for the next five weeks, not the next five years?”
“That is the best this hopeless Treasurer, who simply doesn't understand economics—he's a PhD in spending; he's a PhD in excuse-making. That's the one thing that he focuses all of his time on. The best he has is 70c a day in over a year's time. The Australian people are smarter than that. They know they have been let down by this Treasurer, who is only focused on one job—his own. Actually, no—”
“That's because he doesn't get it. He absolutely doesn't get it. And it's why, in his time as Treasurer, we have seen an eight per cent reduction in the standard of living of hardworking Australians. The truth is, for many Australians, it's far worse than that. If you're running a small business, it has been 18 per cent. If you're working overtime, weekends, because you can't afford to pay for your workers, it has been an 18 per cent collapse. If you are an Australian and you live in Western Sydney and you've got a mortgage, you've paid $50,000 more since this government came to power than you expected to pay just 2½ years ago. That's in after-tax income. That's what you have seen under this government. Their answer to all of that is 70c a day over a year from now. That's their answer.”
“Last night we saw handed down by this hopeless Treasurer a budget for the next five weeks, not for the next five years. It is a budget for the prosperity and security of two people and their jobs—the Prime Minister and that hopeless Treasurer who is sitting over there. It is only about them. It is absolutely not about the hardworking Australians trying to get ahead, who are going backwards under this government. In 2½ years, Australians have seen the biggest collapse in their standard of living in the history of this country. We've never seen anything like this before. It is worse than any other country in the world. This hopeless Treasurer doesn't understand economics. He has never worked in the private sector—actually, I'm wrong; he worked in the private sector for six months, and he says he absolutely hated it.”
“Twenty-seven thousand small businesses and other businesses have hit the wall. And there's been a record-breaking household recession. Inflation has been too high for too long. It remains above the target band. It's been stuck outside the target band for 12 quarters, and prices are not going down under this government. There is a better way to get this country back on track.”
“This Labor government has taken this country in the wrong direction. Its bad decisions and poor priorities have made Australians worse off, and indeed Australians are poorer than they were just 2½ years ago when Labor came to power. After spending an entire election campaign telling Australians that they were going to get cheaper energy, a cheaper cost of living and cheaper mortgages, they have got exactly the opposite. Let's take a look at what they have delivered: twelve interest rate increases, meaning a typical family with a mortgage is paying more than $50,000 extra from when Labor came to power. They've delivered a $1,000 hike in energy bills—whatever happened to that $275 reduction that the minister for energy promised?—and a record collapse in living standards, which no other peer economy in the world has seen.”
“I think he thoroughly enjoyed the role he played as defence minister because he saw it as one of those bedrock services and roles that the government can play that are so important to our security and our future as a country. It has been a true honour for me to be a colleague and a friend of, and certainly to be mentored by, a man as wonderful as Kevin Andrews. Can I wish my very best to Margie, to the family and to the kids—Emily, James, Stuart, Catherine and Benjamin. May Kevin Andrews rest in peace.”
“Government policy is important—don't get me wrong—but Kevin always understood that ultimately human fulfilment and happiness come from the relationships we have with those people close to us. That is the bedrock. That is the most important thing of all. To the extent that policy can have a role in making sure that we enable people to have a great family life, that's important. That is fundamentally important, and I think Kevin's commitment to those values is something we should all revere. He also had great commitment to our flag. Alongside faith and family, he believed in this nation like few others. He was an incredible servant in his many roles, including his ministerial roles. I saw him being particularly proud of his time as defence minister.”
“That expression of faith is something that I have enormous respect for. I can only hope to be even close to that level of coherence of Kevin each day. But we saw it—all of us—in the party room, we saw it in our informal interactions, and we saw it in the parliament as well. I've talked about family and his belief in family. He wrote about this, and he spoke about it often. Of course, that relationship with Margie and with his kids was right at the heart of that. But I think the important point here is that he did something which is difficult in this place. Often, here in the parliament of our great nation, it is easy to believe that the answer to all problems is just a better government policy.”
“We've just heard the member for Deakin and the member for Solomon talk about the wonderful civility of Kevin Andrews. Much of that, I think, came from his upbringing, but it also came from his faith. His deep faith was something that I have great respect for. Each of us who are people of faith in this place live that in different ways. The most important way that Kevin lived it was by living those values in the parliament every single day, in every moment. He just wouldn't depart from them. That is difficult because, as the member for Deakin just told us, this place can be faddish. We can be slaves to fashion, to whatever is the latest piece of thinking. That was never Kevin. Kevin would always go back to those bedrock principles and values that he grew up with and that he believed in.”
“That is largely true, but Kevin's contributions on karaoke nights at Pollie Pedal, one night each year when the karaoke machine came out, were not always his best contributions, I have to say. He and Tony Abbott would combine each year to give a rendition of 'Suspicious Minds' that is best forgotten, because they couldn't hit the note on any of the notes. But they would do it each year and each time they would hold themselves out as the greatest singers of 'Suspicious Minds' since Elvis himself. That wasn't Kevin's best, but it was something we will always remember. Those of us who have heard it will always cherish it as a wonderful example of the authenticity of Kevin Andrews. His role modelling for me, personally, extended into many different areas. One was his civility.”
“In 2017, he'd just been defence minister, and we visited many of the defence barracks along the route that year from Albury through to Manly, including Holsworthy barracks—I think that was the last one we visited before we went up to Manly. We were leaving Holsworthy Barracks down Heathcote Road, and Kevin took a tumble But you wouldn't have known; this guy had a capacity to manage pain like few I have ever seen. It was vintage Kevin. His demeanour never changed. It was always calm, it was always gathered and it was always coherent even when he was in extraordinary pain. He did occasionally inflict pain on Pollie Pedal, I have to say. The Leader of the Opposition yesterday in the House made reference to 'what happens on Pollie Pedal stays on Pollie Pedal'.”
“Just as there were great rivalries throughout that formation of Italy, there were great rivalries in the story of the great cyclists of Italy—which we continue to see today, by the way; it continues to be one of the great cycling countries of the world. This was vintage Kevin Andrews: combining his passion for history, his passion for writing and his passion for cycling in a book that I think was a really novel contribution, emblematic of the way Kevin Andrews looked at the world and the way he contributed to the world. Our time on Pollie Pedal together, over all those years, was really wonderful. The member for Solomon made a nice contribution; I didn't realise he was there when Kevin broke his collarbone in 2017.”
“He wrote a number of books, but one of his truly remarkable ones that, I think, has not been given enough attention is his book about cycling and the history of Italy. Now, you might all think, 'Well, that's kind of a weird thing to write a book about,' and initially I thought, 'That's right.' Then I looked at what he had written about. He had written what I think is a really masterful contribution about the history of Italy, how Italy—as a state , as a government, as a country—was formed, the rivalries in that formation and how cycling had a parallel to that. The great rivalries in cycling in Italy were parallel to the great rivalries in politics in the formation of Italy. Of course, anyone who knows something of the history of Italy will know it was a cathartic formation that took centuries.”
“The conversations would often meander to all sorts of weird and wonderful places, but Kevin would always come back to the basics of why we were doing what we're doing and the basics of what was important in our lives—the relationships we have and the people and values we stand for. With Kevin, it was so consistent and coherent every single time. Over time he became a truly great role model and mentor for me, not by instructing me on what to do but by demonstrating how to live. That kind of role modelling is the most powerful of all. It's role modelling he would never have fully realised he was giving. Some of the best mentors in life don't even realise they're your mentors. Kevin was one of those for me. He was absolutely one of those. His passion for cycling combined with his passion for writing.”
“But another of his great passions in life was cycling. I learnt over time how passionate he was about cycling, because I spent a lot of time sitting on a bike right next to him. One of the wonderful things about sitting on a bike for each year for eight days over a thousand kilometres, is that you get to talk to people and get to know them in a way that you might otherwise never get to know those people. You've got a lot of time, and, if you talk, some of the pain goes away! I had a lot of time to talk to Kevin and a lot of time for Kevin when I talked to him as we sat on the bikes together. We were both on Pollie Pedal each year for many, many years, starting in 2013. In Canberra on Wednesday mornings a group of us go out, and Kevin would come along to that as well.”
“Certainly, that was the case between Kevin and Margie. It was an incredible partnership—their life together. I saw it time and time again when I saw both of them. I saw them most when it came to cycling—and I'll talk about that in a moment—but their partnership is a model to so many of us, because it showed you how two very different people could complement each other and support each other. The support they gave to each other and what they sought to do in their lives were amazing. Even though some might say that their marriage was one steeped in old-world values, I think they're values that are the hallmark of a great partnership, because that's what their marriage clearly was, with their children, Emily, James, Stuart, Catherine and Benjamin. He was a man of great faith, devoted to God, and I'll come back to that in a moment.”
“It seems like a long time ago, 1991, but he was here a very long time. He won it in a by-election, and he served the people of Menzies with enormous distinction over almost three decades. For that, we should all be enormously grateful. Of course, as he would have said, the most important part of his life was his family, and many have made that point. He was married to Margie—an extraordinary marriage. She was the head of his Praetorian Guard, and anyone who knows Margie will know exactly what I mean by that. She is a formidable and wonderful, wonderful woman. Their partnership was an extraordinary one because—as I think the Leader of the Opposition pointed out yesterday—the complementarity between the two of them was great. Perhaps, sometimes, similar people attract, and sometimes it's those who are more complementary.”
“It's a great honour to speak about my friend and mentor, Kevin Andrews. I think this condolence motion to him is incredibly important, because he served this country in a way and for so long that so few have been able to—as Father of the House. He's someone for whom I had enormous respect, both in his time here and beyond. Much has been said already about his background. One of the really important parts of that background is that he grew up as a country boy, born in Sale. His family ran a small trucking business, and many of his values that you can see he lived by came from that background. It was a background that I think breeds some of the greatest Australians—I would say that. It tells you something of his old-world values, in many ways, and where they came from. He won his seat of Menzies in 1991.”
“My question is to the Prime Minister. The Albanese Labor government has created a cost-of-living crisis, a gas crisis, a crime crisis, a rent crisis, an energy crisis and a housing crisis. Living standards have suffered the biggest collapse in the developed world. Australian households have been in household recession for more than 700 days, the longest on record. Prime Minister, why are Australians paying the price for Labor's economic incompetence?”
“That will mean even fewer Australians will trust this government, this Labor Party, when it comes to the superannuation that they put away, hoping that it will be there for their retirement—that they think is their money, but that, sadly, this Treasurer and this government have decided is their own money. There is a better way: getting this country back on track by beating inflation and boosting growth; through cheaper energy with a better mix of energy sources; through affordable homes, by breaking those infrastructure bottlenecks that we know are preventing the supply of extra homes in this country; by balancing immigration with the supply of housing; and by ensuring this country is getting back on track.”
“That's a direct quote from the Treasurer's book G lory Daze , where he says how much he hated his six long months in the private sector, and he went straight back to what he's much happier with, which is lots of government. I'll save everybody the pain of reading Glory Daze ,and I'll say this: there aren't many glorious days ahead of this lot on the other side of the parliament. I cannot recommend this book. I much preferred the member for Parramatta in the Quarterly Essay , where he advocated strongly for nuclear power. At least he's an economist, unlike the Treasurer. But let's be honest about this tax. Labor's super tax is nothing more than an unindexed wealth tax.”
“We know that the small-business people and farmers who have put land in their self-managed super funds will have to find a way to pay that tax when land is not going to give them liquidity they can draw on easily. So what's the answer? They're going to have to sell. They have to realise the unrealised capital gain. This is not rocket science, and it's why we haven't seen this kind of impost in the past. It's why we haven't seen this in countries across the world. But, in Australia, we've got a Treasurer who thinks this is a good idea. You've got to remember that this was the brainchild of a Treasurer who has never worked in the private sector, unless you count 'six long months as Queensland general manager of a public relations firm'—six long months.”
“We know now that, according to Treasury's own analysis, a 20-year-old who earns an average wage throughout their life will have a superannuation balance higher than $3 million in their early 60s, and they will be hit by this new tax. Analysis of the ATO and census data reveals that that means that more than two million Australians under the age of 25 today will be hit by this additional tax to pay for Labor's addiction to spending. But, worse still, part of this package is going after unrealised capital gains. Unrealised capital gains are unrealised. And, if you have to pay a tax, you have to pay it in cash, so you have to realise it.”
“In fact, we have seen new research just in the last little while from the Financial Services Council saying a staggering 73 per cent of Australians expect that Labor will make further changes to superannuation if they are re-elected—an extraordinary number. That is a complete loss of faith and trust in the stability of superannuation, which is so crucial to Australians' retirement. It's not hard to see why there's this lack of trust, because, as I said a moment ago, right now we've got new superannuation taxes going through this parliament. The Treasurer made a very ham-fisted effort today to explain why he was doing something that he promised he wouldn't do. They promised that they wouldn't come after superannuation.”
“Well, they are going after franking credits. There is no doubt about that. They promised not to touch superannuation taxes. They are coming after that. We see that legislation coming through the parliament at the moment, and I will come back to that in a moment. They promised not to change negative gearing, but we know the Treasurer was working on a secret plan to come after negative gearing. Just today, the Prime Minister refused to rule out coming after negative gearing. He has been given so many opportunities. He laughs and carries on every time he is asked the question and never rules it out. He never has and I don't think he ever will, because we know that's exactly what he wants to do. Australians know that on tax, Labor's word means absolutely nothing.”
“We've seen record levels of insolvencies, but we are also seen record levels of government spending, over $350 billion of extra spending from Labor. And, yes, we opposed in this parliament over $100 billion for programs that have delivered nothing. They're not delivering the manufacturing we want to see and not delivering the houses we want to see. If you're going to spend that kind of money then you have to find that kind of money. The way they are doing it, as we all know all too well, is by taxing Australians more. Australians are paying the highest level of personal income tax ever. The increase for Australians has been over 20 per cent since Labor came to power. Included in that is a tax grab from this Treasurer and this Prime Minister which they promised not to do. They promised not to touch franking credits.”
“This guy makes pizzas and he uses a lot of gas. The price of gas has gone up by 34 per cent. Food is up 12 per cent. Rent is up 17 per cent. We know for a working family the cost of living is approaching an increase of 20 per cent, and incomes have not kept up with that. This is why we have seen the biggest hit to Australia's standard of living in our history. It's the biggest hit in our history, worse than for any of our peer countries. It's seen a bigger reduction than in any of our peer countries. We also know that this government's own plan doesn't get us back to the standard of living Australians had in 2022, three years ago, until 2030. Right at the heart of this is Labor crowding out the private sector.”
“The sad reality, though, is that Australians have seen the exact opposite over the course of the last almost three years. Nothing is getting easier. Australians are paying more for their mortgages. Australians have paid $50,000 in after-tax income in additional costs on a typical mortgage since Labor came to power. I was talking to one of my constituents the other day. Before Labor came to power, their mortgage repayments were $1,500 a week. Now, they're $4,000 a week. That's $30,000 a year in after-tax income that this small-business person has had to find. He and his wife run a small business in my electorate. They work incredibly hard. They're working extra hours to get by and to pay that mortgage. The stress on them is typical of the stress we're seeing on Australians right across this great country as they pay more for their energy.”
“Good on the member for Whitlam for the role he's played in the success of that important business, and thank you for your public service. Three years ago—2022—seems like a long time ago now. It was the year Queen Elizabeth died and we were seeing COVID going backwards, which was a good thing, of course. It was the first year we saw large language models, with the emergence of OpenAI. It was on 2 May 2022 that I think a lot of Australians took notice of what the then Leader of the Opposition said, which was that life would be cheaper under Labor. That was almost three years ago; the anniversary is coming up. Labor and the Prime Minister at the time talked a very big game about lower electricity prices, cheaper mortgages et cetera.”
“Before I move to that critical matter, I've just a couple of brief words about my neighbour the member for Whitlam. We knew each other from before politics. We knew Julia as well before politics. Little did we know we were going to become neighbouring seats, but it has been a very civilised neighbouring relationship for the most part. I've enjoyed working with him on really critical issues across the region, including the 2019-20 bushfires, of course, and we share a passion, which might surprise some. That's a passion for the survival and the prosperity of the steelworks in the Illawarra and Port Kembla, because it was the first place I worked coming out of university and I think it's an incredibly important contributor to the region.”
“My question is to the Treasurer. Prior to the last election, the Prime Minister ruled out any changes to superannuation. Why is the Treasurer persisting, for the first time in our history, on taxing unrealised capital gains on superannuation assets?”
“My question is to the Treasurer. Can the Treasurer tell Australians by what percentage the cost of food has gone up during Labor's cost-of-living crisis since the election of the Albanese Labor government?”
“We can have cheaper energy by ensuring we have a balanced mix of the full range of fuel technologies, including gas and nuclear. We can have affordable homes by investing in the infrastructure that will unlock new housing supply in this country, in contrast to the absolute and abject failure of those opposite even to reach their own housing supply targets. We also need to make sure we get the balance right between housing supply and immigration. That balance is crucial and has been completely out of whack in the time those opposite have been in power. Australians are poorer than when Labor came to power. We cannot afford another three years of Labor.”
“Australians are working extra hours and having to cut back not only on luxuries but on essentials, and that continues. We live in the best country in the world. There's nothing that can't be fixed in our economy by having a change of government. There is a better way. We can get back on track. By getting back to basics, we can take our economy to a far better place than what we have seen in the last 2½ years of this Labor government. That means beating inflation by reigning in wasteful spending that those opposite can't help themselves with—36,000 additional Canberra based public servants. Today we see this Treasurer using the Public Service as a political weapon in the lead-up to an election. That's why he needed extra public servants. We know why he needed extra public servants—to play political games.”
“They have to buy the uniforms, they have to buy the pencils, they have to pay those bills that are necessary to get the kids back to school, and we see what a struggle it is for so many families. Nowhere is it more painful than for Australians with a mortgage. There's no relief for those Australians who have paid, let's face it, an extra $50,000 on average on their mortgage since Labor came to power. That's $50,000 extra over and above what they had expected to pay since Labor came to power. That has to come from after-tax income. Finding that kind of money is nigh on impossible for families. That's why we're seeing them crack open the piggy bank. We're seeing savings falling to low levels. In fact, there's almost no net savings left in our economy right now.”
“Of those 27,000 failures, we know 4,000 were in the hospitality sector. But those opposite show no concern for that—no concern whatsoever for that. We are seeing the pain that Labor's homegrown inflation is inflicting on those businesses. To give you an example, 45-year-old Kuldeep Singh is running a cafe in his region. He said: … We're just surviving and it's very hard to make a profit … … interest rates aren't coming down, inflation is too high and people aren't spending much money. The cost of living is crazy. I don't think Labor is doing enough for small businesses so I do hope they don't win the next election. Well, we're with you, Kuldeep. We're with you. We're with you on that. We all see the pain that small-business owners are under. For families, as kids go back to school, it all becomes very real.”
“Wherever I go around Australia, I try to visit similar sorts of community centres, and I'm seeing this wherever I go. I know many on our side of this House—and, I hope, on the other side of the House—are making similar visits and seeing that pain wherever we go, as I saw at Bennies with Father Michael yesterday. We're seeing similar pain in the business community. It's small businesses we worry about most because we are seeing record levels of insolvencies—27,000 since Labor came to power. Those opposite couldn't care less about small businesses. Most of them have never worked in a business. The Treasurer himself says that the six months he spent in the private sector were truly awful. He really disliked it. He couldn't get back to the public sector fast enough. But we are seeing this extreme pain in the business sector.”
“I was in Queanbeyan just yesterday with our wonderful candidate for Eden-Monaro, Jo van der Plaat, and we were with Father Michael at St Benedict's Community Centre. We were talking to Father Michael about what he is seeing on the ground in his community centre, where he provides meals for people in the region who are doing it tough. He is seeing numbers that he has never seen before. On the weekend, he provided 60 families with meals, families who simply can't make ends meet anymore. It's a tough time for someone, whether it's in Queanbeyan or any other part of Australia, when they have to go into a place like this, a wonderful place like this, and say, 'I can't feed my family anymore.' The stigma they feel, the frustration that Australians feel, because they can't feed their families is truly, truly galling.”
“They're the relevant measures—the worst in the world. Australia is not used to being the worst in the world. This is not something we revel in. We like to be the best in the world. But, I tell you what, when those opposite are in power, we are absolutely the worst in the world. The other comparison, the other benchmark, that I think is important when we look at our standard of living is: have we ever seen this before? Since the data on the standard of living was first collected, it turns out we have never seen a collapse in Australians' living standards like we have seen under this Labor government. They are numbers. But what really counts is what we see on the ground. Every member of the opposition is out on a regular basis in their communities talking to people and seeing the pain of Australians under this government.”
“We'll find out on Wednesday where that's at, but the one thing I can absolutely guarantee this parliament is that it's going up, and it's going to keep going up under this government. The truth is that under this government Australians are going backwards faster than they ever have before. We heard during question time that the standard of living of Australians has fallen by 8.7 per cent since Labor came to power. The Prime Minister and Treasurer like to tell us that it's not that bad—it's not that bad; in some kind of parallel universe, it could be worse! Well, let's look at a few parallel universes, like other countries in the world. It turns out that there is no peer country in the world—there is no other OECD country—where the standard of living has gone down as much as it has in Australia.”
“They've never had it so good. I am very happy to give the answer to that question, because food, since Labor has come to power, has gone up by 12 per cent. But it doesn't stop there, let me tell you. The cost of rent has gone up by 17 per cent. The underlying cost of electricity has gone up by 32 per cent. There's no price reduction coming to Australians from that side of politics over there. Gas has gone up by 36 per cent. Insurance and financial services have gone up by 18 per cent, health has gone up by 10 per cent and education has gone up by 11 per cent, and it keeps going! It's not over yet. In fact, tomorrow, on Wednesday, we will see the employee living cost index come out. This is the cost that working families have to pay for items, services and goods. Since Labor came to power, they have so far gone up by almost 18 per cent.”
“We just saw a question time where, question after question, the government refused to answer questions that Australians want to know the answer to or already know the answer to. We heard the Treasurer refuse to answer the question as to what the cost of the tax breaks is when he goes to boardroom lunches at Qantas, Woolworths and Coles. He either didn't know the answer or he doesn't want to answer the question. But I've got to tell you that, in terms of answering questions, the most egregious failure of all in that question time was from the Prime Minister himself, because he could not answer the question about how much the cost of food has gone up for Australian families since Labor came to power. He couldn't answer that question, yet he is out there every single day telling Australians how good they have it under his prime ministership.”
“My question is to the Prime Minister. Under this bad Labor government, Australians living standards have collapsed by 8.7 per cent. This is the biggest collapse on record and bigger than any other peer economy. Will the Prime Minister now apologise for promising Australians they would be better off, and admit that Australians can't afford another three years of Labor?”
“My question is to the Treasurer. Treasurer, a large company can cater for a lunch with food and alcohol worth thousands of dollars in its boardroom and can claim that cost as a tax deduction. What is the cost of this tax policy to the budget?”
“My question is to the Treasurer. Treasurer, unlike small businesses, big businesses like Coles, Woolworths and Qantas can cater in house, in their corporate boardrooms, and do so as a tax deduction. How much does this cost the budget?”