The interview moves on to why the fuel excise isn’t a bribe, but the tax cuts are a bribe.

Q: Let me talk about the fuel excise because recently you described that particular excise in 2023 and the Prime Minister quoted this in parliament today, he said that you said it was costly and able to be gamed by the oil giants. So was it Labor’s surprise tax cut that changed your mind on this?

Dutton:

No, actually there was a great quote today around Jim Chalmers who said it’s fantastic for there to be relief at the bowser for families. They said that two years ago.

Q: What about you, though?

Dutton:

I guess I would just put that context that there are a range of views out there that wasn’t what the Treasurer was saying today, but what we’ve said is that we want to put in place the ACCC to monitor and to make sure that all of it is passed on. To be honest, the experience when you look back to the Howard years, for example, but since then as well, where there has been a cut in the excise, it has been passed through to the consumer, and I think Australians who are pulling up at the bowser tomorrow morning on their way to work or tomorrow afternoon on the way home and they’re filling up, they know that next time they do it, if there’s a Coalition government, it will be $14 or $15 cheaper than what they are used to paying.

Q: How is that not, to use your words, an election bribe in the same way that you’ve accused the government of bribing voters on their tax cuts?

Dutton:

Because our benefit is now, it’s not promised in 15 months’ time. (Isn’t that more of a bribe?)

I suspect if the Labor Party is re-elected, particularly given it can only be in a minority form with the Greens, that they end up walking away from some of these budget measures because they will have to redo their budget.

Q: But on your one, why don’t it add up to being a bribe?

Dutton:

Well, it provides support to people now who are really hurting (giant ute drivers who spent the better part of a house deposit on a giant gas guzzler by choice – many of whom also used the instant asset write off to purchase it in the first place] and I believe that waiting 15 months is more about a political stunt. So if you accept, as I think all Australians must, that this has been a bad government and families and businesses are under pressure,they need that support now and our argument is that this is the most efficient way to deliver that and I think it will make a difference for families and for small businesses as well.