The Top 10 biggest Federal Government spending items:
$376 billion Total spending in 2012-13, as forecast last December
$37 billion Aged pension
$20 billion Family tax benefits
$18 billion Medicare services
$15 billion Disability support pension
$10 billion Pharmaceutical benefits scheme
$9 billion The dole
$8 billion Money for private schools
$8 billion Residential aged care
$7 billion Funding for universities
$7 billion Public sector superannuation
In addition.
defence spending at $21.5 billion and Other expenses of note include $12 billion in interest payments on the government's debts and $2.3 billion managing immigration.
Any government that tried to slash Family Tax benefits would not stay in power long so that is mainly a no no for politicians. The best they could do is nibble the edges.
Certainly paying down the debt would help but to do that you have to raise taxes or sell something off. You would probably need to sell a lot off to raise the money needed.
Cut our immigration altogether would save a couple of billion. Do we really need immigration???
We can kick all the oldies out of aged care facilities that would save a good amount. and send the oldies back to work and cut out the pension, that would save plenty.
