“Ms Bishop has made several similar statements recently. In a Network Ten interview on February 10, she said: “We can’t solve all the problems of the budget debt and deficit, the massive unprecedented size of it that we inherited from Labor – because it was the worst set of financial accounts inherited by any incoming government in Australia’s history.”

The verdict: Large borrowings to finance Australia’s participation in World War I and World War II and the impact of the Great Depression led to much higher deficits and levels of debt than any government has experienced since. The Howard Government also inherited more gross and net debt and a higher budget deficit relative to GDP than the Abbott Government. Ms Bishop is wrong.