Labor to reconsider bank tax: Bowen

Labor will consider resurrecting the bank tax if it wins government.

Shadow treasurer Chris Bowen said the tax, proposed by the former Labor government and dumped on Tuesday by the coalition before it was ever implemented, was a recommendation of Reserve Bank governor and the council of financial regulators.

He said it was also supported by state treasurers.

Mr Bowen said its removal put a $1.5 billion hole in the federal budget.

"What we will do is see what the Council of Financial Regulators continue to recommend," he told ABC television.

Treasurer Joe Hockey said this would have been a tax on savings, affecting everyone with a bank account.

"Now is exactly the wrong time to apply such a tax to bank accounts, when people are receiving lower returns than they may have expected in the past," he said.

Mr Bowen said Mr Hockey believed in this tax, a levy on bank deposits, and had included it in his last two budgets.

This was another case of the treasurer being rolled, he said.

"We will have considered and well-judged policy but it will be policy that I, as the alternative treasurer, believe in," Mr Bowen said.