Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I also rise tonight to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2006-2007 and cognate bills. You have to marvel at the institution of federal parliament. This morning I was speaking on a motion in fierce agreement with the member for Cook and now I follow him this evening in fierce disagreement with his position on the budget before us. I think this budget suffers from sins of omission, because there is so little in it. There was so much money to spend yet the government have not spent it. They have given away tax cuts—and, yes, the Labor Party welcome those tax cuts; we asked for them 12 months ago. Indeed, if you had given the tax cuts to families 12 months ago, you might have assisted those families, but now the tax cuts are being given with one hand and taken away with the other. They are being swallowed up by petrol prices and the recent interest rate hike. Sadly, they may again be swallowed up by interest rate hikes if we do nothing about curbing the money going back into consumer spending.

I always marvel at this government’s crowing about its great economic management and its fantastic record on budgets and all the rest of it, because it is all on consumer spending. Eventually the day of reckoning will come when the credit card bills come rocking in and someone has to pay them off. There is record household wealth, mainly in the bricks and mortar people are living in—and it is all well and good to have a house that is worth anywhere between $200,000 and $700,000, but you are not going to sell your house to recognise it. You are paying it off day in and day out and you are mortgaged to the hilt; you are geared to the hilt. So any little movement in the interest rate is an absolute killer for the ordinary family.

These tax cuts are welcomed by Labor, but they should have been given a long time ago. There should have been more assistance in this budget for families. Tax cuts, though they have been given, will not help with families’ costs of daily living. This budget has done nothing to address this country’s spiralling record household debt. It has done nothing to address our spiralling credit card debt. It has done nothing to put a damper on consumer spending. Indeed, the government boasts that consumer confidence is up. These tax cuts will go back on the government’s credit card, which one of these days will have to be paid off.

The budget was a huge missed opportunity and tonight I want to address some specific and glaring areas of missed opportunity. For me, the No. 1 missed opportunity was child care. Here is this government saying that it has done many great things for child care, but there was not one dollar in this budget for child care. It lifted the cap—whoopdedoo! The budget has done nothing. The government has lifted the cap on family day care and outside hours care. That may help in some areas, but it will not help in my electorate of Chisholm. We already have a massive waiting list for family day care. So the cap has been lifted. So what? No-one has the skills or the willingness to provide family day care throughout my two municipalities. So lifting the cap will not help. The outside hours care may assist—I will acknowledge that—but, at the same time, places that have not been utilised by centres could easily have been swapped around. But for ages the government has said, ‘No, we can’t do that.’ There was a very simple fix.

There is a child-care crisis in Australia and this budget has not fixed it one iota. Child care is one of the biggest issues affecting local families in Chisholm, yet the Howard government continues to ignore the problem. This budget does nothing for child care. It promises a lot, but it is all smoke and mirrors. It fails to guarantee one extra child-care place in the Chisholm electorate—or anywhere else in Australia, for that matter. It also fails to address the issue of child-care affordability, which is the No. 1 issue in my electorate. I have been contacted by several parents who are struggling to find child care and to afford good quality child care. By ignoring child care, the Howard government is ignoring Australian families. The government is ignoring the Herring family of Chadstone, who emailed me at the end of last year in absolute panic because the father works full time and the mother was set to return to work and they could not find child care for their baby. They wrote:

Dear Ms Burke,

We require your help in finding child care for our six-month-old daughter.

Even though we signed up to our preferred child care provider four months before the birth of our daughter, we have been advised that there are so few places we may have to wait another year. At the time of putting our name on the waiting list, we were encouraged to believe that early 2006 was a realistic possibility.

As you can understand, in today’s society it is not always possible for either the mother or father to stay at home, and no grandparents are available to help out. A nanny cannot be considered due to financial constraints.

The lack of government or council provided child care is a source of distress for us, as it must be for many young families. The current government is encouraging us to have children, and is taking some responsibility for the current baby boom, [but] it is not providing any infrastructure to support young families.

The Herring family was in absolute distress. But, after several phone calls by my office to dozens of child-care centres, we finally were able to cobble together a temporary solution: two days at one centre and three at another. It was not ideal, but it was the best we could do.

Recently I conducted a survey of local child-care centres in Chisholm. Of the 24 child-care centres surveyed, 15 had absolutely no vacancies. This is long day care and, for those who do not understand, generally this is the preferred option of most people; generally it is what they are after—not always. Some people prefer family day care, but we are talking about long day care. Of the nine remaining centres, several had only a few places available, many of which were part time on specific days. The Howard government seriously needs to put more funding into child care. This budget, as I said, has done nothing to assist that. This government also needs to stop shirking its responsibility for child-care planning. At present, new centres are being built in areas where there is an oversupply, while areas with great need go without. This needs to be addressed—and the government cannot keep passing the buck and saying that it is a state issue; it is not. It is an issue that needs to be addressed across the board.

To make matters worse, child-care costs have risen by 62 per cent since 2000. This is hitting families really hard. Child-care fees are currently rising at a higher rate than everything, except petrol. That is a crying shame for our families, who are doing it tough already. It is not just Labor who has criticised the Howard government for its neglect of child care. Even the member for Lindsay, one of its own, has joined in attacks on the coalition’s record on child care, saying that the budget was not an adequate response to the crisis. She said that Labor is much more in tune with the issue and she has commended Labor’s policy of establishing 260 new child-care centres on primary school grounds.

The government needs to make sweeping reforms to child care as a matter of urgency. Australian families do not want imaginary places; they want real ones. If families cannot access child care, they cannot work. Extreme new industrial relations laws coming into place and the changes from Welfare to Work will force even more families to work for longer hours at shorter notice, which will place even greater pressure on the system.

Unlike the coalition, Labor has a plan to fix Australia’s child-care system to give families affordable child care that is easy to access. The Howard government should adopt Labor’s policy, which would provide new capital funding to establish new child-care centres on primary school grounds, solve the workforce issues that are crippling the system and establish a single waiting list in local areas. This budget has failed child care and it has failed families.

The other issue I want to look at is illegal fishing. This is something that you would not think of as a big issue in downtown Chisholm, I admit; but, as chair of Labor’s task force on transport and maritime security, it is something I have become quite interested in and quite passionate about. I would say again that the Howard government’s measures to fight illegal fishing are woeful also. While it is encouraging that the government has finally acknowledged that illegal fishing is a problem—for many years now, it has put its head in the sand and said that it was not actually an issue—it seems it has no idea about just how out of control illegal fishing is in our northern waters.

Peter Costello boasted in his budget speech that this new measure will double the number of apprehensions of foreign vessels each year. Again, whoopdedo!—because last year alone there were only 204 apprehensions. Considering that there were 13,018 sightings of illegal fishing vessels in our waters by coastguards, doubling the current rate will only bring apprehensions to 408 next year, which is around three per cent of all illegal fishing vessels which enter our waters. What a joke! Labor believes Peter Costello should aim to catch 100 per cent of illegal fishing vessels coming into our waters and, indeed, he should be deterring these fishing vessels from even starting the treacherous journey from Indonesia, not settling for just a lousy three per cent.

While I welcome the fact that the government has finally recognised that Indigenous sea rangers have a role to play in combating illegal fishing, I concur with the Northern Territory fishing minister, Kon Vatskalis, that $6.9 million for the program is not adequate. Indigenous sea rangers should have a big role to play in this issue. They are already doing a fantastic job on a shoestring budget—most of them are paid for out of the communities’ own money and most are also paid under CDEP, not for the proper job they are doing. We should recognise the value of the work these people provide and pay them a proper wage as proper rangers, as we do for any other person who performs this great role for our nation. We should be doing more because they are doing more to protect their waters, their culture, their heritage and their communities. As numerous as the people are who I have seen on my various trips around the country recently, as part of our custom and our tradition we need to do this anyway. As we are the only ones who actually live up in these very remote communities, why are we not being adequately utilised to protect our borders?

After years of Howard government neglect, an illegal fishing crisis has emerged in northern Australia. The Labor transport and maritime security task force has travelled the country. I have been to some great places—sadly generally for only a day so I have not really got to enjoy them—Perth, Broome, One Arm Point, Maningrida, Brisbane, Cairns and Launceston. We have heard first hand from the industry and community groups about this issue. Mostly they tell us that they are sick and tired of being ignored and overlooked. They believe that this government has failed them miserably. As we heard time and time again, ‘It is because we are in the Kimberley; it is because we are up here out of sight, out of mind. If one of these boats arrived in Sydney Harbour, someone would do something about it.’ That is tragic.

The evidence gathered by the task force is alarming. The Howard government has neglected our national border security to the point where foreign criminal syndicates now view Australia as a playground for illegal fishing. If 13,000 boats are getting onto our shores, what else is coming? They are not just coming into our waters; there was multiple evidence of landing. It is not just commercial fishers who are suffering. The illegal fishing crisis threatens the very existence of a number of our Indigenous communities. The fantastic people at One Arm Point, the Bardi community, need to be commended. They are producing the trochus shell in hatcheries on shore, a beautiful shell that is sold on and made into pearl buttons. In the hatchery, they get them to a point where they can go and reseed them on the reefs. Later they harvest them. It is very hard work because you have to get down on the reef and pluck these sea snails off. Last year they sent off a container to Italy and made $85,000. That might not sound a lot to some people in this place but to a very remote Indigenous community, off their own bat, $85,000 was a lot of money. This year they are not going to make anything because Indonesians have stolen the majority of the trochus. For anybody else that would probably be theft but, again, it is a remote Indigenous community and it seems nobody cares. Our ecosystem is also under threat, with Indonesian fishers killing our sharks in huge numbers. They take dolphins and turtles as bait. By leaving ghost nets throughout our waters, a lot of turtles, dugongs, sharks and other species are being caught in these nets and killed.

Biosecurity is another great risk, and there is a very real concern that our import markets could be compromised by the introduction of animal diseases such as rabies, foot and mouth disease and swine fever, to name a few. I could go on forever on this topic but I want to get to my last point which is telemarketing. Whilst I welcome the money in this budget for telemarketing I reckon somebody could have at least had the decency to recognise me because it has been my campaign and nobody else’s that has finally got the government to introduce a do not call list. We get the blame for being oppositionist for opposition’s sake.

Helen Coonan was great. She heard that Labor was going to announce its policy. I had Kim Beazley lined up in my electorate one morning—thank you to Erin, a lovely constituent of mine, who was going to have us in her house—and at 8.20 that morning Senator Helen Coonan put out a press release saying, ‘Here’s a do not call register.’ Twelve months before that she told me that it was a waste of time, it was a joke and it could not be done. So at least in this budget line she could have said, ‘Thanks Anna.’ Previously the Howard government said it would not work and this is despite the fact that similar registers currently operate in the UK, the US and Canada. When I introduced a private member’s bill in this place last October, the government would not allow a vote. Instead, Minister Coonan announced a discussion paper on the issue. I could have told the minister that the overwhelming number of submissions would be in support of the proposal.

Australians receive over one billion calls from telemarketers each year. They are simply driving our constituents nuts and we should be doing something about it. I have received over 1,000 phone calls, emails and letters from the community in support of my campaign for a do not call list. Here is just a sample of what some of my constituents have had to say on this issue. In September last year, Kathie of Mount Waverley emailed me saying:

I have lost track of how many times I have had difficulty feeding and putting my baby and toddler to bed because of these annoying calls. I get at least five each week—and they are never convenient for me. Thanks for taking up the issue.

And in October, Heather, also of Mount Waverley, emailed me the following:

Thank you for your newsletter that I received through the mailbox. I would very much like to have information on how to stop telemarketers targeting our home. We receive so many calls that I’m beginning to think there is a large notice next to our name in the phone book saying ‘ring these people frequently’.

And Robert of Surrey Hills wrote:

I fully support your efforts to stop the scourge of telemarketing phone calls. I work from home and the calls are an endless nuisance.

It is now six months later and people are still getting in touch with me to express their frustration and dismay at the government’s inaction. It is unbelievable to think that many Australians are now reluctant to answer their phones. Just last month I received an email from a constituent called Allison, who said:

I was very interested in your telemarketing campaign. We received three overseas calls in one week ... I would dearly love to have our phone number off these telemarketing lists ... We have caller ID so now every time I see that it’s from overseas I hesitate to answer it. The only reason I do answer it is because we have relatives over in New Zealand ... thank you for listening.

And it is not just constituents. People from all over Australia have contacted me in support of this issue. I put on the record that I do not want people to abuse the individuals who are working for these telemarketing call companies. I do not want you to be picking up a whistle and blowing it in their ears. I had a very nice email from a woman the other day who said her daughter worked in one of these centres. She said that while she supported the do not call register, she did not want us to take it out on the people making the calls. I wholeheartedly endorse that. These are people making a hard buck—it is a tough gig—and I do not want people to be taking their frustrations out on the people making the calls. That is why I think people should have the option to say, ‘No, I don’t want to be on this list.’

Time and time again people ask me, ‘Why isn’t the government doing anything about this? We’re being driven nuts in our own homes.’ There was very much a sense of disbelief that they had no rights to protect their privacy and their family time in their own homes. Finally, the government has acted, but it was forced to act in such a hurry that we are still not sure what this all means. Only today, an article by Neil Shoebridge in today’s Australian Financial Review says:

The Howard Government is silent about several key details of its do-not-call register for consumers and small businesses:

The definition of a small business

How often the register will be updated

How much it will cost telemarketers to access the register

How the set-up cost of $33 million was determined

How industry’s contribution of $15.8 million was determined

How industry’s contribution will be enforced

Which organisations will be exempt

How calls from overseas companies will be stopped

The days and times telemarketers will be allowed to call people and businesses that are not on the register

If the Australian Communications and Media Authority, which will manage the register, will outsource the running of it

All these questions were asked in the Financial Review today. The minister has to have the answers. She has told the industry that she will not speak to them until the bill is out there. I say that it is easier than that. You have only to look at what is currently happening in the US, Canada and the UK to see how these can operate.

For a do not call list to be successful it has to target calls made from overseas. There is nothing to stop the government from penalising Australian companies using overseas call centres to sell their wares. The do not call list must also be administrated by a government agency. If the industry is in charge, I fear it will be a second-rate registry which simply will not work. If this is going to work, it has to be complaints driven. It has to put the best interests of the consumer first, not the best interest of the industry.

The government must also close off any loopholes which will allow telemarketers to continue bugging people who sign up with the register. For instance, it should consider making caller ID mandatory for direct marketers. At present Telstra refuses to divulge the identity of incoming telephone calls made from a private number, so if a direct marketer’s number is not listed, it will be impossible to register a complaint. As I say, I welcome this move, but this budget is appalling by its omissions. (Time expired)

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