Jackie Kelly (Lindsay, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, no doubt you are aware of my announcement last Friday that I will not be contesting the next election. This is an entirely personal decision, arrived at after much discussion with family and friends. I have been very conflicted. Being a woman of conservative values, I want to soldier on for the Liberal Party, but those very values are the reasons I feel I need to spend more time with my family, so it is with mixed feelings of both sadness and excitement that I discuss Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2007-2008 and the related bills, this government’s 12th budget and our 10th budget with a surplus.

When I returned from Asia in 1992 after serving with the RAAF at Butterworth in Malaysia, I was appalled at the predicament this country was in. We had 18 per cent interest rates and 20 per cent to 30 per cent youth unemployment. It was a nation of welfare-dependent families with little hope for a brighter future. I was even more appalled by the apathy shown by many Australians with regard to the state of this nation and even more dismayed when they re-elected a Labor government under Keating in 1993—a government whose track record of governance was and still is appalling.

The very people responsible for those six consecutive deficit budgets leading up to 1996—the expenditure blow-outs, the mismanagement of taxpayer dollars and the mismanagement of the economy—remain on the opposition benches waiting for another chance to raid the taxpayers’ coffers, to hollow out the Future Fund and the endowment fund and every other stash of money that we have been putting away for any future call on superannuation by our military personnel or other public servants. It was that government that took the DFRDB—the fund soldiers had been putting into—and rolled it into consolidated revenue to be paid some time in the future. We have reversed that decision. We know our expenses, we have put aside for our future expenses and we have saved for future unexpected shocks—such as the seven-year drought that has rocked the farm exports of this nation. Does anyone really believe that the Leader of the Opposition is an economic conservative when he has Wayne Swan as shadow Treasurer? Mr Rudd is barely across the detail of his own party policy, and he has not been tested by devastating events such as terrorist attacks and tsunamis. How do we know that he will not be absent if there is another tsunami, for example, as his predecessor Mark Latham was absent last time—absent at a time of national crisis? Where is the testing of this inexperienced leader with a team of has-beens from the previous government?

The last 12 years have been an exciting period in my life, allowing me to be a part of what I am sure history will record as one of the golden periods of Australian political history. The legacy of this government will secure the future of both present Australians and many future generations to come and it would be irresponsible to change jockeys now.

I note that this budget also provides for our veterans, who have a special place in my and my husband’s hearts after our service in the RAAF, where we met. I have maintained my RAAF Reserve membership. Although I have been grossly inefficient—you must do 11 days a year to be considered efficient—I do intend to make up for that in retirement. I also intend to fully return to my favourite sports of hockey, as a player—and, who knows, I might even make a veterans’ carnival finally—and rowing, for which I have unfortunately allowed my coaching accreditation to slip. So I will be starting from scratch. But my new home on the banks of the Nepean River is ideally placed for my return to the sport of my youth, probably not as a rower but more in a coaching role.

I have re-read my maiden speech in the last few days and I will quote from it. It says:

I know the pomp and ceremony here in Parliament House is overwhelming. There is the danger of getting too used to the Comcars, the room service, the flash offices, the guttered roads and all the mod cons that insulate you from the failing small businesses, unemployment, bankruptcy, soup kitchens and the despair and depression of our youth. But eventually you must go back to the real world. If you have not looked after your real world in your electorate as you should have, then this prospect may frighten you. ...

I have given up my career for the people of Lindsay. There is no going back. I will fight for their interests because in the end I must return to live amongst them and I will do that with my head held high.

I think I have vindicated my maiden speech. I am thrilled with this budget, which is yet another instalment of this government’s good economic management. Obviously, I will return to whatever employment opportunities await me in the future, but I will always have a significant interest in the media and the interpretation of what goes on in the media. I will probably be a very prolific writer of letters to the editor. It is a luxury I have never indulged in as a member of parliament, but it is certainly one I am going to enjoy in retirement.

I noticed in the Daily Telegraph today there is a report on the ETU secretary, Dean Mighell. He describes employers as greedy ‘expletives’ and compares workplace inspectors with paedophiles, which I believe is probably as a result of their ability to stand up to the thuggish intimidation employed by the ETU. I know that from very personal experience because the ETU has established one of their Work Choices offices in my electorate, from which these thugs operate. I have been intimidated and my family has been intimidated by the ETU—particularly my husband, as an owner-builder of our own home site. They arrived with A Current Affair camera crew in tow making all sorts of allegations, which the workplace inspectors dealt with in an appropriate fashion—much to the chagrin of the ETU, which was seeking to score political points. So full credit to the workplace inspectors. I can see why the ETU has such a disparaging view of them.

Such intrusions into people’s homes are actually standard for the ETU and yet Mr Mighell says in the Daily Telegraph article:

... they’re not allowed to enter your home, which is pretty good because you just can’t be too sure of their orientation in terms of certain things—you wouldn’t want them near your home, wouldn’t want them near your children.

They do not want you near their homes and yet the unions are quite happy to enter yours. If the Labor Party and the unions—the ETU, the ACTU, the NUW and every other U—get their way at the next election, they will enter your workplaces. They do not like you doing it to them, but they will do it to you. Dean Mighell uses incredibly foul language and intimidation. He admits to using strikes to get rewards from employers that unions do not deserve. I quote again from the article. He says:

Now we have kept that 4 per cent agreement across our industry and I’d like to know how many millions of dollars they’ve paid workers that we’ve racked up through that little bulls ... stunt ... it was good fun and it’s still there, so that’s a couple of pots [of beer]—Just remember, a little bit of bulls ... put it aside every week, have a little smile when you have a beer because some d...head’s paid for that that shouldn’t have.

This is a return to the future. The unions are expending an enormous amount of money, effort and energy in trying to defeat this government at the next election because they know it is all on the line. We will not tolerate this intimidation. We will stand up to it and we will liberate the workplace and homes from that type of thuggery. Yet they are smiling all the way to the bank because they think: ‘Wow, it’s upon us. We’re looking good.’ It is a return to the bad old days of union intimidation. They did not like it when we reformed the waterfront. They did not like it when we reformed the tax system under the GST. They did not like it when we brought in workplace reform and unfair dismissals reform, and yet they turn around, after reaping the benefits of that prosperity, and say, ‘Oh, by the way, we’re economic conservatives.’ I do not think anyone will believe them for a minute on that score. People know that, once elected, they will spend that largesse unwisely and very quickly run to deficits.

Such political tactics are part and parcel of the ALP campaign and their union mates. I have seen it and experienced it. I have been subjected to it, as have my husband, my children, my home and my friends—Jim Aitken and local councillors. We have constantly been intimidated, particularly by the ETU. I am fairly saddened by their lowly actions and cowardly tactics. I just wish more Australians could be witnesses to the way in which they operate, so that they could know how insecure our great nation will be if it is governed by the ALP, under union control. We have a number of unionists entering parliament, such as Dougie Cameron and Greg Combet, who are very fed up with the way in which the ALP has been dealing with their issues, so they are entering parliament to make sure that things are done right, and they would then hold office in all three tiers of government. It would be a very sad day indeed.

They are certainly coming at all of our candidates in our marginal seats. If you look at the Your Rights at Work website, you will see that they have targeted 19 seats. They have a very explicit campaign regarding what they are going to do in those seats, and it makes very interesting reading, in line with the leadership displayed by the secretary of the ETU in the Daily Telegraph today.

I congratulate local ALP branches for at least preselecting David Bradbury in preference to Mark Ptolemy—another ETU member—who was hoping to be the candidate in Lindsay. David Bradbury works for Blake Dawson Waldron, which designed the Work Choices legislation, and he is very supportive of our amendments to the fairness test introduced yesterday by the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations.

I would like to acknowledge my husband. He has been a significant contributor to my political success. We have, together with Therese Rein and a number of other Australians, benefited enormously from the prosperity under this government over the last 10 years. He has been a significant contributor both financially and emotionally to my political success. I love him dearly and plan to give his career and direction sway for the next 10 years, as he has given me for the last 10 years. After that, all bets are off. His ability to cut to the heart of a matter, to feed back popular opinion and to sculpt political strategies to get across our arguments and to articulate our values versus those of the ALP have been an incredible support for me. Both he and the many staff I have worked with, along with our dedicated supporters and the voters of Lindsay, have been the wind in my sails to achieve what I have achieved over my political career.

I would like to thank my first employee, Peta Demery, who helped me to select my original team of Margaret Connor, Christie Bickley and Nick Berman, and all of the other staff I have had since then until my current staff of Christine, Karen, Emily, Michael, Morghan, Anne and my volunteers, Irene, Trevor, Diane and Angie. They have been fantastic supporters. I hate to name people because I always leave someone out, which is always unfortunate.

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