Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Hansard source

What the self-appointed duty senator and the Liberal candidate do not understand is that the Australian water fund was set up to fund projects exactly like this, as it has already done so with the Bendigo section of the superpipe. Why does the Liberal candidate think that it is all right for the federal government to support the residents of Bendigo and fund their vital infrastructure but it is not okay for the federal government to support Ballarat residents? It is extraordinary that, since the $2 billion Australian water fund was set up in 2004, more than half of the funds remain unallocated. A federal Labor government has already committed to securing Ballarat’s future water supply and I again call on the federal government to ignore the Liberal candidate’s unhelpful intervention and to do the same.

These are just a few of the areas where the government has failed to demonstrate that it has a plan for the future prosperity of the nation. There are many others. Today, again, in the news—but it has been around for a long time—is the issue of housing affordability. There is the issue of real assistance and incentives to move people to participate in the workforce, instead of the Welfare to Work reforms that are currently hurting many of the people in my district who are already working part time and trying to get ahead and do the right thing. The government’s failure over the last 11 years to effectively address the health needs and the social participation needs of our Indigenous Australians also calls them into question.

See this speech in context