Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

This includes extra payments for seniors—in particular, the one-off payment that we referred to before. For the first time the utilities allowance has been increased from its previous rate of $123 per annum to $500. That is a significant advance. As the government has indicated before, pensioners, carers and those on DSP payments are experiencing great difficulty when it comes to cost-of-living pressures. That is why I have indicated many times in this chamber that the future of income support payments from retirement income payments will be considered by the Henry commission of inquiry as well.

I go back to the premise of the Leader of the Opposition’s question. He is arguing about the inadequacy of the age pension as it exists now six months after those opposite left office. Pensioners, like everyone else, have experienced 10 interest rate rises in a row, record high inflation in 16 years and, last year alone, an increase in petrol prices by 33 per cent. Those opposite would argue that these cost-of-living pressures mysteriously emerged in the last six months and that somehow this government’s budget measures which have enhanced pension payments are somehow worse than those which were brought in 12 months ago by those opposite.

I suggest that if the Leader of the Opposition wishes to be a responsible participant in the debate about the future of retirement incomes policy, including the pension, he does so responsibly on the basis of the facts rather than simply throwing forward one set of assertions after another instead of reflecting on what has changed materially against the level of the pension, the ways in which it is indexed, the way in which we have handled the one-off payment, the way in which we have increased the utilities allowance and why we are now having this matter considered for the long term for pensioners and carers through the activities of the Henry commission.

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