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

We have it confirmed from the Leader of the Opposition, the Leader of the Liberal Party, that building school infrastructure is not an infrastructure priority for the nation. That is what he said. On the question of hospitals, as they twist and turn and have to deal with every P&C and P&F in each of their electorates who comes and says, ‘Why are you voting against a building program for the primary schools in your electorate?’ what this Leader of the Opposition then seeks to deflect to is the necessary investment in hospitals. Following 12 years of Liberal government, they are talking to us about the priority of investment in public hospitals—after they gouged $1 billion out of public hospital expenditure. I have seen it all!

In our first year in office, at the meeting of the Council of Australian Governments in this building in December last year, what did we agree on? A $4.8 billion plan with the states and territories to reinvest in public hospitals, a $1.1 billion plan to invest in the future human resource needs of the health system, further investment when it comes to emergency services of $750 million and further investment when it comes to elective surgery of $600 million. We have done all these things in one year, and those opposite have the absolute audacity to stand here and challenge whether we regard public hospitals as an infrastructure priority. The truth is that in their 12 years in office what characterised those opposite was that no infrastructure whatsoever was a priority. You ripped and gouged at public hospitals, you failed to invest in our universities, you failed to invest in our TAFEs and now you refuse to invest in our primary schools. I say to those opposite that the contrast in terms of nation building is clear.

I also say to the Leader of the Opposition that his and the Liberal Party’s opposition to the biggest nation building and school modernisation plan for Australia demonstrates how out of touch they have become. The Liberal Party are out of touch with P&Cs, P&Fs and mums and dads seeking to have decent buildings for their kids in primary schools, out of touch with mums and dads struggling with paying back-to-school costs and out of touch with small business, who want the measures that we foreshadowed yesterday by way of the accelerated investment allowance. You are out of touch with the needs of tradies, carpenters and plumbers, who are desperately seeking new project work. You are out of touch with the real needs of Australians. Instead, his prescription is this: stand to one side and allow the Australian people, Australian tradies and mums and dads to face and endure the full brunt of this global economic recession without government stepping in to help. That is the alternative.

I say to the Leader of the Opposition and to the House that the challenge for the nation at a time of unprecedented global economic challenge is clear-cut: either you act and government intervenes to help stabilise financial markets, to help increase growth, to help support jobs and to help families deal with the consequences of this global recession, or you vacate the field, as recommended by the Liberal Party. The Liberal Party is out of touch with mums’ and dads’ basic needs right across country. This government will get on with the business of seeking to protect the Australian economy and families as much as is humanly possible from a global economic recession, which they did not cause and which free market fundamentalism has rammed in their direction.

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