Nola Marino (Forrest, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Appropriation (Water Entitlements and Home Insulation) Bill 2009-2010 and Appropriation (Water Entitlements) Bill 2009-2010 as well. These are government supply bills for both ordinary and non-ordinary annual services in relation to water entitlements and home insulation. There are two purposes of the appropriations. The first is to provide additional funding to cover the rebate payments made under the government’s home installation program; and the second is to provide additional departmental costs to the Department of Environment, Heritage and the Arts and the Department of Climate Change and Water, associated with the acceleration of the water buybacks within the Murray-Darling system that are addressed in the water entitlements bill.

These bills are typical of the Labor government’s mismanagement not only of the legislative time frame but of the government funding process itself. The 2009-10 funding allocation for the installation program will be exhausted by late December 2009. The Labor government has spent billions of dollars. A lot of this stimulus money has gone overseas with the Chinese pink batts and I would question how this protects or addresses the interests of Australian workers or business in relation to any impacts of the global recession.

I read an article in the Farm Weekly, which quoted the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry as saying that the Labor government’s economic stimulus package boosted pork sales in the lead-up to Christmas. However, Mr Burke’s theory was dismissed by Australian Pork Limited, who stated in the same article that market data concluded there was only a minor rise in sales compared to the previous years.

The Labor government’s reckless spending has resulted in a massive underlying cash deficit of $57.7 billion for 2009-10, and the government’s home insulation program typifies this carefree attitude to spending. We hear, day after day, of the waste and mismanagement. We look at the $1.7 billion blow-out in the BER program, with over $7 million wasted on signs and plaques whilst, at the same time, we are seeing the slashing of the cataract rebate. This is really an incredible comparison.

The home insulation program has been riddled with waste and mismanagement, as we hear, and also with issues of safety. Quotes and invoices are being fudged and it is very interesting that the quotes happen to match a number of the government rebates. My office recently contacted six registered insulation installers in my electorate, to ask for their opinion on the program. They had very similar issues. The waiting time for payment is usually two weeks but for jobs at houses that have an address not registered with Australia Post—usually a rural address—the installer cannot process this online, and must fax all the details to the department, which can take from four weeks, at least, for them to get the payment. This is an issue of cash flow for small businesses, particularly at this time.

Secondly, all of them have difficulty in getting the insulation itself. Some are being told to wait for several months. They have also said that big businesses have had the buying power and independent small businesses have been unable to match this—they were unable to match the demand and had lost customers in the process. They also informed me that the price for bats had increased between eight to 27 per cent and, in one instance, from $54 to $69 per bag. Mr Garrett has opposed our calls for a full Auditor-General’s inquiry into the program, but this billion dollar blow-out demonstrates why the investigation is certainly warranted.

I also note that some of the issues in relation to insulation providers in respect of training have affected long-term businesses within my electorate—people who are very seriously trained. They also expressed concern in relation to ongoing business once the program has ceased and the bulk of the work has been done. Exposure to major building companies is also a concern.

Mr Garrett has been opposing our calls for a full Auditor-General’s inquiry. The appropriation and water entitlement bill will provide funding for the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts to accelerate water buybacks within the Murray-Darling Basin system, as I said earlier. We know that the Labor government received $10 billion from the coalition under the National Plan for Water Security, which included nearly $6 billion for water infrastructure. That included, as we heard previously from the member for Murray, on-farm water use efficiency measure. There is no doubt that we need a re-plumbing and we need to be working with farmers on water use efficiencies, and I am sure the member for Calare would agree with this. On-farm efficiencies are a critical part of what should be happening in relation to irrigation and water use.

The Productivity Commission is currently reviewing the water buybacks, but the government is bringing forward funding. Would the member for Calare say that is a contradictory circumstance?

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