Chris Hayes (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

My colleague the member for Wakefield laughs. But the laugh is this: that bill has been held up in the Senate and been opposed by Senator Joyce, and now he goes on radio and say it is a disgrace that the scheme has not been introduced. There is one way he can help that to be introduced, and that is to change his vote. This is the hypocrisy we have got to learn to live with, I guess.

We hear the Liberal Party talk tough about cutting government spending by blocking and opposing measures, but look at what they have been doing. What they want to achieve would only make the deficit worse. Last week the shadow treasurer during his speech to the Press Club indicated that the opposition wanted to cut basic services to Australians, basic services that Australians actually rely on. They plan to cut funding for education and health. Why should we be surprised about that? The current Leader of the Opposition was health minister and he knows full well that he and his government took a billion dollars out of health. I know a lot has been said about it, but the facts remain. Look at the bottom line: a billion dollars came out of health. And that is not to wallpaper over the money that was taken out of education, particularly vocational education. All those things that have contributed to our skills and trades deficit over the time of the Howard government can be traced back to when they decided to rip money out of the education budget.

I know a lot of crocodile tears are being shed at the moment for the mining companies, but it was not all that long ago that the mining companies were lobbying here because they wanted those skills. One of my boys was working in the mining industry for some time. They get paid quite well, I grant you that. That is probably why you could not get a power point put on in Sydney or Launceston or in the member for Wakefield’s area in South Australia. The young fellows were out there working in the mining sector because, going back a number of years, it was booming then. But there are ebbs and flows in the mining industry, and, like many others, my son got laid off and he is doing other things now. Now the boom is moving back into gear and we are seeing a two-speed economy developing. We do need to address that. We also need to look out for the interests of other businesses, particularly businesses that rely on the same basic skill sets that are used in the mining industry, particularly those mainstream trade areas which are in demand in the mining community but also in demand in a community that is still trying to recover from the worst economic crisis in living memory.

Simply gutting education and health cannot be the way to go if we are clear about building a community for the future. I know the real differences being made so far in the south-west of Sydney. I see what we have been able to do there only through our funding of $16 billion in the BER. I do not know about the member for Wakefield but I have not had people knocking on my door in Werriwa and complaining about investing in their schools—not a one. I would challenge people opposite not to cower and oppose it when all your colleagues are around but to stand up when those photos are being taken at schools as we are opening these halls and new classrooms and commercial cooking facilities and say, ‘We actually really oppose it.’ I do not get much opportunity to talk to principals who say, ‘We don’t want this investment.’ As a matter of fact, I do not get any of that. That is one of the things that have been particularly successful. I know that out of 9,500 projects there will always be something that will require attention and, to her credit, the Deputy Prime Minister is looking at addressing those issues.

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