Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Shortland for her wonderful contribution; it is a very timely opportunity as well. Last week was a good week for democracy in this country, and I think having the tax forum was a really positive and good thing to do. Like many people I went there with a view that maybe this would be just another talkfest. That was probably a fair criticism pre the tax forum, but I have to say that after two days I walked away with a completely different view. My view now is not only that this was tax forum absolutely essential, was good for this country, was in the national interest and was an absolute bargain at just $1 million but also that it is something we should look at doing every year. I think we should do that, because there was something that came out of it that really was important. It is important to get all of our community leaders in the one place, in the one room—the government leaders, the state treasurers, the Commonwealth Treasurer, ACOSS, the heads of unions, the community sector—and get everybody together to bang a few heads together, to actually talk about the issues and to say: 'Hang on, if we are all agreed on certain parts, why can't we get through this? What are the barriers? What are the blockages for us actually getting through some of this stuff?' There are significant barriers. Tax reform is not about a switch that is on or off; it is about long-term reform and long-term processes. But if we are ever going to get to that table—if we are ever going to get to that point—then you have to bring people to the table. You have to do it where they are all in the same room at the same time, where they can argue points through and they can say on the public record: 'We're interested. The states want to reform. They want to get rid of land tax; they want to get rid of certain taxes, certain levies, certain fees, taxes on insurance and fees on insurance.' They cannot just do it on their own. This is the great opportunity that is being missed by the opposition: by getting everybody together, Labor and Liberal governments—and that is the beauty about this: you can find new paths and new ways through dialogue, through talk and through listening—if we have a common goal, we will find a way to achieve it. I think that for the bargain basement price of just one small million dollars—it is a lot of money in the scheme of people's lives, but in the scheme of the national government of the Commonwealth it is a very small fraction of our democracy—it is a really good thing that we did that.

Today is a good day to be talking about this because today we heard a lot of calls about democracy. What does democracy mean? Let me tell you what I think democracy is about. It is about accepting the decision of the people. The people always get it right. Australian governments, like them or not, have always been in some way good. We do not always agree. I cannot say I agreed with governments of the opposite persuasion, but I did respect the fact that they got elected. Regardless of how governments get elected, they are the elected government of this country. I respect that process. I believe in the Constitution and in what this place represents. To disrespect that when it does not suit your own agenda is a slap in the face to all Australians—and not just to us, not just to our government, but to the office of Prime Minister. The office of Prime Minister is not about an individual. As we have seen in recent times, the Prime Minister can change. So it is about respect for that office and what it means for all Australians. By diminishing the office of Prime Minister you diminish all future Prime Ministers in that office—and that I object to.

Democracy should be about respecting the office of government. You do not have to agree. You are allowed to argue your point. You are allowed to fight for what you believe in. You are allowed to do all of those things. But the shambles and the disrespect we saw in question time today from people who were bussed in and signed in by the Liberal Party in full knowledge of what these people were going to do shows great disrespect for the institution of democracy and the institution of parliament. This is the sort of stuff we all tut-tut about when we see on the television screen at six o'clock the uprisings in the Middle East and in other countries where they cannot sort out their own internal affairs through proper election processes. Well, in this country we can, and we ought to stick to that.

This tax forum is part of that democratic process. I am not going to gild the lily in terms of how it came about. It came about through an agreement with one of the Independents, Rob Oakeshott—and that is fine. So we got to that place and we had the tax forum, and I think good things are going to come out of it. I am quite happy about what took place. We had more than 200 key decision-makers in this country sitting together and genuinely listening to each other. I really felt there was some genuineness in that room about trying to tackle some of those big and difficult issues that the Howard government, in its 12 years, could never fix—and in another 12 years could still never fix. Unless you bring people together you are never going to get through those difficult issues. I congratulate the government and everyone who participated, because that is what democracy is all about.

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