Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you—it sounds crumby. The cost of a loaf of bread will rise 0.016c—less than one cent. Tim Tams will increase—

Government members interjecting—

I know some of my colleagues are very interested in this one. Tim Tams will increase by 0.012c per Tim Tam. So I think the colleagues are still going to be able to afford their Tim Tams.

I now need to turn to the impact that some of the opposition's previous policies had on ordinary working families, because this is a very serious matter. Those opposite have been crying crocodile tears—when every single day they were in government they were screwing down the wages and conditions of ordinary working families, taking money out of health care and undermining our public education system. The hypocrisy of that! Studies show that casual and part-time sales assistants lost an average of 12 per cent of earnings under Work Choices. AWAs were especially bad for women, with women working full time on AWAs taking home $87.40 per week less than workers on collective agreements. In 64 per cent of AWAs, annual leave loadings were cut; in 63 per cent, penalty rates were cut; in 52 per cent, shift work loadings were cut; in 51 per cent, overtime loadings were cut; and in 46 per cent, public holiday pay was cut. The hypocrisy of those opposite talking about how they feel about ordinary working families when everything they did in here was against their interests is astonishing.

And I remind people of their opposition now. They are opposed to pension increases that come out of the clean energy bills. They are opposed to family benefit increases coming out of these bills. They are opposed to investment in steel jobs, coal jobs and industry jobs that come out of these bills.

But, at the same time, what are they supporting? They are supporting the big mining companies against the mining communities that will benefit, against the workers who will get an increase in their superannuation and against the small businesses that will see their taxes cut because of the minerals resource rent tax. Who are they supporting when it comes to poker machines? They are supporting the big gambling interests against ordinary working families. Who are they supporting when it comes to tobacco advertising? They are supporting big, wealthy, multinational tobacco companies against the 15,000 Australians who die of smoking related illnesses every year. Do you know that the cigarette companies kill more people in Australia than they employ here every year? Guess whose side the opposition are on on that one! Every single time they are for the interests of the big guy against the little guy. What we saw yesterday continues their opposition to a clean environment and continues their opposition to investing in our clean energy future. And what will happen if they get in and reverse—as they say they will—these tax cuts? They will reverse the pension increases; they will reverse the industry assistance. They will put a million people back into the tax system who have had their tax-free threshold tripled. They will drop their tax-free threshold. We know they will not do that. We know that they will never have the courage to do what they claim they are going to do, and reverse this carbon tax. That is a good thing, because we need this clean energy future. (Time expired)

See this speech in context