Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Firstly, I would like to congratulate the member for Parramatta for bringing this exceptionally important motion to the House. Secondly, I would like to encourage the New South Wales government to rethink the position that they have taken on this issue. In doing this, I would have to acknowledge that the New South Wales government has blatantly disregarded pensioners living in public housing. I suppose I should also add that the coalition side of politics really has blatant disregard for anyone on a low income and has not delivered to pensioners in the past.

The previous speaker was talking about pension increases. I would have to say that it is the Rudd-Gillard government that has delivered the biggest increase to pensioners since the pension was introduced in this country, and on this side of the House we are extremely proud of that. We are very proud because we know that pensioners have served our country well over the years and, as such, they deserve to have a decent standard of living.

This brings me to those pensioners that are living in public housing in New South Wales. As I have already said, what is happening is a disgrace, a cruel cash grab by the New South Wales government. It demonstrates the difference in the way the Labor Party and the coalition parties think about pensioners and their commitment to pensioners. When the historic increase in the pension came into being, the New South Wales government, then a Labor government, did not include the increase and hike up the rental for people in public housing. They realised that pensioners have been doing it hard and, as such, they recognised the fact that pensioners deserved this one-off increase in their pension to be left out of public housing rent increases. Now how different it is with Barry O'Farrell in government in New South Wales. Instead of accepting a payment that is put in there to actually compensate for the cost increase that pensioners will incur due to the introduction of a price on carbon, what is Barry O'Farrell doing? He is including it as income when calculating rental. I have before me a letter that the state member for Swansea sent out to one of my constituents, who was extremely upset about the tone of this letter. In this letter the state member for Swansea highlights the fact that that money is needed for vital maintenance of public housing. I share with this parliament the fact that the Rudd and Gillard governments' record of investing in public housing is second to none.

Under the previous Howard government public housing was ignored and there was no investment in public housing whatsoever. What the Howard government did was put in place programs and strategies that made it harder for pensioners and did nothing to help the people that were living in public housing. They did nothing to cut the waiting list. They did nothing but cut the amount of money that was being given to the states for public housing. Public housing tenants were ignored. I think the bottom line is that those on the other side of this parliamentary chamber think that public housing tenants are second-rate citizens and they feel that they are not going to vote for them so they can totally disregard them and rip out of them every bit of money they can. I can tell them that the more than 1,800 pensioners that live in public housing in the Shortland electorate deserve better. They deserve better than what Barry O'Farrell is doing, and I will certainly be in there fighting for them to see that they do not have to suffer this sort of—(Time expired)

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