Sharon Grierson (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Instead, they will commission an audit report. Just remember, it is code for: 'We will do an audit. We'll get someone else to do it. We'll be the nice guys, so someone else will say "The sky is falling; the country's going broke" and we will have to do more cuts than we ever thought we would need to do.' That is exactly what has happened all around the country as conservative governments come to power. Just as the Queensland Liberal government has done, they will cut to the bone. Take the 2010 election. Treasury analysis shows us that Tony Abbott and the Liberals had an $11 billion black hole in their costings. In 2013, following the Liberal leader's budget reply, they have already revealed a further black hole. It is getting bigger and it is getting blacker. There goes the happiness. They promised $5 billion worth of savings but they will not exactly say where they will come from. How will this be filled? The only way is that it will be cut to the bone.

We already know that the Leader of the Opposition plans to cut the Schoolkids Bonus, a program that has helped thousands of families in my electorate at a time when we are also investing into the retail sector. They are supposedly the friends of small business over there. Small businesses have benefited from the Schoolkids Bonus. Round January and February, a time when there is a lull, the benefits have just poured in because families have spent the bonus and it has been great for everyone.

The opposition have also said they will slash 12,000 public servant jobs in Canberra and 20,000 around the nation. They also intend to lower the tax-free threshold, increased by Labor to $18,200. They will lower it again down to $6,000. There is no incentive for work there. This will hurt the lowest paid workers in Australia including many families in Newcastle and, of course, it particularly hurts young people and women. As Professor Phillip O'Neill wrote in the Newcastle Herald on Monday 27 May:

How many of these workers and their families would be affected by cuts under any Abbott government? How many community members would be hurt by a loss in services? It is a scary thought.

Only Labor governments do stand up for families and only Labor governments stand up for jobs. Only Labor budgets set the path for a stronger economy, a smarter nation and a much fairer society. Our Labor budget delivers $14.3 billion for DisabilityCare Australia. We truly can be a civilised society, ensuring that all Australians with a significant disability receive the individualised support and care required regardless of how they acquired their disability. No Australian deserves to be left behind.

Our National Disability Insurance Scheme has bipartisan support but it took a federal Labor government to put it on the agenda and make it a reality because that is the Labor way. It follows in the footsteps of Medicare and the age pension as a great Labor reform and one I am incredibly proud of. Until that commission of audit gets its hands on it, it apparently has bipartisan support. If that commission of audit ever comes into fruition, I think social agenda issues will be the first things cut. But with an additional $300 million in Commonwealth funding for the launch site in the Hunter, the biggest in our nation, I know how much the people of my region and electorate care about the NDIS.

Paralympic gold medallist and proud Novocastrian Kurt Fearnley tweeted on budget night::

It is long overdue reform and I am proud that Labor is delivering that reform. Prior to entering parliament in 2001, I was a principal at a school for students with many complex special needs. I witnessed first-hand the difficulties faced by those students and their triumphs. I know how much extra resources mean when you are scratching to put together a 12-month plan. We want the NDIS. For me to know it is going to benefit everyone is a very heartening experience. But this is not just a social reform, it is an economic reform as well.

Deloitte Access Economics tells us that closing the gap between labour market participation rate and unemployed rates for people with and without disabilities by one third would result in a cumulative $43 billion increase in Australia's GDP over the next decade in real dollar terms. Today, however, just half of working age Australian with disabilities are employed in the workforce. This is a real case for the change that Labor is bringing.

Our budget also delivers $9.8 billion for better schools under our National Plan for School Improvement. It has been informed by the independent Gonski review of school funding, the most thorough funding review of Australian schools funding in 40 years. We know education is the key to future opportunity for our youth. We know that this additional funding will boost the performance of students, preparing them for high-skilled and high-wage jobs, those jobs of the future that are going to become more common but also require a higher attainment. After 30 years in education under the existing funding formula, I know how disparate it was, how disadvantaged our students were—

Mr Tudge interjecting—

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