Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Communications) Share this | Hansard source

It is a privilege to rise and speak in this address-in-reply debate, which of course follows the speech of the Governor-General upon the opening of the 44th Parliament. At the outset I want to express my thanks to the voters of Bradfield for returning me to this place in the 44th Parliament.

I have now represented the electorate of Bradfield for a little over four years. In that time, I have contested three elections: a by-election and two general elections. And it is pleasing indeed to now be in government, after the challenging years of opposition, because government brings with it the opportunity to deliver some material outcomes to the people who elected me to this place.

In the time available to me, I want to talk about some of the key areas of impact that I believe the Abbott government will have for the people of Bradfield. I want to speak about our commitment to provide $405 million to help build the F3-M2 missing link, a vitally needed piece of infrastructure in Bradfield. I want to speak about our commitment to ensuring that private hospitals play a bigger role in delivering health services to local communities, and highlight the shining example of this in the Sydney Adventist Hospital located in my electorate of Bradfield. I want to speak about our commitment that there will be no unexpected detrimental changes to superannuation within the first term of the Abbott government, an issue of considerable concern to my constituents in Bradfield. I would also like to speak about our small business agenda, including reducing the red tape and compliance burden for small business and reducing the cost of doing business—matters which I know are of considerable concern to the businesspeople of Bradfield because they are raised with me on a regular basis.

Let me turn first to the F3-M2 missing link and the work of the Abbott government, in conjunction with the New South Wales Liberal-National government, to deliver this vitally needed piece of infrastructure. The F3 might have recently been renamed the M1 by the New South Wales government but this project continues to be widely described as the F3-M2 missing link. Whatever its name, it is a project that is vital for my electorate of Bradfield, to relieve the severely overloaded Pennant Hills Road and the overloaded Pacific Highway, to improve journey times for those travelling between Sydney and the Central Coast and, very importantly, to deliver safety and amenity benefits to local residents of Bradfield, particularly in suburbs that are affected by the extremely heavily trafficked Pennant Hills Road.

The F3-M2 missing link project builds on a considerable legacy of public policy work, including work initiated by the Howard government. The 2004 study by Sinclair Knight Merz identified air quality, alternative transport options and noise impacts as areas the community wanted to have scrutinised as the project was developed. Importantly, that study found that the F3-M2 missing link project, by removing stop-start conditions, is capable of delivering positive benefits, including reduced noise for 94 per cent of residents and improvements in air quality.

The Sinclair Knight Merz study was followed by the Pearlman review, commissioned by the Howard government, which recommended the route which is now largely to be followed should this project proceed. In 2013, a proposal developed by the private motorway operator Transurban Group, using the route recommended in the 2007 Pearlman review, was received by the New South Wales government under that government's unsolicited proposal process. I am pleased to say that the New South Wales government took that project seriously and moved to have it considered within its unsolicited proposal process. The project has now moved to an advanced stage, with community consultation now underway and final proposals by interested construction companies having been lodged with Transurban.

The project to date has been an outstanding example of cooperation between the New South Wales and federal governments and the private sector. I have mentioned that the federal government, the Abbott government, has committed to spend $405 million on this project. A similar amount has been committed by the New South Wales government. The total project budget is around $2.65 billion, with the balance to be contributed by Transurban and, of course, recovered through toll charges for those who use this roadway.

I am eager to see the F3-M2 missing link built because I believe it will deliver profound benefits to the communities that I represent. On the latest information available to me—and I emphasise that the project has still not reached a stage where these matters have been definitively finalised—the project is likely to involve two separate tunnels running under Pennant Hills Road, each wide enough to take three lanes, although initially the road will be configured as two lanes each way. This will give sufficient capacity for 100,000 vehicles per year. As a reference point, today Pennant Hills Road carries 60,000 vehicles per year—so, significant additional capacity will be available through the F3-M2 missing link. The other expected benefit of this two-lane configuration, notwithstanding the width of the tunnels, is that it will allow the road to have an 80-kilometre-per-hour speed limit. Again, that remains to be finally determined, but that is the latest information available to me.

A point I wish to emphasise is that, even if residents of affected suburbs like Thornleigh, Normanhurst and Wahroonga do not wish to use this road themselves but wish to continue using Pennant Hills Road, they will have the capacity to do that. Unlike the poorly conceived approach taken by the New South Wales Labor government when it came to, for example, the Lane Cove Tunnel, there is not going to be a contract which will mandate the reduction of lanes on Pennant Hills Road. That is the first important point.

The second important point is that, even if local residents choose not to use this road, it is very clear from the stated position of, amongst other things, peak bodies for the trucking industry that the B-doubles and other trucks which today are very heavy users of Pennant Hills Road can be expected to use the new expressway, the new tunnels and to pay the toll for doing so. The reason they will do that is enlightened commercial self-interest. This road will save many minutes of journey time. For people running a commercial trucking business, saved time is worth money. The toll will be a good deal for them because, through paying it, they will receive a materially reduced journey time. In turn, that will be good news for the people of Wahroonga, Normanhurst and Thornleigh, because the extremely busy Pennant Hills Road, today carrying large numbers of B-doubles and other trucks, is likely to become considerably less busy. That will materially improve the amenity of residents in those areas, it will materially improve the sense of community in those areas and it will be a lifestyle improvement for these important areas of my electorate of Bradfield.

I am pleased that the New South Wales government and the Abbott government are coming together on this important project. I look forward to further stages of the approval process being worked through so that construction can get underway. I want to particularly acknowledge the work of the Deputy Prime Minister, who in opposition made the time to come to visit Pennant Hills Road. He joined with me and the member for Berowra to make a visit to Pennant Hills Road to understand the nature of the congestion and the impact on community amenity there. The support that he has shown on this very important project is something that I want to acknowledge and express my gratitude for.

Let me turn next to the question of health policy and the role that the coalition sees for private hospitals in the provision of health services. In that context, I want to refer specifically to the Sydney Adventist Hospital. This is one of the largest, most successful and most important private hospitals in Australia. It has a range of facilities and capabilities in every respect similar to a major public teaching hospital. Indeed, it is a teaching hospital, as I will go on to talk about. It is also a hospital with an emergency room. It is a hospital with specialised facilities in a whole range of areas. There is a major new cancer facility being built. The San, as the Sydney Adventist Hospital is affectionately known, is a major institution in the electorate of Bradfield and a major provider of health care to the people not just of Bradfield but of the entire surrounding northern and north-western areas of Sydney.

I am pleased to note that the Minister for Health has visited this hospital twice within the last 12 months. In March last year, when we were in opposition and he was the shadow minister, Peter Dutton joined with me in a visit to the San to meet with the management, to tour the hospital's facilities and to discuss key issues of importance in relation to the hospital's activities and the major growth program that the hospital is now on, including, as I have mentioned, the very substantial cancer centre which is in the process of being constructed. As health minister later last year, in November, he came to the San again, to officially open its state-of-the-art clinical education centre, a joint project with funding not just from the San itself but also from both federal and state governments. It is a major centre which will provide integrated teaching not just for medical students but also for nursing students and a whole range of allied health professions, including physiotherapy and many other areas. This centre is a powerful demonstration of the very important role that private hospitals can play in the training and education of our medical professionals. It is also a demonstration of the nature of the services that a major private hospital can provide to its local community and to the broader community. Minister Dutton said in his speech at the opening of the clinical training centre:

Australia is facing a critical shortage of doctors, nurses and other health professions and attracting new people into the health system is crucial. To do this we must continue to find new and innovative ways to train and retain health care professionals and this Centre at Adventist Hospital is a great example of best practice.

I think there is a broader point which could be made. The previous Labor government had an ideological hostility to the private healthcare system. By contrast, the Abbott government wants to work with the private hospital system to deliver more choice and greater access to health services across Australia. In my view, the San at Wahroonga, in my electorate of Bradfield, is a fine example of the very deep and rich contribution which a private hospital can make in serving the community. It is a contribution which has been of profound benefit to the people of Bradfield and of northern Sydney and is a model deserving of replication around Australia.

I would like to turn to a third area of interest to my constituents in Bradfield, which is the commitment made by the coalition at the 2013 election that there would be no unexpected detrimental changes to superannuation within our first term of government. The previous Labor government generated continuing change and uncertainty in Australia's superannuation system, which produced many complaints to me by my constituents in Bradfield. Let me remind the House of just some of Labor's series of tax increases in superannuation. Over the five-year period, Labor increased taxes on superannuation by more than $8 million, predominantly targeting low- and middle-income earners. These changes included a $3.3 billion cut to super co-contribution benefits for low-income earners, reducing the co-contribution benefit from $1,500 to $500. At the same time, Labor steadily reduced contribution caps for those over age 50, from $100,000 to $50,000 and then $25,000. That hits people just at the stage of life when—having, hopefully, paid off the house and got the kids either totally or largely off their hands—they are turning their minds to maximising their savings for their retirement years. Labor's changes to the contribution cap hit hard at just the time when people are looking to maximise their contributions. We had many claims that this problem was going to be fixed, and indeed the previous Labor government promised it would reintroduce or increase concessional caps up to a level of $50,000. In fact, it managed to get only as high as $35,000 and only for those aged over 60.

Another promise which Labor made was never to tax super payments for the over 60s, but then Labor last year sought to introduce precisely such a tax, which I am pleased to say the Abbott government has moved quickly to cancel. The key point is this: times have changed. We are in a new era of stability for the superannuation sector, and that will be very welcome indeed to my constituents in Bradfield. The coalition is committed to Australia's three-pillar retirement system: an age pension as a safety net, a compulsory system of retirement savings through superannuation and incentives for voluntary saving.

Let me turn, in the final part of my remarks today, to the area of small business, which is vital in my electorate of Bradfield, as it is to the entire Australian economy.

There is no policy area, I venture to suggest, where the difference between the Liberal and the Labor parties is more profound than small business. To the extent that Labor politicians have any experience of business, it typically comes from negotiating as union officials with larger businesses. More broadly, our political opponents regard business with suspicion—they want to tax and regulate business rather than encourage it. To the extent that they have any familiarity at all with business, as I have mentioned, it is from negotiating with large business rather than any experience at all of carrying out the activities of a small business. You could count on the fingers of one hand the number of Labor parliamentarians who have actual business experience.

By contrast, the coalition believes that business is critical to our nation's prosperity. We believe business people should be congratulated and not harassed for what they do. That is why a major priority for the Abbott government will be to improve the business environment to make it easier for all types of businesses, but particularly small business, to get on with serving customers and generating a fair return. In my electorate of Bradfield there is a broad range of small businesses—according to recent data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics there are some 16,765 businesses. Interestingly, just over 10,000 of these are non-employing businesses—that is, in the main they are sole traders. At the other end of the spectrum, 2.2 per cent of businesses employ more than 20 people in the electorate of Bradfield. These statistics show just how important small businesses are to our economy in the electorate of Bradfield.

Last year as part of the Shop Small campaign I was pleased to join with my state colleague the member for Hornsby, Matt Kean, Peter Vickers of the Ku-ring-gai Chamber of Commerce and the Mayor of Hornsby, Steve Russell, to visit Flower Infusion in Wahroonga, just one of the many fine small businesses serving important community needs in the electorate of Bradfield. The Abbott government knows that small business is the engine room of our economy. We want to double the growth rate and create an additional 30,000 new businesses across Australia each year. To achieve this we have a multistranded agenda, led by our energetic Minister for Small Business, Bruce Billson, that includes scrapping the carbon tax, cutting red tape by $1 billion a year and establishing a root-and-branch review of competition laws.

Let me conclude by reminding the House that the Abbott government has come to office with a strong, positive agenda for the nation. I can say that it is an agenda which is also strongly positive for the people of Bradfield. It is an agenda I am proud of. I am confident we will deliver significant benefits for my constituents and I look forward to working as part of the Abbott government to deliver on this agenda.

See this speech in context