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

I will reflect very briefly on some of the previous contributions today on this matter of public importance, which were extraordinary in respect of their complete unwillingness to address the issue of the National Commission of Audit report. Members opposite had a range of opinions about a range of topics but certainly not the topic that is currently before us today, and that is the urgent need for the Abbott government to release the National Commission of Audit report before the Western Australian Senate election. It would seem that members opposite do not think that the people of Western Australia deserve to know what is going to happen prior to an election. They do not seem to think that the people of Western Australia would want to know. There are some members opposite who indeed suggest that the Senate by-election is almost a pointless exercise, because people are going to go in and do exactly what they did before. I heard one member suggest that. Well, I might suggest that members opposite are taking the people of Western Australia for granted, and I do not think the people of Western Australia are, for one moment, going to cop that silently.

I echo the call from the member for Brand earlier, on behalf of all Western Australian people, for the Prime Minister, the Treasurer, Senator Cormann, Senator Johnston and all other WA federal executive members to end this game of secrecy and to make good on the promise that this government had to release the Commission of Audit report to the public and to release it now. We have already seen, as speakers prior to me argued, that this report has been delayed at each and every by-election. This will be the fourth delay, if we do not see the report released prior to 5 April.

Unfortunately some Western Australians have already missed out on what is potentially vital information for them, as voting in the Senate by-election started yesterday. It is beyond belief that members opposite do not have a high enough regard for the people of Western Australia to enable them to make an informed decision before going into a polling booth to cast a vote. It is extraordinary that there would be an expectation that people do not need that information, that they are somehow just going to rubber-stamp an exercise from last September.

Those who have voted do, however, have a taste of what is to come, because the conservative state government has already embarked on a very broad range of cuts in Western Australia that are eating into jobs and services in WA. What voters can be sure about with the Abbott government is that it cannot be trusted, and that is a profound problem—a profound lack of trust. What is the Abbott government hiding? In particular, what is it hiding from Western Australians? Is it hiding further cuts to education, health, pensions, the ABC or SBS? This report, which has been sitting on the Treasurer's desk since January, represents some 900 pages of deep thought, we are led to believe, from this government. We can only assume that the failure to release it is because of the cloak of secrecy that this government continues to operate under. It is hiding what we believe to be very wrong priorities for this government and the nasty cuts that we were not privy to prior to the election.

It is unacceptable that the Treasurer says that the government hopes to adopt the 'great majority' of recommendations from the Commission of Audit but keeps those findings and cuts completely under wraps and away from the public. It is unacceptable that he can make an assertion that the great majority of recommendations would be adopted before even seeing the report. I will say it again: this government cannot be trusted. The people of WA deserve much better.

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