Alannah Mactiernan (Perth, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Yes, and it can conform with the basic spin we hear from the government about this budget. But what has happened here to the pensioners of Western Australia, who tomorrow morning will be rallying against this budget and the very, very unfair way it impacts upon pensioners and retirees, will be grist to their mill: to learn that the Prime Minister has come into this place and said that every single state has agreed to maintain the value of pensioner concessions when he must know—it is inconceivable that he does not know—that the Premier of Western Australia has made it very, very clear that that $20 million is gone, dead and buried, and he has no intention of replacing that. So, who is going to cop the cut? Who is going to cop the reduction in their concessions? It is the pensioners of Western Australia. This is most unfair, and I call upon the Prime Minister to come in here and be honest and correct the record.

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