Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Families and Payments) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Just to pick up on the Leader of the House's point, Labor indicated our position four months ago. Four months you have had to figure out what you had to do to get agreement to the measures that Labor said we were prepared to support. But no, they are far too arrogant for that. They come in here today and finally present the bill that we are debating right now that does contain measures that Labor said four months ago we were prepared to support. But because of their arrogance, they were not prepared to come and have a discussion and figure it out. They were actually forced to this position because they knew that their bills were going to go down completely in the Senate and they would have ended up with nothing, absolutely nothing, if they proceeded with their genius strategy in the Senate.

Fortunately, we have got to the point where Labor has agreed to some sensible changes, and Labor has always been prepared to support sensible changes. But we will never support cuts to the pensions. We will never support what you want to do to young Australians, which is to leave them on their own and to say to them that they will have absolutely nothing to live on for six months. We will never support saying to families, 'We will take family tax benefit part B off you when your youngest child turns six.'

What does all this mean for their budget? Of course what it means for their budget is that they will never get these measures through. They have reintroduced them again today to try and keep the numbers in their budget, but the truth is that when we see their budget numbers we all know that those numbers are inflated. What we have proven in this parliament yesterday and today is that these measures will never, ever get through Labor. Labor are going to do everything in our power to stop you cutting the pension, to stop these massive cuts to family payments and to stop the cruelty of your attack on young Australians. We will do everything to stop these measures. I sincerely hope for the most vulnerable Australians that Labor will continue to prevail.

See this speech in context