Justine Elliot (Richmond, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too am pleased to rise and speak on the government's failure to plan for a fair and sustainable retirement for all Australians, because we constantly see bad decisions from a bad government. That is all we ever hear from them. Labor will fight the Abbott government's second attempt to cut the pension for hundreds of thousands of pensioners.

The fact is that this Liberal-National government continues to recklessly attack the standard of living of older Australians. It does that by cutting their pensions, by slashing their services and by increasing taxes. The fact is that this government has failed the present and the future retirees of Australia as well. But those pensioners and older working Australians should be very clear about one thing, and that is that the Liberal and National parties are coming after your pensions. That is a fact. For those living in regional and rural Australia, it is the National Party that are coming after your pensions. That is my very clear message today; make no mistake about it. To all those people living in country Australia: the National Party are coming after your pensions. I note that there are none of them in the chamber right now. No wonder. It is absolutely terrible that they are voting for this measure. It will impact people in regional areas quite severely.

As we know, the government tried to cut pensions last year, and they are trying to cut them again this year. If they get re-elected, they will keep trying to cut them. That is what they do. The fact is that they just cannot be trusted when it comes to pensions. These unfair and cruel cuts that the government have been making have indeed been devastating to the nation and devastating to older Australians, particularly those older Australians who live in regional areas, such as those in my electorate of Richmond.

Locals in my area have every right to feel betrayed by this government and particularly betrayed, as I have said, by the National Party. This government really only has two things at its core: broken promises and unfairness. That is it: broken promises and unfairness. We see it time and time again. Of course, in its first budget, the government launched an unprecedented attack on the pension, particularly with its cuts to the indexation for pensions. It was one of the most savage attacks that we have ever seen. It would have seen every single pensioner in this country left worse off. Within 10 years, the cut would have amounted to $80 per week. In my electorate, there are 20,520 people on the age pension who would have had their pension cut by this cruel Liberal-National government.

Of course, before the election, we had the now Prime Minister promising that there would be no change to pensions. He said, 'No changes, no cuts.' He said on SBS News:

No cuts to education, no cuts to health, no change to pensions, no change to the GST and no cuts to the ABC or SBS.

In my area, we had all the National Party running around. They were all campaigning there on the North Coast of New South Wales. What were they telling everybody? 'No cuts to pensions.' And what did they do? We all know that the Prime Minister's promise, the Liberal Party's promise and the National Party's promise stand for nothing, and we know they cannot be trusted. Make no mistake about it: they will do it again. They will lie again. They will run around and tell everybody the same thing again.

But, in relation to those cruel cuts from last year's budget, pensioners made their voices heard. We in the Labor Party proudly stood with them to fight this government in terms of those cuts. We stood with them and we won in terms of those changes because we made it very clear that these were cruel and unfair changes. But then we get to this year's budget and what did they do? They continued their very unfair attack on pensioners. Labor will vote against the government's new round of cuts to the pensions. We will vote against this government's cuts to the almost 330,000 low-income pensioner households and the government's plans to throw more than 90,000 pensioners off the pension entirely.

These threats to pensions continue because the Prime Minister and his colleagues on that side of the House are out of touch. They just do not understand. They just do not get it, so they keep these attacks up on our pensioners. If you are on a pension now, be careful because the Liberals and the Nationals are coming after you.

With these changes, some single pensioners will be $8,000 worth off because of this measure. Some couple pensioners will be $14,000 worse off. More than 230,000 pensioners will on average be $130 a fortnight worse off—that is $3,380 per year. As I said, more than 90,000 pensioners will lose their pension altogether. So these are some very extreme cuts that will really impact right across the country.

In my area, I have been approached by so many pensioners very concerned as to how these cuts to their pensions will impact them. Make no mistake about it, Labor will fight this measure. As we fought it in last year's budget, we will fight it in this year's budget. We will stand with the pensioners once again and we will fight this right up until the election.

This government have lied consistently to the people of Australia. They said there will be no changes to pensions, but they have made changes to the pensions in last year's budget and in this year's budget. I say to people in rural and regional Australia, you cannot trust the National Party, particularly when it comes to your pensions. Many of our pensioners live in rural and regional Australia. We will keep fighting the government. We will fight them every day until the next election. Make no mistake about it, they lied before the election, they lied in relation to last year's budget and they will lie again.

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