Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health) Share this | Hansard source

I understand why the member for Braddon is so sensitive. Of course he would be getting the emails that I am getting—email after email—and people coming to his electorate office one after another saying that this is unfair and showing him the calculations of how these pensioners will be worse off. I have had so many pensioners come and show how they will be worse off under this attack by the Liberal Party. It is very shameful that they will not look at those at the highest end with huge amounts of superannuation and not look at tax concessions that are unsustainable in the long-term and do eclipse spending in the budget. They will not look at that. Why won't they look at that? I am not sure. Instead, they will attack low- and middle-income pensioners who rely on that extra help. They have worked hard all their life.

Finally, I would like to make the point that I do not believe that these pensioners are welfare bludgers. Those on the other side have characterised them as welfare bludgers who need to be cut off from this welfare because they are just taking so much. I mean, quite frankly, that is an insult. Those on the other side should be embarrassed to hear the Minister for Social Services characterise our hard-working pensioners, who have worked hard all of their lives—as I have illustrated by so many in my electorate—as welfare bludgers. That is an absolute shameful position. They need to rethink this policy. Unfortunately with this dirty deal with the Greens, there is only one party in this place that will stand up for pensioners. That is the Labor Party. We are proud to stand up for pensioners, we will continue to stand up for pensioners and we will be their voice in this parliament because the Liberal Party and the Greens have abandoned them.

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