Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

Labor has a vision for a strong economy and a fair society—an Australia that is safe and prosperous with an economy that is growing strongly, generating quality, well-paid jobs, and an Australia where that economic growth is shared. The Liberals do not share that vision. Their vision is very different. Their vision is tax cuts for the rich that, maybe, trickle down to the rest of us. Their vision is for a $50 billion tax cut that goes to the biggest businesses, including the four big banks, including overseas shareholders, but that does not drive economic growth in this country. Their vision is for a $16,400 tax cut for someone on a million bucks a year and a wage cut for ordinary workers.

This morning we heard a train wreck of an interview from the Minister for Industrial Relations and, incidentally, the Minister for Women. When asked about the government's own submission on the minimum wage, she could not answer a question about what was in her own submission, where it said that low-paid workers tend to be young, female and single. She could not answer how many, what proportion or what numbers were being talked about. Her own submission to the Fair Work Commission said:

Increasing the national minimum wage is not an efficient way to address relative living standards. Low-paid employees are often found in high income households.

As if my wage should depend on my parents' wage or on my husband's wage.

We are going back to medieval times when we say that a woman's wage should depend on what her husband earns or what her parents earn. It is an outrage, especially at a time when this government also supports cuts to penalty rates. We had Margarita up in the gallery before, and I met with her earlier today. She told me her story—how she came here in the early eighties and from 1996 onwards she was working in the hotel industry—as a widow trying to raise her young children. The youngest one was three years old.

She was having to work Sundays and be away from her family, because that extra 50 bucks a week made all the difference to her family and being able to put decent food on the table and a roof over the heads of her children and being able to get shoes and school books and all of the things a family needs. She could not live without those Sunday penalty rates. And this government says that she does not deserve those penalty rates and that 700,000 workers like her do not deserve those penalty rates for being away from their children on weekends. Her son asked her recently, 'Mum, why were you never there when I was eight years old?' She replied, 'Son, I was working to put food on the table and a roof over your head,' and he hugged her and said, 'Mum, you did a great job.' Can you imagine what it is like to be asked by your children why you were never there on a Sunday. Her daughter said to her, 'You are a grandmother now.'

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