Madeleine King (Brand, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I can see why this government and the member for Dawson wouldn't want a fact check facility at the ABC or elsewhere, with the rubbish they spin out all the time. Who could have guessed that when the Turnbull government handed down their budget earlier this month there would have been some surprises for the ABC? Yes, the Treasurer, happily stuffing the stockings of the big banks and his big business mates, has delivered a big lump of coal to our national broadcaster. In freezing the indexation applied to ABC funding, this Turnbull-Joyce-McCormack government has delivered an $83 million cut which forms part of an overall eye-watering cut of $254 million these Liberal-National governments have wrought upon on our ABC.

When it comes to the ABC, you cannot trust any Liberal government. I ask members: what does this government have against the ABC? Why does it hate the ABC? Maybe it's something to do with the ABC being the most trusted source of news for Australians. Maybe it's something to do with the ABC being among the most trusted institutions in this country. Is it simple jealousy? All this mean and tricky, untrustworthy, malfunctioning government can do is to petulantly take away funding from the most trusted body in this country. What an immature and vapid bunch of nothings those opposite are.

Before this Prime Minister finally, with what stands for courage in the Liberal Party, stood up to knock over the empty chair in the Liberal Party party room, the member for Warringah promised the Australian people that there would be no cuts to the ABC and to SBS. As sure as night follows day, Mr Rabbit proceeded to cut the ABC and SBS. That was 4½ years ago, and this Prime Minister is no different at all. Seriously, the empty chair would do a better job than this banker. He has thrown his #qanda leather jacket in the back of the cupboard and reached for his top hat from the top shelf and joined a cavalcade of conservatives lining up to give the ABC a bit of a kick.

Well, I've got news for those opposite. People like the ABC. They like the national broadcaster more than they like you, and they trust the ABC more than they trust you. Here's another newsflash: people don't think the same as you over there. Just because you and Uncle Rupert don't like the ABC doesn't mean the rest of the country feels the same way. It's not the fault of the ABC that people aren't buying The Australian or watching Sky. That's no-one's fault but their own.

If I could reflect on Western Australia and what the cuts have meant to the ABC in WA: under the Liberals and Nationals, the ABC staff numbers in Western Australia have plummeted due to jobs and services being centralised on the east coast. It's not because technology has made these jobs redundant. It's because they're cost cutting at the expense of local services. There's no reception, there's no HR manager, there are no finance staff and there's no outside broadcast van in Perth or in Western Australia. And, for rural WA—that's a third of the continent—as the Labor candidate for Fremantle, Josh Wilson, has pointed out often, there is no WA reporter for Landline. Someone is flown in from Sydney to report on Landline issues for Western Australia. I wonder what those agrarian socialists, the WA Nationals, think of that. I wonder if they know. Do the members for Durack and O'Connor and Forrest realise that a journalist from Sydney has to fly to rural WA to undertake WA stories for ABC's Landline? Because of this government's cuts to the ABC, the nation's pre-eminent rural and regional TV program, covering stories and issues concerning regional communities, does not have a Western Australian based reporter. Another bit of news for those opposite: there are fairly substantial agricultural and regional interests in WA. So I ask: why do you seek to constrain the national broadcaster with your cumulative $254 million of cuts to the ABC?

Do you realise that the cuts mean that the issues important to those in WA cannot be canvassed on television in the cities and towns? Are you even able to see the connection? With this government and its cuts to the ABC: well, they have consequences. It's those in the regions and remote areas—they're the ones who miss out on their stories being told around the country.

In addition to that, as the member for Lingiari pointed out, they have also lost short-wave radio in the far north—as did the Pacific, a place where we used to project reliable, independent news. But, no, no more. This vapid government has simply left the scene and left our broadcasting interests out of the Pacific. These $83 million cuts are shortsighted. To the millions of friends of the ABC, rest assured that the Labor Party will continue to stand alongside the ABC. (Time expired)

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