David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to refute a lot of the intent of this MPI. As if we haven't delivered on things that are incredibly important to people, have the opposition been hiding with eyes wide shut? We have delivered JobKeeper and JobSeeker, the biggest wage support that any Australian Commonwealth government has ever initiated. We have delivered on our promise to support child care during the immediate period. It was made free for people. There is still support for child care coming through. There are initiatives that we have already delivered for small businesses, particularly those with apprentices, because we know we need to build our skill base. Nothing would be worse than to lose those people in apprenticeships, because they'll be the 'skill deliverers' of the future.

We've helped many businesses through the tax changes, in improving cash flow for small and large businesses. We have also underwritten unsecured loans, to the tune of 50 per cent of the loan, to try and help small businesses where, even though they are getting JobKeeper or a benefit out of an improved cash flow initiative, their PAYE retained tax from their employees gets recycled into their business, to help keep people employed. We have delivered so much.

The most critical services people have delivered are in the health portfolio. You've got to realise the length and breadth of the response—it is mind-blowing, what has been achieved in the health portfolio. In the first instance, we've been building hospital capacity, by negotiating with private and public hospitals, and increasing ICU and ventilator capacity. While there was a global race to get hold of personal protective equipment, we've built up our national medical stockpile of personal protective equipment. We've set up GP respiratory-led clinics. We've given extra money to the states for a large proportion of the extra costs, because of the COVID-19 pandemic. We have funded extra money into research, through the Medical Research Future Fund. We have announced an aged-care pandemic response plan.

As to what the people on the other side are trying to make out: there was community spread of the disease, and, sadly, a few institutions got it. As we've seen around the world, with lots of elderly, frail people in close quarters, if the community spread gets in there it can have dire consequences. But you have to keep it in perspective. There has been financial support for the aged-care industry, starting back in March. Just two days ago, we announced another extra tranche of support, another $563 million, including support for those at home who have left aged care to go back to a home-care situation. There are further tranches of support for workforce retention. There's support for aged-care workers, particularly available to the Victorian situation. That's another $1½ billion.

The mental health response pandemic plan has rolled out, with extra work for frontline health workers, for older people, for carers of those with mental illness, for Indigenous people, for people in the national disability scheme. We've set up—particularly again because of the problem in Victoria—a mental health task force with 15 more mental health clinics in both metropolitan and regional Victoria. We've increased funding for existing services in the digital space and also extended funding for headspace. Wherever you look, there has been support.

We have tried to stimulate the economy in regional areas with our response, through local governments, getting the infrastructure rolling, to keep people in employment. But the big support through JobKeeper, JobSeeker, tax flow— (Time expired)

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