Keith Wolahan (Menzies, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition was spot on when he began his reply with the following: 'We live in the best country in the world, but for millions of Australians things aren't easy right now.' Cost of living is more than a slogan; it is about the gap between income and prices. That gap is growing. Labor's recent budget is good at detailing problems but devoid of real solutions. Families across my electorate of Menzies are struggling to make ends meet. Everything is more expensive, whether you are paying your power bill, filling up the car or saving for your first home. The average price of fuel in Melbourne today is about $2.10 depending on where you buy it from. Electricity prices are forecast to rise by up to 56 per cent over two years. This is despite Labor promising a $275 cut in power prices 97 times before the election. It is no wonder that families think twice more than they used to.

We know that inflation must be brought under control, but we should not forget that this comes at a massive cost to millions of families, many on fixed rates that will expire in the coming months and years. If you look at a heat map of mortgage stress, the western portion of my electorate of Menzies is one of the highest in the country. Given record house prices, it is not surprising that families have stretched themselves to live in our part of the world; it's a lovely place to live. This means that each increase in mortgage, rent, power, fuel and food prices forces families to make tough choices between the things they need and the things that make them happy.

For many, this trade-off is paid in lost time with loved ones, as they are forced to work extra shifts or even a second job. Many think twice about school excursions. I noticed that not many from my electorate have come on the school tours here. There may be many reasons for that, but, for a lot of families, it's an extra cost they can't afford. For many, it's a choice about whether their children remain in a sporting team. The World Cup is on this Wednesday morning, and most Australians will turn on the TV at 6 am and watch Australia—the Socceroos—take on France. But soccer is actually a very expensive sport to play. It doesn't have all of the subsidies that AFL and cricket have. For families in my electorate who love soccer—they call it football—those fees are very high, in the hundreds of dollars. Again, as rates rise and inflation goes up, they're some the things that have to be cut.

Going to the movies—I hear many families say that they go less than they used to, and they don't know whether they will this summer. We often see the great big blockbusters come out on New Year's Day. Again, there'll be fewer families going to the movies than last year. Christmas and birthday presents will be sacrificed. Families will think twice about holidays, and, for many, the cost of food is going up and up and up. Right now, families are making the real choice on a daily basis about what type of food to eat, and those decisions will be even harder next year.

The Albanese government needs to recognise they are not in opposition anymore. They were a very effective opposition; that's why they get to sit over there. But they're not there anymore. They need to take responsibility for balancing sustained growth with ever increasing inflation. I am disappointed to see that there is no immediate relief in sight for families. Between a combination of surging inflation and rising interest rates, average wage earners will be $5,000 a year worse off. Even worse, mortgage holders will on average be up to $13,000 a year out of pocket. This budget fails to deliver not only on a macro level but also on a micro level within particular seats. I've listened to many of my colleagues speak about projects they were expecting to see in this budget, projects they fought hard for, and then, when they opened the budget papers: whoosh, gone, not there.

Let me talk about one in my electorate. My electorate is mostly metropolitan, but, on the eastern side, there's Warrandyte/Wonga Park, and that feeds into the suburban areas of Warranwood and Croydon North. There's an intersection called Five Ways. It's called Five Ways because five actual roads intersect in the one spot, and it is packed full of families going to and from school every day. It's full of families, yet it is one of the most dangerous roads in Victoria. In 2021, a young girl in her 20s was in an accident and died later in hospital—totally unnecessary, because it's a road that we know needs to be fixed.

I fought hard for election commitments, and I never took my seat for granted. But maybe some people thought it was safe, so I didn't get as many as other seats might have got. But this was one that I got, and I was really proud of it: we got a commitment to fix Five Ways. I'd actually prefer the project to be built over any political gain that could be had. When I heard that my Labor opponent would match it, I thought, 'That's a great thing,' because then, whoever wins, the community would get what they need. I thought this was one of those projects.

Residents have been calling for urgent upgrades to this intersection for years; 1,000 locals signed a petition. So, when my Labor opponent was quoted in the local Warrandyte Diary as saying that this would be matched, I was delighted, because I thought, no matter what happens, this project's getting filled. However, after the budget, I went flicking through the budget looking for a commitment to this project, and it wasn't there. I asked for a meeting with the transport minister and, to her credit, she sat down and we had a chat about it and she told me something quite alarming: that the candidate, despite having been quoted in the Warrandyte Diary as saying that this would be matched, had never passed that up through the chain in the Labor Party. It never happened. Let's pretend that that's a good enough excuse—that you require some form to fill in that goes through the party. Well, it's just not acceptable, with a road that a young girl died on and where families face that risk every morning and every evening, to have the Labor Party say, 'You didn't fill in a form, so that community's going to suffer.'

I notice that that same candidate is now a state candidate in the same area, in Warrandyte. I hope that the locals, whenever anything is promised by that candidate, ask, 'Are you going to fill in that form?' Will the Labor party be trusted to actually fulfil its promises? That side talks a lot about integrity, but integrity is what you do, not what you say. When we look at what they do, it is a trail of destruction. That is one example in my area that was about saving lives. So Labor has said one thing in my seat and then has done another in practice. There are serious questions for that candidate to answer.

Despite viewing young Australians as reliable supporters, Labor has abandoned younger Australians. There is no immediate plan found in this budget to assist with homeownership. For example, a young person who has recently found their way into an administrative role out of university and is renting is far worse off under Labor. It is hard to define a typical young person, but take, for example, a young individual who has recently found their way into such a job straight out of university. The median weekly advertised rents for that person have increased by a historic 4.3 per cent over the September quarter alone, bringing the year-on-year rise to 10.3 percent. In dollar terms, Australia's median weekly rent now sits at $520 for houses and $460 for units. While juggling growing HECS repayments and rental costs, this young person must juggle other immediate expenses. One survey of private sector office administrative workers found that 30 per cent have dropped private health insurance to save money. Again, it's another choice that people are making because of rising costs and rising inflation, and that side bank their support because they think they'll always have it. Well, be very careful what you take for granted. Labor's lack of support will see long-term consequences—in this example, to their health, where people are going without. That places further burden on our public health system, which again has a financial cost.

We have to do more as a parliament to help young people own their own piece of Australia. We all have to do more to get young people into their own homes. We know it is a source of economic security. I said in my first speech, standing here, that I want to look young people in the eye and say to them that homeownership is core business for our party. But we have urgent work to do—urgent work that shouldn't just wait for the next time that we have the privilege of sitting on those benches. It is urgent work right now. It was Robert Menzies who spoke in the darkest days of World War II—when there was a myriad of other things to be worried about, including the very existence of this nation—not just of the forgotten people but of their desire for a home into which they could withdraw and where they could be among their friends. That is a universal aspiration for every generation of Australians.

So, even though we are in opposition, we're offering constructive solutions. We have recommitted to the super home buyer scheme. We will extend the same opportunity to women who separate later in life—women who have few housing opportunities and are increasingly left homeless. I see this in my electorate. Like many others, I have been to food banks in my electorate run by churches and other community groups. I was at the Vantage Point Church in the east of my electorate, and they were running a food bank. As I left, there were 50 cars queued up to get some basic supplies, and just about every car was driven by a woman who had been separated from her partner or whose partner had died. They were doing their best to pay for the mortgage and the food with one income. I'm proud that our party has got a policy for people in that position, because, again, the security of their home is a way for them and their family to escape poverty.

We don't want to go down the path of the United States where giants ETFs snap up vast quantities of residential properties, becoming super landlords. On my declaration of interest I own Vanguard shares. But I am shocked to think that that ETF in the United States owns so much residential property. We don't want that here and we don't want it by a Vanguard or a superfund. We want families owning houses. That's who should be owning houses in this country.

We hear a lot of talk about old class divisions, but if you really want to create class divisions in this society, you will have fewer people owning homes and you will have a more superfunds owning them. That is a recipe for class division in this society. If the Labor Party are serious about it, they will not walk down that path and they will join with us in getting more young families into their own homes.

The part that our leader spoke about on this side was a tax relief. As he said, your cost of living is interconnected with tax relief. To help you and your families to plan ahead, the coalition believes in a core principle and it's this, that you should keep more of what you earn. Hardworking Australians should be rewarded and the best reward for that is lower taxes. Due to tax relief legislated by the last government, a person earning $90,000 paid $3,000 less tax than they did under Labor, each and every year, and that compounds over time.

Stage 3 of the tax cuts will lower tax for more than 10 million Australians. It will simplify our tax system. We know it will abolish the 37 per cent tax rate entirely. It means those earning between $45,000 and $200,000 will pay no more than 30c in the dollar. For someone earning $60,000 a year it means $400 more in your pocket. For those earning $80,000 it means $900 more. For those earning $$100,000 it means $1,370 more. For 95 per cent of workers it means a top rate of no more than 30c in the dollar. The coalition plan means that the top five per cent of income earners will pay 33 per cent of all income tax. The legislated tax plan future proofs people's income that they have worked hard for. We are hearing the whispers again about how this particular tax cut won't survive going forward. Again, don't walk down that path. Stagflation is a concept I hope we don't experience but it's one we should keep one eye out for.

I will conclude my last 30 seconds with this: what was the point of it all? We all came back here for a special budget, so why? Why did we come back? Why did we sit through that? To those who tuned in to watch, they saw a set piece event designed to exploit publicity. They saw a new Treasurer enjoy the limelight, stand up and get lots of hugs from his colleagues. But Australians are asked to ask, 'What was the point of it all? Was it just an expensive press release?'

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