Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Social Services) Share this | Hansard source

If the minister was listening, which he clearly wasn't, he would know that I'm discussing the priority that this bill is taking in the House. It's the absolute wrong priority. Instead of the government doing their job, we have this. It's the solemn duty of government to use their energy, time, skill and the Public Service to protect Australians. Instead, we have this. It's an utter embarrassment to those opposite.

There are good people opposite who I know feel embarrassed by these sorts of tawdry deals done in the Senate. It's been legislated at the eleventh hour now this year. It's close to the end of the year. Why? Because that was the promise made to Senator Pocock—'If you vote for our bill, we'll make sure we legislate this by the end of the year.' With all due respect to Senator Pocock, he hasn't really driven a hard bargain here. He's not exactly negotiated for himself, from his perspective, a phenomenal outcome, because what has he negotiated and what's the government delivered? The government's delivered him a committee of fellow travellers who will give them useless advice that they should already know and that they'll then ignore. How do we know that? Because they've already ignored it. The interim advisory committee, this committee that is now being legislated, has provided advice to the government that the government have ignored.

All of that you could put up with because, in the end, if people want to volunteer their time and give the government advice that the government will ignore, it's a free country. Absolutely. Do it. But to spend nearly $10 million of taxpayers' money to bring together a group of people who are already doing very well for themselves to prognosticate and give advice to government that is going to be ignored is an abject waste of money. We have seen that before this year, with $400 million spent on a referendum. That all of the energy and efforts of this government have been put into priorities that are completely not helping the Australian people in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis is remarkable.

When you look at what the government have delivered and what they promised, it's very interesting. I started my remarks by saying nobody in the gallery and no-one in the Australian public had heard of the Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee before the election. Why? Because it was never promised. We know it only came up as part of a dirty deal with Senator Pocock. But what the Australian people did hear before the last election very loudly from the Prime Minister and all of his MPs and shadow ministers at that time was that he was going to make their lives easier. Under this government, how have they made it easier? The cost of food is up by 8.2 per cent, the cost of housing is up by 10.4 per cent, the cost of insurance is up by 17 per cent, the cost of electricity is up by 18.2 per cent and the cost of gas is up by 28 per cent. An Australian with an average mortgage is paying $24,000 a year more.

The most repeated promise before the last election wasn't the promise of an Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee; instead, we got another promise on 97 occasions. That promise was repeated not as a slip of the tongue; not a moment where, as we all do from time to time, you get a bit excited and say something that you haven't thought through. On 97 occasions the Prime Minister said, 'I will deliver Australians energy price reductions of $275 a year.' The Prime Minister has never mentioned that since the election. It was something he was willing to promise 97 times before the election, but he's not been able or willing to repeat it once since.

Instead, as I said, we see that the cost of electricity is up by nearly 20 per cent. The cost of gas is up by nearly 30 per cent. Australians would have every right to be angry if energy prices had remained the same. They'd say: 'Well, hold on. You told me I was getting a $275 reduction. But it hasn't moved. It's still the same as when you were elected.' They would have a right to be angry. They have a right to be utterly appalled that, rather than prices staying the same or going backwards by $275, they're paying 20 per cent more for electricity and 30 per cent more for gas. This Prime Minister stared down the barrel of a camera 97 times and made that solemn promise to the Australian people. I suspect many Australians voted for him on that basis, because they believed that he meant what he said, that he was going to deliver what he said and that he was going to deliver energy price relief.

So, instead of delivering the things that they did talk about before the election, we're now spending the precious time today in this chamber, the people's house, on a day when the issues being faced in this country require urgent attention from this government, delivering on a dirty deal done by the government with Senator David Pocock in order to get some of their troubled industrial relations legislation through. It's a shocking precedent. Do the backroom deals all you want, as long as it doesn't cost Australian taxpayers. Somebody's got to stand up for those taxpayers, and on this side of the House we will, and I certainly will.

Let me repeat: these taxpayers are people who get up every day, those mums and dads who don't get home in time to bathe their young children, because they're working. They have to work that little bit harder every time the government does something like this today, spending $10 million on something that is akin to flushing money down the drain. Who's going to stand up for those people? Well, clearly, nobody in the government, but we will. It's a terrible precedent because I'm worried now, particularly with their very troubled and radical industrial relations changes seemingly being stalled again in the Senate, what other dirty deals they are going to do in order to get the union wish list ticked off. Who won't they sell out? Who won't they shake down for a bit more money in order to get their agenda through in order to pay back their union paymasters? This time it's $8.7 million, but the next dirty deal will be a lot bigger, and the dirty deal after that will be a lot bigger. And, like a gambler, they'll chase their losses. The only problem is that they're not gambling with their money; they're gambling with your money. It's very easy to gamble with and waste other people's money.

We will be opposing this bill. We'll be opposing the fruits of this sneaky, backroom, dirty deal between the Labor Party and the senator. We'll be calling on the government to save this $8.7 million. Put this $8.7 million into something better. Put it into the health system. Put it into mental health. Put it into the education system. There are a thousand things you could do with $8.7 million. If I went to my electorate and said, 'What on earth could we do with $8.7 million?' there'd be a list as long as your arm of decent, worthy projects and people to support, including for cost-of-living relief, that everyone in this place would say is absolutely worthy. It would be a worthy use of $8.7 million.

But flushing $8.7 million down the drain to bring in a group of Labor fellow travellers to give them advice that they're going to ignore is terrible policy. It shows no regard and no respect for the Australian people. It completely disregards those millions and millions of Australians who work hard, get up every day and make sacrifices in order to work hard and pay their taxes. The one thing they expect in return is a decent government that spends that money wisely. They'll look at this and know that every single one of those 8.7 million dollars is being utterly wasted, disregarding their efforts, and that's why we will be opposing this bill.

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