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

This motion is about the unacceptable increases in passport fees and processing times. Let's be clear: this isn't a conversation or debate about a luxury item. For families, particularly families with relatives overseas, we are talking of a necessity.

Deputy Speaker, I want you to imagine a family of four—two children and two parents—on a close-to-average income. The average income is getting closer to $100,000, so let's round it up, to make a combined family income of $200,000. That family, in the last 20 months, has seen the cost of groceries rise by nine per cent and the cost of housing increase by 12 per cent. If they have an average mortgage of $750,000, that's an increase in their mortgage payments of $22,000 after tax, and if you're on an average income that is very hard to find from other sources. They've seen the cost of electricity go up by 22 per cent and the cost of gas go up by 27 per cent. Insurance rates have hit record highs. I want you to imagine that family of four. For people in electorates like mine—where 70 per cent of residents are first- or second-generation migrants, as am I—there is often a good news story where a relative is getting married and you're invited. Or there's often a short-term tragedy, where you find out that a loved one—a parent or a grandparent—has died and you're asked to go to the funeral. Often, those are urgent requests that need urgent processing. For many families in my electorate, processing fees for a family of four require an urgent application, and that has an even increased fee. Many may not be aware of what those fees are: looking at the fees for a family of four, with the 1 July increase the $290 processing fee for a 10-year adult passport will cost $688. With two parents and then a child's passport, which is $201—and only lasts for five years, so they have to be renewed more often—we're talking about an urgent fee of $1,778.

Just imagine that you're a family of four in my electorate; you're struggling as it is and your parent or grandparent has passed away. You're trying to rush home to comfort your loved ones and to say your final goodbyes. For a family of four who have to go to Athens, an economy return airfare is about $14,000. To go to Hong Kong, it's just under $5,000. For those going to Rome, it's just over $10,000, economy return, and for those going to Mumbai it's just under $8,000. Then, on top of that, this government is asking you to pay $1,788 to process a document that allows you to do that.

This government likes to talk about its stage 3 tax cuts and how it's giving an average family like that $800. Of course we support that, because it's needed. But with this hand, $800 dollars is being given and with this hand $8,000 dollars is being taken away in loss of real income. Australians are doing it tough, and this manifests itself at the checkout in the grocery store, it manifests itself when they look at the utility bills that they have to pay and it manifests themselves when they look at the $22,000 in extra mortgage payments they have to find after tax. For families in electorates like mine, and in many metro areas in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Adelaide, a $750,000 mortgage doesn't get you much—it doesn't—so they're paying a lot more than that extra $22,000 increase. Then, on top of that, when their heart is broken and they have to go and say their final goodbyes, they're being slugged with this unacceptable increase.

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