Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

This evening I rise to talk about the changes coming in on 1 July and other measures that the government has implemented to help families with the cost of living. With successive budget surpluses, we are building a sustainable economic future for Australians while providing targeted support for those who need it. On 1 July, every Australian taxpayer will received a tax cut. Across our country, 13.6 million people will receive a tax cut. As we know, this provides a bigger tax cut, delivering meaningful cost-of-living relief to Middle Australia without adding inflationary pressures to the economy. This is keeping money in the pockets of hardworking Australians.

The government's tax cuts, unlike the reforms proposed by the opposition, provide greater protection for low- and middle-income taxpayers from bracket creep and support the progressiveness of Australia's taxation system, with nurses, teachers and truckies earmarked as some of the occupations most likely to benefit. In our electorate of McEwen, 76,000 people will receive a tax cut. The average tax cut for taxpayers in McEwen will be $1,583. This is an extra $1,583 of relief in the pockets of members of our community who are working hard to make ends meet.

Further tax relief is also seen in the Albanese Labor government's amendment to the Medicare levy low-income threshold for 2023-24. This will insure that more than one million low-income taxpayers continue to be exempt from the Medicare levy or pay a reduced levy rate. It's all part of a budget that is responsible in its relief for Australians. These much-needed tax cuts have been threatened to be taken away with the election of the LNP government, should they be elected, through their rollback schemes.

Another way the government is providing cost relief is through energy bill support. We know that energy price rises have put pressure on small businesses and household budgets. From the 22 failed opposition energy policies that left a legacy of chaos in the energy sector to the illegal Russian invasion of Ukraine, energy prices have been a burden on all Australians. That's why every household will receive a $300 rebate and around 1.5 million businesses will receive a $325 rebate. This energy bill relief will take the pressure off household bills, again providing effective cost-of-living relief to all Australians. This is practical energy assistance, unlike the far-fetched ideas that have been thrown around by those opposite. Their plan is a pie in the sky and off in the never-never. Our plan is concrete and flows into household pockets in six days time.

Let's not forget this government has greenlit 54 renewable projects, which will power three million homes. We have also supported states to achieve 330,000 rooftop installations of solar this year alone. Rather than promoting half-baked proposals, the government is continuing to move swiftly to implement the energy infrastructure that was neglected for a decade, getting diverse and Australian-made energy input into the grid as soon as possible to alleviate the current pressures on the energy market. Everyone can be sure that this Labor government is being pragmatic and acting on evidence to provide sustainable and efficient energy infrastructure to support Australia's growing energy needs. We also consider the cost involved in doing this to be far cheaper than the cost of inaction, which we know will cause more serious weather conditions and more strain on Australian businesses, farmers and households.

When it comes to Medicare, it has been the heart and soul of the Labor Party to provide the residents of McEwen and Australians across the country with cheaper medicines. The Albanese government is again easing the cost-of-living pressures by ensuring that your Medicare card and not your credit card determines what health care you can get. We are expanding the ways Australians can get mental health care under Medicare, with a $361 million dollar investment in mental health services. We're also indexing the rebates on common medical tests such as blood tests, which will keep these procedures bulk-billed. We are also expanding on our improvements to women's health, with higher Medicare rebates for seeing a gynaecologist for complex conditions like endometriosis, for revolutionary new medicine for breast cancer and for care from a midwife.

Residents in McEwen have benefited and will continue to benefit from our commitment to delivering cheaper medicines. Since January 2023, residents in our communities have saved over $1.9 million and got over 160,000 cheaper scripts. As of June 2024, they've enjoyed the benefit of 30,000 60-day scripts, saving them and their GPs valuable time and energy. In addition, we are easing the pressure on household budgets by freezing the PBS co-payment and adding more medicines to the PBS. In addition, pensioners and concession cardholders, who do it extremely tough, also won't pay more than $7.70 for their PBS medications for the next five years. I certainly hope that the coalition will continue to support these sorts of measures.

When it comes to education, the Albanese government is ensuring the future of aspirational Australians by building a better and fairer education system for everyone. This can be seen in our education policy, which provides $3 billion in relief to those with student debts. This relief comes in the form of capping the HELP indexation rate to the lower of the consumer price index or the wage price index. We also backdated this to 1 June 2023, when the indexation was severely affected by the inflation rate. Students felt like they were drowning in debt and many students were considering whether or not their degrees were worth it. We are rectifying that. In McEwen alone this change will support over 17,000 people with HELP debt. The changes will make tertiary education more accessible and open the door for more young Australians. Also, because we've permanently changed the way indexation is capped, it will mean that this will never happen again.

The government understands the importance of higher education for upskilling our younger generations and providing opportunities for people to reskill. Another way we're providing cost-of-living relief for Australia students is by introducing the Commonwealth prac payment for teaching, social work and nursing students, including midwifery students. We're providing over $300 a week to around 68,000 higher education students and over 5,000 VET students who do mandatory prac as part of their degree. We know that there are skill shortages and we are doing what we can to help alleviate that problem.

We are doing the same with housing. We understand that safe, affordable housing is central to the security and dignity of everyone in our community. It's a national shame that many Australians cannot find an affordable place to buy, but this government has been working very hard—against the odds in this parliament—and has introduced measures to change that, including a National Housing Accord that will support planning and zoning reforms, an investment of over $350 million in additional federal funding to deliver 10,000 affordable rental homes over five years, which has been matched by states and territories. Federal funding of $2 billion through the Social Housing Accelerator will deliver 4,000 new social homes across Australia. These are so important, and we have a $500 million housing support program for initiatives to help kickstart housing supply, including connecting essential services and amenities, supporting new housing development and building planning capacity. The fund that we have put up—the $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund—is the biggest investment to support social housing and affordable rental housing in more than a decade, and supports some 30,000 new homes. Further delays in the Greens passing these reforms through—despite stating they want ambitious reforms—is regrettable. We urge them to get out of the way.

Veterans are so important in our community and I want to outline the additional support for Veterans Affairs in this budget. As noted by Shane Wright in the Sydney Morning Herald, on page 97 of the budget is a paragraph that needs to be read and understood by all Australians. It refers to the projected $6.5 billion going to veterans over the next five years, which is largely due to more claims being processed because of increased staffing levels, which will result in increased payments. What that means is that this government took to the election a plan to support our veterans—not just cheap talk, but actually a plan to do something. We know that in the previous government the member for Calare threatened to resign as veterans affairs minister unless money was allocated to the Defence Force because veterans were waiting up to a thousand days to have their claim heard—not actually paid, just heard. We have put on over 500 employees in the Department of Veterans' Affairs to reduce the waiting time for those claims and we're seeing the evidence of that. The member for Calare let the cat out of the bag when he said the former government thought there was no political advantage in veterans, so they didn't do anything to support the DVA.

In conclusion, what I say to people is this: we know you're doing it tough but with this government you have a group of people who are prepared to stand side by side and support you when you need it.

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