Melissa McIntosh (Lindsay, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Energy Affordability) Share this | Hansard source

The High Streets across our country are slowly being stripped of life because they just can't afford the bills. I know this; it's happening in my own community. Each day I wake up to a new local story that says another business has closed its doors. Business insolvencies right across the country are at record highs. The member opposite should be concerned because it's heartbreaking that Western Sydney has some of the highest rates—Western Sydney, where his electorate is. Six out of 10 business failures are in the west, but he's walking out the door, turning his back on his own electorate when he could be hearing the stories of the people who are behind these small businesses in Bringelly, Merrylands, Guildford and Canterbury.

Why is this occurring? Because they just can't pay the bills. And the top one, the top bill they can't afford, is their energy bill. A gym in Penrith was paying around $12½ thousand or $13,000 for energy. Now they're paying $27,000. How is this sustainable? It's absolutely not. Do you know what is going to happen? They're going to close their doors as well. It's not just the cafes and the gyms which are struggling, as heartbreaking as that is; it is also our Australian manufacturers—those manufacturers across Western Sydney that are making Aussie made and are a heavy industry. Do you know what they rely on? They rely on 24/7 reliable energy. Their lights can't go out. They can't put solar panels on the roof. They could have all the solar panels in the world, but they need gas. They need affordable gas. They are making products that our country relies on and that will lead us into the future. They need gas to be making steel. They need gas to be making some of our country's most important safety products, our railways and our roads. The importance of sovereign manufacturing is critical, but right now they are struggling under this government's energy prices.

I've talked about our small businesses and our manufacturers, but do you know who is struggling the most? It's people—the people across our country, in Western Sydney and in all parts of our nation. As my colleague the member for Fairfax said, people are on hardship payments for their energy bills like never before. There are 600 more each week needing support just to pay their energy bills. People are coming up to their local members on the street, saying that they can't afford to both eat and heat. They are lining up at our food banks like never before. I've spoken to some of our local charities who say that the people who they are feeding have double incomes. They're not only feeding these people but helping to pay their bills. They're coming to a food bank and saying, 'I can't afford my electricity bill,' and that food bank is helping them to pay it. Now that very food bank that is helping Australians in need is struggling because their own energy prices are up, and they don't know how much longer they can keep their doors open.

At one stage, there was hope. That hope was given by the Australian Labor Party at the last election when they told the Australian people that their energy bills would be $275 cheaper. That hope has been completely slashed now. How can you say something 97 times and not be committed to it? How can you break a promise so big that you said it 97 times to the Australian people? They haven't admitted to this broken promise, and when we look at the numbers that $275 is now completely gone. People across Western Sydney are now paying over a thousand dollars more for their electricity. Every single person in Western Sydney is struggling—those small businesses, those cafes who tell me that sometimes hardly anyone walks through the door, that gym in Penrith which is at threat of closing and that food bank that is supporting people on double incomes. Do you know what? A grant that I just got into our schools is now feeding kids who aren't being fed before going to school. This is a disgrace.

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