Jenny Ware (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Full bipartisan support—thank you, Minister. He had full bipartisan support, and that report that was given to the minister had bipartisan support. It was unanimous. So I would suggest that the Prime Minister could take something from the John Howard playbook and think, 'I'm going to act in the nation's interests here'—act in the nation's interests and not in the interests of some of his friends and allies. He has missed an opportunity to demonstrate strong leadership, moral courage and political conviction on a national, social and health epidemic.

Ms Murphy's husband has asked: 'What is going on? Labor, what are you doing about this report?' Reverend Tim Costello has been asking about it. Anna Bardsley contacted the Prime Minister three weeks ago and said, 'I am coming to Canberra this week because I need to speak to the Prime Minister about gambling reform and about gambling harm.' She couldn't get an audience with the Prime Minister, but she got an audience with me, and the stories from her and her colleagues about the devastation of gambling harm on them and on their families were heartbreaking. There are women who have served time in prison for theft simply to feed their gambling habits. Another spoke about first gambling at the age of seven as well as the social impacts online gambling has had on his Asian Australian community.

Australians love a punt. Today is Melbourne Cup Day. Most Australians gamble responsibly. They do it with friends. They do it as a social activity. They gamble with money they know that they can afford to lose. That is fine. But, for a number of Australians, gambling harm causes a massive problem for them.

I've been asked about Bundeena by somebody over on that side. I went to the minister after April and said: 'Can you please assist this community of mine? They need fibre to the premises or fibre to the curb.' The minister wrote back to me: 'NBN Co has advised that there have never been any plans to provide fibre-to-the-curb services to Bundeena. However, parts of Bundeena have been included in the project to eventually deliver fibre-to-the-premises upgrades.' That was supposed to have occurred in 2023. The minister has now changed the date to 2025. He indicated at the end of the letter, 'Unfortunately, this process is lengthy and has significantly delayed the delivery of upgrades to the Bundeena area.'

Nobody on this side is talking about privatising or selling off NBN—

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