Mark Coulton (Parkes, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Ageing and the Voluntary Sector) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009, along with related appropriation bills for the 2008-09 budget. As a new member of parliament, this is the first budget I have had the opportunity to respond to and I am delighted to do so. However, I must say that overall I found this budget to be terribly disappointing. There is very little in this budget to provide a better future for regional Australia, particularly for my electorate of Parkes, and I find that incredibly frustrating.

Firstly, I would like to put on record my extreme disappointment over the lack of funding in this budget for regional development, particularly the decision to axe the hugely beneficial Regional Partnerships program. I know that this House has seen and heard many a debate over the Regional Partnerships program, and the accusations of pork-barrelling and flawed administration in relation to this program predate my time in this House. While the current government, particularly the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, is keen to try to discredit this program, I can inform the House that many communities in my electorate have benefited beyond measure from Regional Partnerships.

Just last week I was able to see the benefits of Regional Partnerships firsthand. Last week I had the opportunity to be at the opening of the doctor’s residence in Baradine. Baradine is a small town in my electorate that has been through some very tough times of late, yet its community spirit cannot be extinguished. I do not think there is a more resilient and hardworking community in my electorate. Baradine has always had a difficult time keeping a permanent doctor in the town, so the community got together, raised some funds, received some local council support and finally put in an application under the Regional Partnerships program, an application which was successful. The community now owns a doctor’s residence, which has helped them attract a permanent doctor, who will start at the end of next month. In the past, Baradine has also received funding under the Regional Partnerships program for the rural transaction centre, which provides many essential services to a community that would otherwise go without.

Baradine is only one example of a town that has seen the significant benefits of Regional Partnerships. Other worthwhile recipients that have received funding under this program in my electorate include the Moree Plains Gallery Art Precinct development, which received $269,500 for new workshops and upgrades. I must say that the art displayed in this gallery is largely Indigenous art and the display has been a huge boost to the Indigenous community in the Moree area.

The CWA in Gunnedah has received $48,253 for an extension to its building. The Mungindi Progress Association received $14,850 towards a community bus. The Coonamble Shire Council received $27,500 to assist with the Quambone Community Shed. And in my home town of Warialda the local medical centre received $200,000 to develop a much needed walk-in, walk-out primary health care centre.

I know that the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, along with some of his colleagues, has been working hard to discredit this program. I know that there have been accusations that this program was not administered adequately and that there was not enough regulation or paperwork for the program. But I would invite the minister to come and visit some of the groups in my electorate who worked hard to put in an application, only to be told that the program is no longer operating, and so they have to simply miss out.

I might make the point in this place that the member opposite me, who represents the city of Ipswich, commented in his budget reply speech on the largesse that flowed through to his electorate. He mentioned $10 million to fix up the main street in Ipswich, and while I do not wish the residents of that wonderful city any ill I am wondering what paperwork and what processes were gone through for that project. I would like to see the application. As I have been sitting in this House, I have heard speaker after speaker from marginal Labor seats being very much appreciative of the great gifts that have come their way, and I am wondering what paperwork and processes were done before this funding came through.

I would encourage the minister to speak to some of the constituents who did comply with the guidelines and filled in pages and pages of paperwork. I suggest he speak to Tony Cole and the crew at the Coonabarabran Volunteer Rescue Association, who work tirelessly to help others during natural disasters and after accidents. These volunteers are hardworking local gentlemen—plumbers, builders and abattoir workers. They look after the carnage on the Newell Highway and at all times of day and night they are saving lives and, at worst, sometimes retrieving bodies from the accidents that we have in that area. They desperately need a new shed for their vehicle and equipment, as their current premises are far from adequate—premises, I hasten to add, that they actually constructed themselves. The local community has contributed money towards the project, and so has the New South Wales state government. The Volunteer Rescue Association were hoping the remainder of the money that they need to complete the project might be available through Regional Partnerships, but now that hope has been diminished. It will be a tough slog for these guys to try and find the money in their local community to help their service, which really is essential for the community. The Coonabarabran Volunteer Rescue Association should not be left in the lurch.

And there are other groups in my electorate who were hoping for funding through Regional Partnerships. They include the Dubbo Royal Flying Doctor Service base, whose facilities are in desperate need of expansion and upgrade. This iconic Australian service will now have to fight a little bit harder to ensure its survival due to the axing of Regional Partnerships. I might add that the local community in Dubbo have raised half a million dollars as their contribution to this base.

As I have said, while I wish the good citizens of Ipswich no harm, I hope while they are taking refuge under the pot plants in their new main street they think of the people in western New South Wales who are suffering from an inadequate service from the flying doctor base due to the axing of that program—a program in which, I might add, their application was submitted to the area consultative committee; people had been working on that for many months with community fundraising activities.

In addition to Regional Partnerships, this budget also took the razor to many other essential rural programs, including Growing Regions and agricultural training, and scrapped the OPEL contract, which was to provide fast broadband to all Australians, particularly those in rural areas such as my electorate of Parkes. In these three key areas—regional development, communications and agriculture—Labor has stripped more than $1 billion from rural and regional Australia. This budget fails to deliver any practical initiatives that will help to empower and grow our regional communities.

I am very disappointed that much of the funding allocated in this budget appears to have been diverted to honour election promises made by the Labor government during last year’s election campaign. If there are accusations of pork-barrelling being made over Regional Partnerships, then surely the funding of these election promises should be tarred with the same brush. From what I can gather, many of these election promises have been signed off with next to no administration or paperwork, and they have certainly not been subject to an intense level of scrutiny. I have also been made aware that much of the money that would appear to have been allocated in the budget for certain programs has already been spent to cover Labor’s election promises, which means there is not much left in the pot for the rest of us. From my perspective, that is perhaps the most distressing aspect of this year’s budget.

As I said in my maiden speech, I believe the greatest tool of empowerment and builder of confidence is education. I do not believe that this budget delivers on Labor’s election promise of an education revolution, particularly for school-age children. I am very disappointed by the discontinuation of the $1.2 billion Investing in Our Schools Program. Investing in Our Schools has gone a long way towards fixing some of the critical infrastructure and faculty shortfalls in many schools across my electorate of Parkes. Since becoming the federal member of parliament, I have had the pleasure of visiting many schools across my electorate that have benefited from this funding. These schools include Ilford Public School, Fairfax Public School, the GS Kidd Memorial School—which, I might add, is a school for children with disabilities—Coonabarabran High School and Moree Public School, to name but a few. These school communities have made a conscious decision to apply for funding to fix the problems that they see as the most significant in their schools. After all, no-one knows more about what is needed for these schools than the parents and teachers. Some of these schools are one- and two-teacher schools in very isolated areas. I see that the Investing in Our Schools Program has come to an end and I think that is a real shame. It is also a shame that there are no new initiatives for primary schools, with funding directed to programs specifically for secondary schools, and that the $700 literacy and numeracy tuition vouchers for struggling kids have also been scrapped.

As I said earlier, overall I found this budget to be terribly disappointing. However, there are some things in this budget that are welcome, and I am hopeful that some of the programs announced may be of benefit to my constituents in the Parkes electorate. According to the Treasurer, the decision to invest $20 billion in the new Building Australia Fund could well have some positive implications in my electorate. According to the Treasurer, this fund will be used to finance roads, rail, ports and broadband across the nation. While I have some very real concerns about the administration of this fund, particularly the fact that it appears as though it will be going through the states and that the money set aside for the next 12 months appears to be only for planning, I am still trying to see the glass half full and hope that some of the worthwhile projects in my electorate may be funded under this scheme.

I am hopeful that the inland rail line project may be financed through the Building Australia Fund. The proposed rail line would bisect the Parkes electorate and would place it at the crossroads of transport in regional Australia. It would be particularly beneficial for some of the major towns in my electorate, including Dubbo, Gilgandra, Coonamble, Walgett and Moree. I would also like to see the construction of an expressway over the Blue Mountains as one of the projects delivered by the Building Australia Fund. This road would bring with it enormous tourism and business development opportunities for my electorate, particularly for the southern towns, including Mudgee and Wellington. I am also hopeful that some of the smaller projects, such as the upgrade of the Castlereagh River bridge at Ulamambri, will be considered.

I also believe that the productivity of an area should be considered when allocating road funding. Many areas in my electorate have black soil roads that may not have a high enough level of passenger usage to be considered for funding under the existing road funding guidelines but are frequently used to haul large quantities of grain and agricultural produce. I will be pushing for productivity to be a factor to be taken into account when roads are considered for funding under the Building Australia Fund, whenever that may be.

I am pleased the Labor government decided to continue with the Roads to Recovery program. Roads to Recovery has been a real boon to regional roads in Australia, particularly in my electorate, and I know that many of my local councils will be pleased that they are still able to access it.

The announcement that the government will invest $10 billion in the new Health and Hospitals Fund to finance improvements to hospitals and the healthcare system could also be a plus for my constituents. While I have some serious doubts over the administration of this money, I will be pushing for some major health infrastructure projects in my electorate to be funded. I am particularly keen to see the Gunnedah medical centre up and running. There are many people who have been working tirelessly on this initiative, and I have recently met with some of the instigators, including Dr Grahame Deane, Kate Perrett, Fiona Strang and Penny Crawford. The Gunnedah medical centre concept is a superclinic that is ready to go. Not only will it provide essential health services for the residents of Gunnedah and the surrounding areas but it will also provide training facilities for medical students. This project should be funded through the Health and Hospitals Fund, and I will be working hard to ensure that it is not overlooked.

I welcome the announcement of the $11 billion Education Investment Fund, again with some apprehension over the administration. This money is supposed to be used to finance skills—TAFE colleges and universities across Australia. Through this fund, I would like to see the implementation of a thorough, community based learning program, similar to the Gwydir Learning Region that operates in my electorate. My involvement with the Gwydir Learning Region opened my eyes to how a community changes when it values education. The provision of educational opportunities that are relevant for individual communities must be a priority for the Education Investment Fund.

I would like to mention a few other budget announcements that are relevant to my electorate of Parkes. The Labor government’s announcement that it will provide all four-year-olds with access to early childhood education for 15 hours a week, 40 weeks a year, by 2013 sounds like a good idea in theory, but I have some concerns as to how it may be implemented when there are areas in my electorate that do not have an existing preschool or childcare facility. I believe the key to delivering this promise in rural areas is increasing the funding given to the many mobile preschools, including the Tharawanga and Gwydir mobile schools, which operate in my electorate. I have already raised this issue with the relevant minister and I am hopeful that, when it comes to early childhood education, the needs of kids in rural and remote areas will be considered.

The decision to continue to provide some funding for volunteers may also have positive implications in my electorate. I know that many volunteer groups in Parkes—whether they be the PRAMS groups in Gunnedah, working to improve the paediatric and maternity services at the local hospital, or the Walgett District Historical Society, working on a celebration of 100 years of rail to Walgett, to be held later this year—will be interested in the Volunteer Grants program announced in the budget. I will be doing all I can to ensure that as many local volunteer groups as possible from my electorate get a slice of this funding.

Another big issue in my electorate is the provision of supported accommodation for disabled people to allow them to age in place. The budget did outline some measures that are meant to increase the availability of these services, and I will be pushing the case of a few extremely worthwhile disability housing projects in my electorate, especially the supported accommodation earmarked for Narrabri and the Westhaven Association’s project in Dubbo.

Overall, I would say that this budget does not provide for regional communities and that we have been severely short-changed. However, in the interests of remaining positive, I can say that I will be fighting tooth and nail to ensure that every project in my electorate receives every possible dollar of funding that we can access. Despite not having much to draw from, I will not see the good people of the Parkes electorate go without.

In conclusion, I would also like to place on the record my support for the budget reply speech delivered by the Leader of the Opposition, Brendan Nelson. Dr Nelson’s speech gave the people of Australia an opportunity to see what the coalition stands for and how we will achieve our goals. It was a real indication of the high standard of the coalition as an alternative government, and I hope his words are firmly engraved in the minds of Australian voters.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The people of my electorate, much to their dismay, learnt long and hard about coalition neglect in the 11½ years the coalition were in government. Plenty of promises were made in the last few weeks of the federal election campaign by the incumbent Liberal member, but regrettably in 11½ long years residents saw almost no money going into the development of Ipswich and its surrounding rural areas. It is interesting to note that the biggest swings to the Labor Party in the federal electorate of Blair at the last election were in the rural areas—and the member for Parkes should consider that. It was the neglect of the coalition government, of which the National Party was a member, which saw rural areas swing so heavily to Labor. In some of the rural areas we got a primary swing of 20 per cent; in some of the areas it was 15 per cent. There are areas in the federal electorate of Blair that have not seen a National Party representative at any level for over 20 years. This is because people believed the Labor Party and the current Prime Minister and they disbelieved the promises which were coming fast and furious in the last few weeks of the campaign from the coalition when opinion polls were obviously not going well for them.

I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and its associated bills. I agree with the Treasurer, who announced in his budget speech that this is a budget that strengthens Australia’s economic foundations and delivers for working families under pressure. I am pleased to speak today on this bill because the budget handed down by the Treasurer is manifestly a responsible budget for our times and heralds a new era of responsible economic management. This budget marks the end of the reckless short-term spending initiatives driven by the electoral cycle that so characterised the previous coalition government. It marks the start of responsible economic management and investment to prepare our economy to meet our future economic challenges, placing downward pressure on inflation and beginning our long-overdue investment in our nation’s future.

I am sure in years to come that the various funds established under this budget—these future funds, which have been hailed—will be heralded as great nation-building initiatives. Contrary to the protestations we have heard from the other side, this budget demonstrates that the Labor Party is unquestionably the party of responsible economic management and that only the Rudd Labor government is serious about responsible fiscal management. It is clear that now the people of this country can trust only Labor to manage the national purse strings.

Look at the opposition’s proposals, which include raiding $22 billion from the surplus in some Latin American style profligacy of the 1960s and 1970s. Witness their irresponsibility in threatening to block important budget measures. This budget cuts out waste and pares back the excesses of the regional rorts of the previous coalition government—no more wastage on Work Choices and other coalition propaganda dressed up as government information, no more regional rorts without any regard to the infrastructure needs of our country. Every single dollar of new spending is offset by savings. We have delivered on our commitment to a budget surplus of at least 1.5 per cent of GDP; in fact, we have gone further, with a budget surplus of 1.8 per cent. That is higher by 0.6 per cent than the coalition government’s forecast for the surplus in 2008-09.

This budget clearly demonstrates that the Labor Party is the true party of economic management, the real party of economic reform and the only party unapologetically committed to nation building. It has framed this budget in difficult economic circumstances, against serious challenges, in tighter credit markets, with turbulent global economic problems and slowing world economic growth. Upon taking office, this government inherited the highest level of domestic inflation in 16 years.

During the campaign I ran mobile offices all over the electorate. I have continued to do that since the election. I visited the Riverlink Shopping Centre, the Brassall Shopping Centre and many other places. I have continued to attend the country shows, which were so enjoyable during the campaign. I took great delight in welcoming the German Consulate General to Marburg, a place just outside of Ipswich whose three representatives at the state, local and federal levels have German surnames. I visited the Ipswich Show for three days and the Boonah Show. I look forward to being at the Ipswich home show and the Rosewood, Kalbar, Gatton and Laidley shows.

Constituents told me during the campaign that inflation did not start on 25 November—it had been brewing for a long time. This budget honours our commitment to support working Australians and working families under financial pressure. They have not been forgotten with the $55 billion Working Families Support Package handed down in this budget. We have fulfilled our commitment to reduce personal income tax by $47 billion over four years. These taxes are geared to helping middle- and low-income families. The whole package is targeted towards tax, child care, education, housing and other needs in our community.

The Rudd Labor government understand that families are under financial strain. That is why we are tackling inflation in this budget. The Rudd Labor government has a plan to tackle inflation. It is not a fairytale, in our view. It is not something that happened on 25 November last year. We have delivered a responsible and disciplined budget, which builds on our five-point plan.

There are major investments in skills and education with trade-training centres in schools. I welcomed the initiative in my constituency at St Edmund’s Boys College, which along with the grammar schools has established the Ipswich trade training centre. I urge the other schools in my electorate to do so as well, combining the Lockyer Valley and the Boonah shire. Our commitment to 630,000 extra training places over five years will help tackle the skills crisis which has so added to inflationary pressures.

National leadership in the area of infrastructure will ease bottlenecks which have been pushing up the costs of doing business in this country. I on behalf of my electorate welcome Infrastructure Australia. I look forward to seeing the priorities handed down.

The first home saver account initiatives are welcomed by my constituents, who have told me that they think they are a great idea. We are in one of the fastest growing areas of south-east Queensland—Ipswich and the rural areas—and the cost of housing is increasing all the time.

I welcome also the measures designed specifically to boost workforce participation through the tax and childcare changes. In the medium term the budget will encourage increased workforce participation. This is indeed backed up by the Treasury modelling, which predicts that the tax cuts alone will encourage 65,000 people to re-enter the workforce. This additional supply of labour will be much welcomed. It will mean 2.5 million additional hours of work in the economy each week. This is great news in terms of the acute skills shortages and labour shortages that we have, particularly in the federal electorate of Blair.

The Rudd Labor government will help families ease the burden of childcare costs by increasing the childcare tax rebate from 30 to 50 per cent. It will establish 260 childcare centres in priority areas. This will alleviate the frustration that families have on numerous occasions told me that they experience with having multiple drop-offs and alleviate the additional costs and time when this happens. Co-location is a great thing for childcare facilities and schools. The changes will ensure that half of families’ out-of-pocket expenses for childcare costs will be met every year. Unlike the former coalition government, which delayed payment to families, the government will pay the 50 per cent childcare tax rebate quarterly to ensure support is available when needed.

For the benefit of the member for Parkes, who earlier mentioned the commitments to Ipswich that we have made in the budget, I will run through those so that both he and my constituents are aware of what we did in the budget. We did make a $10 million commitment to the revitalisation of the Ipswich CBD. The Ipswich CBD is not just one street; it is a whole lot of streets. Ipswich—and I see the member for Herbert is in the chamber—is a city the size of Townsville. It is a big, wonderful regional area. And Ipswich CBD needs revitalisation. The state government, Ipswich City Council and the new Rudd Labor government are working hard to do that. In 11½ years, the coalition put nothing into the Ipswich CBD, and the people of my constituency have mentioned that on numerous occasions.

Further, we have made some significant commitments to health in our area. We have made a commitment of $300,000 in recurrent funding over three years—$100,000 per year—for the after-hours clinic run by the Division of General Practice in Ipswich. I welcome this money. Children do not get sick only at 2 pm; they can also get sick at 10 pm. This funding will help enormously. We have also made a commitment of $1.5 million to Cabanda Aged Care in Rosewood. I am pleased that the Minister for Ageing came to Ipswich last week to make that funding announcement.

I was recently at the Cabanda aged-care facility at Rosewood and I would like to congratulate Annie Reilly, who turned 99. I was there for her birthday. Annie’s passions are basketball, tennis and Cabanda. I was pleased to inform those present that the Rudd Labor government has committed in excess of $1.1 million to Ipswich basketball for the refurbishment of their facilities and to Ipswich Tennis Centre for the creation of a wonderful facility which will see international matches played there. So Annie was a very happy woman on that day, but I had to tell her that she was sharing the joy with many others.

I think perhaps the greatest area of redress for the people of Blair has been the Labor government’s commitment to the upgrade of the Ipswich Motorway. We have allocated $5 million to planning and surveying costs, and in February next year we will see the start of construction on the Dinmore to Goodna section. This was the biggest local issue in my electorate in the last election campaign. We campaigned extensively on this for a long time. My predecessor opposed the upgrade of the Ipswich Motorway. I cannot understand why and I asked him that personally on numerous occasions.

Just before the election, the coalition came up with an idea that would cost two to three times the cost of the upgrade of the Ipswich Motorway from Dinmore to Goodna. Crossing the Brisbane River four times in creating bridges as big as the Victoria Bridge and the Captain Cook Bridge in the middle of Brisbane was a terrible waste of money. It did not achieve what it needed to. The Mayor of Ipswich, Paul Pisasale, said to me, ‘Shayne, I cannot understand why we are not upgrading the entrance to the city.’ I am pleased to say that there is a commitment by the government to do that. The Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government assures me that it will be done. It will be done on time and with funding from the Rudd Labor government. Work is already underway on the Wacol to Darra section. That will be done in three years. And I am pleased to say that the Goodna to Wacol section will be complete by February 2009.

This is an important issue. It is not just about economic development in my constituency; it is about the health and safety of people who travel a road that has between 80,000 and 100,000 vehicles per day on it. It is the main linkage for fruit growers and vegetable farmers in the rural areas of my constituency. It links Toowoomba and Ipswich to Brisbane. It is a big challenge. And it is the best evidence of the Howard government’s neglect of the people of Blair. I am pleased to say that the Rudd Labor government is committed to the project.

We have also seen an expansion of the RAAF base at Amberley. I am pleased to say that this expansion started under the Howard government. I acknowledge that the Howard government were committed to the expansion of the RAAF base at Amberley and I pay my respects and thank them for their commitment. We will continue that expansion. One hundred and thirty million dollars will be invested in the RAAF base, effectively creating a superbase. The Super Hornets will be located there—and I was pleased that the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Defence, Dr Kelly, made a speech in the parliament this morning confirming that that is where they will be located. Certainly it is an issue that has been raised with me in my constituency on numerous occasions.

I am pleased to see that the Amberley state primary school has been allocated $26.83 million for its relocation. I will work with the state members in the area and the state Labor government in Queensland to find a suitable site so that the parents and children in the Amberley community and on the south side of Ipswich can be assured that their children’s education is valued and that there is some certainty around this issue, which has been going on for a long time. I am pleased that we have delivered on the commitment which I made to the local action group in March 2007 specifically at the request of the then opposition leader, now the Prime Minister, after a visit to Ipswich. I am also pleased that we have allocated $1 million for the relocation of the Amberley creche and kindergarten, which will be co-located with the new school on a site on the south side of Ipswich.

Peter Lindsay (Herbert, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Can I give you some advice?

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, I am going to continue. There is a further funding commitment by the Rudd Labor government to small business in the Ipswich and West Moreton area. We have allocated $300,000 per annum for the funding of the Ipswich Business Enterprise Centre to assist business in that area. We have seen that electricians and plumbers, people who want to establish small businesses in my constituency, do not know how to go about it. Some people have said to me, ‘How do I get finance?’ ‘What’s a balance sheet?’ ‘What’s a profit and loss statement?’ or ‘I’m not quite sure how to set up a business and how to get mentoring advice.’ I am pleased to say that the commitment that was made by the now minister for that area during the campaign will be fulfilled, and this will help the local business community in my area. I know that the Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the people of Ipswich welcome this. It is an issue upon which I campaigned very hard. I said during my campaign that I was the only major party candidate with business experience and that I understood the needs of Ipswich business and the local community because I had lived there all my life. This money is much welcomed. It will assist in the growth of the economy and in helping working families in my constituency.

This is a good budget for Blair. It is a building budget for Blair. It is a budget that looks after the families of Blair. It is a budget that is exemplified by the words and the deeds of the Treasurer. Since the election, ministers have visited the federal electorate of Blair, and we have seen the money rolling in. I am pleased that they have come and I welcome them—the more the merrier. I congratulate the Treasurer for what he has done. It is a nation-building budget, a responsible budget and a Labor budget. I commend the bills.

Peter Lindsay (Herbert, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Member for Blair, now I can give you some advice! It is positive and helpful advice, and I do not mind if you interject and we have a discussion. In relation to the Amberley school removal: well done on getting that money. I think the only remaining issue that you have is: where does it go? If Education Queensland move it too far—and that is what I think they want to do—the Amberley families will be unhappy with that. So, as the local member, I guess my advice to you is for you to try to get the school relocated to somewhere close to where it currently is.

I have a further piece of advice on this issue: what to do with the old school? Perhaps you and I can work on this in relation to my shadow parliamentary responsibilities for defence. The cadets at RAAF Base Amberley have absolutely terrible accommodation conditions. It has been put to me that the old school building could be turned into the cadet centre, because it is going to come inside the base when the school itself moves out. So it could be reused, recycled, to become a perfect centre for the cadets—and you know how much admired the cadets in the system today are. There is more than one cadet wing or squadron there, and I think that if we both talk to the defence minister about that we might get an outcome for our young men and women of Australia that is also a very good outcome for Amberley. Here endeth the advice.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Now the lecture starts!

Peter Lindsay (Herbert, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, and perhaps I should now give you some advice which you will not like. On my website I have a survey running at the moment on this: do you think you are better off under the Wayne Swan budget? Some 56 per cent do not think they are better off, and I think that has been reflected pretty universally across the country. You have to think about why that would be the case. When the budget was brought down on budget night, the government side thought it was a pretty good budget but the people did not think it was a good budget. Sometimes life is not fair when you are trying to do good things for the country and the community does not accept that you are trying to do some good things.

Of course, people are waking up to the fact that there are some things in the budget that are not good. Even the Labor Party has woken up to that, and I am pleased to see there has been a reversal in relation to the Regional Partnerships program whereby the government will now fund a number of the projects that were just wiped in the budget. There has been some movement on the luxury car tax. I think Bruce Scott, the member for Maranoa, made a very good point that the four-wheel-drives in his towns are in fact considered to be not luxuries but tools of trade. Bruce is right when he makes that comment. We have very great concern over a budget that unashamedly says to all Australians, ‘We’re going to put 134,000 of you out of work.’ That is not a popular measure. It is interesting that a party that purports to represent the workers can say to working families, ‘Sorry, but as a matter of government policy we’re going to take your job away.’ That is pretty tough for everyday Australians. I think the electorate has come to realise that.

The Rudd Labor government’s first budget really has not lifted much of a finger to help ordinary Australians battling with the rising costs of living as to petrol, groceries, private health insurance and home loan interest rates. That is going to be felt right across Australia, including in my electorate of Herbert, which is centred on Australia’s largest tropical city, Townsville. Last year during the election, the Labor Party in North Queensland campaigned furiously and the electorate heard what they said. They said, ‘We promise to relieve the increasing costs of petrol and groceries.’ Well, this budget has broken that promise.

With regard to the latest attempt to have a national Fuelwatch scheme produce lower prices at the bowser, there was a survey today in the Herald Sun looking at the prices in Western Australia in the last three months. It showed prices for petrol in Western Australia are higher than in the eastern states, where there is no Fuelwatch scheme. It is a real danger for Australia to introduce a Fuelwatch scheme that is likely to increase petrol prices. I think that is not easing pressures on hard-working Australians.

The Labor government, which now accepts responsibility for the economy and inflation, will find that this budget has delivered policies that drive up inflation and unemployment. That is quite sad for Australia. In my electorate, which has the largest Army base in the country, Lavarack Barracks, and a fairly substantial contingent of RAAFies as well, this budget proved that the Labor party was prepared to do and say anything to win the election. As Peter Garrett in an unguarded moment let slip, the Rudd government’s devious plan all along was to change it all when they got in. Well, they did. I am going to tell you what they did to my electorate.

On 12 November last year the Prime Minister and the Minister for Defence stood at Lavarack Barracks, in my electorate, and promised 8,000 defence families in Townsville and Darwin that they would be the first to have a defence family healthcare clinic. They promised 12 of these around Australia. They promised $33 million for 12 family healthcare clinics at defence bases and they promised that Townsville and Darwin would get the first two. Did anyone read the budget? I did. Do you know what they did? They announced only five clinics, not 12. They announced only $12 million, not $33 million. Darwin and Townsville were left off the list.

The Prime Minister told the people of North Queensland and our defence people that they would get the first family healthcare clinic in the Defence Force. What did they get? Nothing. That is a broken promise, and I think it dishonours the defence families in Townsville. Clearly, Labor had no intention of delivering. When they did not win the seat of Herbert, they transferred the money to, would you believe, the seat of Gippsland—once again, a seat they want to win. Labor is not going to win Gippsland because, only six months into the term of the new government, Australians are now waking up to what the new government stands for.

Let me talk to you about the Medicare surcharge folly. I know my Labor colleagues will be very uncomfortable about this because they are waking up to the implications of what is being done. In an attempt to say to Australians, ‘Hey, we’re giving you money back,’ they are going to increase the surcharge threshold to $100,000. But do you know what that is going to do? All the fit and healthy people are going to drop out of private health insurance. You might say that that is okay because they do not need private health insurance. But do you know what that is going to do? It will increase premiums for all the people who do need private health insurance. Their premiums are going to go up because hundreds of thousands of people who do not have a big call on private insurance will drop out. The old and the sick, who do need the system, are going to find that their premiums go up.

How many members of parliament are constantly told by pensioners that they scrimp and save to pay their private health insurance? They do—and they are not going to be able to afford it anymore. Do you know what that does? It sends a whole new cohort of hundreds of thousands of people from the private system back into the public system. The public system now cannot cope. I invite Labor members to come and have a look at accident and emergency at the Townsville Hospital. Go into the corridors there and look at all the people on trolleys who cannot even get in the door to be seen in the first place. And you are going to put hundreds of thousands more people into the system!

In private health insurance, people of course pay a component of the health care. But now that component will not be paid. The public purse will have to pay the lot. It is a bad deal for everybody. I just cannot understand why the Rudd government would have adopted this budgetary position when the outcome for Australia is a negative outcome. It is a cruel blow, particularly for older Australians. I would have thought that Labor members would feel very uncomfortable about that. Normally, Labor members would be worried about the pensioners but this shows complete disregard for the pensioners of our country.

With respect to the alcopops tax in the budget, I would just like to read you a letter from the publican at the Sovereign Hotel in Townsville. He is a sensible fellow whose name is Steve Jebb. This is what he has to say:

Now we have had a couple of weeks since the price increase of R2Ds (alcopops), all I have to say is ‘thanks so much Mr Rudd’.

You should know what to you are doing for binge drinking. A nice big, fat tax grab for you and a real increase in overheads for us.

Most of our customers who drink R2TDs are now drinking manually mixed drinks which has forced us to hire extra staff to mix them, extra glassies to pick up the glasses and problems with patrons who can now down the drinks much faster, not to mention the drink spiking thing that is much easier to do with open glasses sitting on the bar.

Mr Rudd, in case you have forgotten, small business people these days are no different to the ordinary working punters, who I thought the Labor Party was created to stand up for.

Here is a hotelier who is saying to Mr Rudd, ‘Here is another unintended consequence of your grab for cash.’ We have seen so much extra evidence now indicating that upping the tax on alcopops has done nothing to reduce so-called binge drinking. This is another bad outcome from the budget. The statistics speak for themselves. It is a very unfortunate outcome.

The Australian technical college in Townsville is the best technical college in the country. There are 310 students at the college and it has been an outstanding success. It is industry driven and it is providing for the specific skills shortages in North Queensland. Do you know what the budget does? It completely defunds the college. As of next year there will be no money. We have heard the member for Blair and various other members talk about the need for skills training. What does the Labor Party do in this budget? It takes the money away. It is a terrible outcome. It is very sad for our community. It is very sad for the good people and industries who have shown the leadership to develop the best Australian technical college in the country. It is very sad for the current and future students who may not be able to use that facility. I appeal to the minister to rethink that decision. The ATC has to continue. I am hopeful that, as other decisions of the budget have been reversed, we will see this decision reversed as well. I believe my time has expired. I appreciate the attention of the chamber.

Chris Hayes (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

During the debate thus far, members opposite have, quite frankly, taken a reasonably easy path, particularly when you hear their response to the budget. It shows that members opposite, unfortunately, have an indifference to spending, an indifference to high inflation and certainly an indifference to how they allocate their welfare. The former Howard government directly targeted welfare at middle-income areas.

On the other hand, the Rudd Labor government in this budget have delivered an unprecedented level of support for working families. But, even more importantly, the government have set a new benchmark when it comes to delivering upon promises that were made prior to the election. That is very important for all of us as members of parliament when we go around our electorates, when we make commitments, in the lead-up to an election. Our commitments have been fully honoured. That certainly distinguishes our government from previous governments, as we saw them take office.

Like my colleagues who spoke before me in this debate on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and related bills, I would also like to place on record my thanks to the Treasurer, the Prime Minister and their team in delivering this budget. This budget is designed to build a strong economy—one that delivers for working families and one that responsibly invests in our future. Local working families in major cities and in all our suburbs, such as mine in Western Sydney, are very much at the front and centre of this budget. The government is committed to easing the financial burdens placed on these working families. The government is providing relief for local families in respect of child care, education costs and other costs of living.

Over the 3½ years that I have had the honour of representing the people of Werriwa—and I have regular contact with all those people, whether it be at 6.30 in the morning at railway stations or in shopping centres on the weekends or at street meetings et cetera—one thing that has been constantly raised with me is the rising costs faced by families, such as shopping costs et cetera. This government has been listening and, as a consequence, it will not fail the people. This government has set out to develop a budget which delivers, first and foremost, to working families of this country—unlike the former government, which, in their last budget, delivered a $40 billion spend, with no savings, with no regard to the inflationary impact, leaving an inflationary legacy that we are now dealing with but summarising it all as ‘Working families have never been better off’. This government stands in stark contrast to the former government, which had one silver bullet for the economic reform of this country. That silver bullet, according to the Howard government, was Work Choices. Not only did it not do what they thought it was going to do; it held people’s job security to ransom and put undue financial stresses and strains on working families throughout my electorate, as attested by the 2½ thousand people who signed petitions in relation to that. But Work Choices is not the subject of this discussion, so I will get back to the appropriations bills.

I would like to highlight some of the more significant aspects of the budget as it affects the people of Werriwa. The $55 billion Working Families Support Package is certainly nothing to be sneezed at. It really delivers for the people in my electorate. It will help people meet the increasing costs of living by providing tax cuts and will help people with childcare fees and with their education costs. Families are a huge proportion of my electorate, so these benefits target the general demographic of the people of south-west Sydney.

The government’s plan is to address cost-of-living pressures by easing the strain on family budgets. This includes a disciplined approach to budget management, taking the pressure off inflation by paying for new spending promises from savings. Every dollar of new spending is offset by savings, which has produced a surplus of 1.8 per cent of GDP, or $21.7 billion. The government is tackling skills shortages and the roads and port bottlenecks that are pushing up the cost of doing business by investing in skills education, including 450,000 new training places over four years and a $20 billion Building Australia Fund to provide the economic infrastructure for the future. Further, it plans to boost household budgets through measures including a $46 billion tax cut over the next four years.

All Australian taxpayers will share in the tax cuts delivered by this government from 1 July this year, at a cost of $46.7 billion over the next four years. These are very significant tax cuts but, more importantly, they are directed at low- and middle-income earners. By and large, people in my electorate will benefit from a little over $1,000 per year as a consequence of these direct income tax cuts. People on incomes of $40,000 will get a $20.19 weekly increase as a consequence. People on incomes of $80,000 will get an increase of $21.15. These are significant and, as I said, they are directed to the demographic of the working families who make up outer metropolitan areas of Sydney such as Werriwa.

Importantly, the education tax refund will help parents invest in their kids’ education. The government will provide eligible parents with a 50 per cent refund on out-of-pocket education expenses from 1 July this year. There are more than 38,000 families in my electorate. This equates to about 56 per cent of my constituents who will be direct beneficiaries of this particular initiative. Under this initiative, families will be able to recover up to $375 per child, per year for a primary school child and $750 per child, per year for a secondary school child. That will make a significant difference to working families seeking to relieve cost pressures as they strive for a proper education for their kids.

This government knows that access to affordable, high-quality child care plays an ever-increasing role not only in a child’s education but in helping parents make the decision to return to the workforce. Unlike the previous government, which had a very laissez faire attitude to child care and thought that there was certainly no problem with affordable child care, this government has actually worked to support mums and dads not only with the development of their kids’ early education but also with some tangible assistance to return to work. To help parents with their childcare costs, the childcare tax rebate will move from 30 per cent to 50 per cent of out-of-pocket costs and will increase the cap from $4,354 to $7,500 per child for approved care. In addition to that, it will be paid every three months instead of once a year, providing the support to working families when they need it most.

There are a couple of things that I would like to quickly run through that were of significance to the people of south-west Sydney in the Werriwa electorate emanating out of this budget. For instance, there was a grant of $100,000 to the Liverpool Migrant Resource Centre. This will go towards important projects helping with the assimilation and participation of refugees into mainstream Australian life. It will complement the current range of successful services and programs offered by the Liverpool Migrant Resource Centre.

The Macarthur Business Enterprise Centre received a recurrent grant of $350,000 per year. This will benefit existing and developing businesses in my area. The fund will assist the Macarthur Business Enterprise Centre to provide a range of one-stop shop advisory services to some 4,488 businesses between Liverpool and Campbelltown.

The Campbelltown Stadium was very fortunately the beneficiary of an $8 million grant to upgrade its sports-playing facilities. It is home to a number of sports, including rugby league, rugby union and soccer. It is now capable of being developed into one of the principal sporting precincts in the south-west of Sydney. Our kids will not only have the ability to go and watch their teams play at a premier sporting facility; they will be able to play at the same facility themselves because this facility will be available both to schools and for weekend junior sports.

In addition to that—as I am sure you are aware, Madam Deputy Speaker Bird—there is a grant of $350,000 for an investigation into the Maldon-Dumbarton rail link. That is a very important study to be undertaken in the south-west of Sydney. It would see the opening up of the south-west of Sydney as important employment lands as a consequence of the possibility of a rail link between Port Kembla and the south-west of Sydney and its immediate surrounds. That will provide an opportunity for significant growth and employment, and it will also give some significant support to the state government’s three-port policy. I see that as an absolute plus for my electorate in being able to develop new areas, new industries and employment opportunities. That is a particular study that I—together with you, Madam Deputy Speaker—will have a very keen interest in.

A particular project under the AusLink 2 program is the widening of the F5 Freeway, which has very strong social and economic grounds justifying it. I went out of my way to challenge the then minister of the former government to widen that freeway. It is not simply about mums and dads spending time away from families on a congested freeway to and from work; there are serious economic reasons why we see this as a major priority in opening up areas of industry. In addition to that, it is the main interconnecting road infrastructure between Sydney and Melbourne. That being the case, this has a very significant economic aspect to it which will generate jobs as a consequence and which will actually help to free up the bottlenecks that are currently acting as an impediment to our economy.

In addition to that, the University of Western Sydney was given a $15.9 million grant. The Campbelltown campus of that university is doing a wonderful job, particularly with the development of its new medical school. I could continue talking for a significant period about what this budget has achieved for my electorate in Werriwa and for working men and women around the country, but time is against me on this occasion. I commend this legislation to the House.

Margaret May (McPherson, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As well as being the member for McPherson, I am also privileged to be the shadow minister for ageing. It is in both of these roles that I shall speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and cognate bills. When I listened to speakers from the other side—from the new Rudd government—particularly in this budget debate, I wondered if we were actually talking about the same Australia, as their take on the Howard government’s legacy is so far removed from reality. The Howard government has, and did have, a proven track record in delivering security, opportunity and prosperity for all Australians. On this side of the House, we are very proud of our record. We are exceedingly proud of our legacy, but the Rudd government has a new mandate: one of insecurity and lost opportunities.

The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, Peter Garrett, was right when he said that once Labor won office it would change everything. He was not wrong. Already the Rudd government has demonstrated it is not fit to govern. The stability of the past nearly 12 years has been replaced by a sense of instability, insecurity and isolation, particularly if you are not a working family. The growing sense of unease about the Rudd government’s performance is warranted because it is doing a thorough job of wrecking the economy and isolating Australians. Forget about social inclusion: we are now seeing the social exclusion of many sections of Australia’s communities.

The electorate of McPherson has a large population of older Australians. Healthy ageing has always been one of my priorities. The Australia of yesterday always had seniors at the forefront of policy. The Australia of today, under a Rudd government, completely ignores and discounts them. This is of tremendous concern, as seniors need to feel valued and important as part of ageing with dignity and maintaining their health and wellbeing. They need to be included as productive members of all our local communities right throughout Australia.

My mother is in her eighties, so I can see firsthand how policies introduced by this government affect her. The government’s neglect of seniors irritates her and takes away her peace of mind, as it does that of many seniors who live in my electorate. Older Australians are feeling disenfranchised and ignored by the government. The government could not have put it any more bluntly that seniors do not matter. The first sign that something was amiss with the Rudd government’s priorities was when it would not commit to the pensioners and carers bonus just a few weeks ago. This caused a great deal of anxiety in the community. This sense of insecurity was compounded when aged care was not an agenda item at the 2020 Summit and only one per cent of delegates to that summit were aged 75-plus. This rejection of older Australians is glaring. They are a significant group of people who make up over 13 per cent of the Australian population and, over the next 40 years, that is projected to rise to 25 per cent. During this time, growth in the labour market will remain stagnant. With increasing life expectancies, we will have the potential to slow economic growth and to reduce all Australians’ standard of living.

Two days before the budget was handed down, the government backflipped on a cut to aged-care funding because of prolonged pressure brought by aged-care associations, providers, families and me. To consider a cut to aged-care funding is nothing short of lunacy as the aged-care industry is under extreme financial pressure, with no guarantee of increases in CAP funding beyond 2008-09. Forty per cent of providers are operating at a loss. Places are undersubscribed in Western Australia and Tasmania, and beds are closing down.

In the news this week we have seen the collapse of two aged-care facilities. Bridgewater aged-care service, which has 107 residents, was put into administration owing thousands of dollars in entitlements to its staff. In addition, 33 residents at Alton Court have to find new homes as the Wesley Mission aged-care facility has been forced to close its doors. I ask members to put themselves in the shoes of these elderly residents. The forced move will be upsetting for many who have been forced from what has been their home for many years. Unless urgent structural reform is undertaken in the sector, more and more aged-care facilities will fail. How does the Rudd government deal with this train wreck about to happen in the industry? It does it with a backflip to a cut to aged-care funding two days before the budget.

Just on the off-chance that seniors, singles and carers have not got the message, budget night confirmed the status quo: if you are not a working family, you just do not count. In fact, you do not even warrant more than a passing mention under this new government. There is no doubt that Mr Rudd has failed to grasp the issues. His inability to make decisions is doing a great deal of damage to seniors in this country. The Rudd government’s budget has squibbed on its inflation rhetoric. Decisions that the government is taking are having an inflationary effect on the economy and jeopardising our future prosperity and wellbeing.

Food prices are soaring and the world is in great danger of running out of food, more so than at any other point in history, with the situation set to worsen. The World Bank has estimated that food prices have risen by 83 per cent in three years. This is placing basic food staples out of the reach of more and more Australian people, particularly our elderly. So what is the Rudd government’s policy response to the food challenges Australia is facing? Wait for it: in the budget it cut funding of $63.4 million to Australia’s national science agency and one of the largest and most diverse research agencies in the world, the CSIRO. The CSIRO’s JM Rendel laboratory at Rockhampton is closing because of the funding cut. This is a facility that provides vital research for Queensland’s $3 billion beef industry through its work in genetics, nutrition and the interaction of livestock with the environment. At a time when the world is running out of food, the Rudd government has decided to cut funding to the very organisation whose science helps to secure Australia’s food future.

Petrol prices, as we have heard all week, are also having a huge impact on senior Australians. Rather than implementing policy that does not add to petrol prices, the Rudd government has done exactly the opposite. I wonder how many people in this place have heard from pensioners in their own electorates about the pensioner who can only budget $5 or $10 a week for the fuel pump.

I must say it was a breath of fresh air to have one of the Rudd government’s ministers making some intelligent comments about fuel prices and Fuelwatch. The Minister for Resources and Energy, Martin Ferguson, correctly said that Fuelwatch would seriously damage the government’s economic and regulatory reform credentials and would put upward pressure on fuel prices, as the Western Australian experience has found it to be anticompetitive.

The Rudd government has said that Fuelwatch would put motorists back in charge of their fuel costs. I call on the Rudd government to stop playing the Australian public for fools because it will not be long before they see through all the empty promises and cheap talk. My pensioners and your pensioners would also be feeling the pinch on the petrol prices. The only winners with Fuelwatch will be the big multinationals, Coles and Woolworths. The 4c a litre that people save on petrol prices by shopping at Coles and Woolworths are paid back through higher grocery prices.

Another very important issue is health. The Rudd government has admitted that lifting the Medicare levy surcharge threshold will cause hundreds of thousands of taxpayers to drop out of the private system. My question is: whatever possesses a government to introduce a policy that will put pressure on the public health system, see private health insurance premiums skyrocket and price older Australians out of the market? If that is not irresponsible and inept, I ask what is. With an ageing society, where the demand for services and technologically advanced treatments mean more and more strain will be placed on the health budget, the Rudd government proposes policies that will jeopardise the entire health system.

Another example of poor policy through this budget is the Commonwealth seniors health card. The Commonwealth seniors health card provided a range of benefits to people who did not qualify for the age pension but had an adjusted taxable income of less than $50,000 per year for singles or $80,000 per year for couples. The Rudd government’s income test will now include income from superannuation, income streams from a taxed source and income that is salary sacrificed to superannuation in the income assessment. The main purpose of the Commonwealth seniors health card is to assist self-funded retirees with certain living costs by providing access to Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme prescription items, certain Medicare services at a cheaper rate and concessional travel on Great Southern Railway services. Mr Rudd said he would keep the cost of living down, but this change will hit hard for the many self-funded retirees in my electorate. The Rudd government, in my view, is alienating self-funded retirees by limiting their access to this practical, cost-saving program.

We have also heard a lot about the Regional Partnerships program, a highly successful program under the coalition. We have seen Minister Albanese today backflip on withdrawing funding for many projects in the Regional Partnerships program. I am delighted that he has. I am hopeful that a couple of those Regional Partnerships projects in my own electorate will now be funded. One of them was a program for the Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary, a sanctuary that is held under the National Trust of Queensland and where we had plans to build an animal welfare hospital. We had applied for a $100,000 grant, and I am hopeful, from what Minister Albanese has said today, that we will see funding for that sanctuary animal hospital.

I also hope that we will see the funding for the skateboard park in Tweed Heads. I have spoken briefly to Minister Elliot today and I am buoyed by her comments. It is a very important community project that will assist the youth of that area.

We have heard a lot about an education revolution. The so-called education revolution is about a computer for senior high school students, with nothing in the budget for junior high school or, indeed, primary school students. Much has been said of the Rudd government’s education revolution, but schools on the southern Gold Coast, in my electorate, will be worse off under Labor’s decision to scrap the successful Investing in Our Schools Program. Labor has abolished the $1.2 billion program to pay for its election promises to put computers and trades centres into secondary schools.

In McPherson, the Investing in Our Schools Program saw around $1.6 million provided to approximately 30 schools for projects they decided were a priority. Up to $150,000 was available to each school to fund everything from repairs of run-down toilets and classrooms to upgrades of playgrounds and IT equipment. The program was a huge success in my electorate and, with school children, P&Cs and the local community enthusiastically getting behind the projects, tangible results have been achieved that advance the education and wellbeing of all young students on the southern Gold Coast. School communities in my electorate have relied on this funding to make up for state government shortfalls.

Australian taxpayers deserve to know why the Rudd government has halted the tender process for an Australian technical college on the Gold Coast when the land has already been purchased for $3.6 million and a contract signed between the department and the ATC to commence building. Three hundred students are already enrolled in training and approximately half of those students have secured apprenticeships which will take them straight into the workforce and help alleviate the skills shortage. The department has assured the Robina ATC that the funding agreement does stand. If that is the case, why won’t they allow the ATC to get on with the business of skilling Australia and allow them to tender for that very important building?

The Rudd government have announced they will make an early start on their election commitments by providing $22.5 million for the upgrade of the Nerang South Interchange on the Pacific Motorway. This is part of the $455 million funding that Mark Vaile announced when he visited the Gold Coast on 31 August last year and that the Labor Party copied with a me-too announcement on the same day.

The Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government has stated that the government will continue to implement its land transport infrastructure election commitments from 2009-10 to 2013-14, with the timing and specific funding arrangements to be negotiated with the states and territories. How can local residents be satisfied that the Rudd government will come through with the rest of the $465 million worth of crucial funding if it is not listed in the budget papers or forward estimates?

On 13 November 2007, Martin Ferguson said the Rudd Labor government would deliver a $210 million six-pack of Pacific Motorway interchange upgrades as part of its plan to battle worsening congestion on the Gold Coast. This election promise pledged $27.5 million for the Nerang South Interchange. Interestingly, the ‘Budget 2008-09’ media statement announces only $22.5 million for the Nerang South Interchange, with no mention of the rest of the $450 million election commitment.

The Small Business Field Officer Program is another highly successful program that has been scrapped by the new Rudd government. McPherson has six active chambers of commerce and more than 14½ thousand small businesses, and there are more than 51,000 small businesses throughout the Gold Coast. To cut this funding is certainly short-sighted. It is vital funding for small business. I say to the Rudd government: go back and have a look at what you have done in cutting that funding to small business.

Solar power is another area whose funding really leaves people breathless, with the government taking away funding for solar hot water system rebates. The Prime Minister has said in the past that we need to boost renewable energies in general. Solar energy is the most greenhouse-friendly energy available on the planet and therefore we need to take some practical steps to make it possible for as many families as possible to invest in it. But imposing a means test on people who want to access funding for solar panels is another very short-sighted measure in this year’s budget.

I would like to put on record some comments about this budget and how it has really affected all Australians. We have heard of and know about so many of the successful programs that each and every one of us, when we were in government, delivered to communities and to the people of Australia. More and more, we are seeing that these programs have been cut, and this is affecting Australians on a day-to-day basis. I had a family contact me today about the means testing of the baby bonus. They plan to have a child, which is due in late January next year. They will now miss out on the baby bonus because of the implementation of the means test from 1 January next year. People need to plan their lives but their plans are being shattered and their dreams taken away from them because of decisions made by this government.

In many ways this new government is marginalising people in communities throughout Australia. I have a particular interest in the elderly both through my shadow ministry portfolio and because of the demographics of my electorate, which has more than 25,000 seniors aged over 65. These people are doing it tough. They received very little attention in the budget papers. Their pensions are not keeping up with the cost-of-living pressures that they are feeling. The price of petrol is having an extreme impact on them, and grocery prices continue to rise. We heard before the last federal election that if elected this government would do something about putting downward pressure on grocery prices and petrol prices. These are two things that are severely affecting older Australians, particularly in my community.

I think it really is time that we stopped to think about how we can help these senior people, who have given so much to their country. These people have built this country and they have been the backbone of this country. They have worked hard and, in many cases, they have saved for their retirement. But many of them need a lot more help than they are getting, and they certainly need some recognition from the government about how tough they are doing it out there in voter land. In six short months the government have lost contact with what is going on. They are out of touch with Australia in general, they are out of touch with families in Australia and certainly a lot of the policies they have introduced through this budget are having an extreme effect on the living conditions of all Australians.

Greg Combet (Charlton, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Procurement) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in this debate on the appropriations bills about some of the initiatives that were contained within the recent budget and how they will impact upon the residents of my electorate of Charlton in New South Wales. Residents in Charlton have, like families around the country, been feeling the pressures of the rising costs of living. Groceries, rent and petrol have all increased by more than 10 per cent over the last two years, and that has included increases of 14 per cent in the price of fruit and vegetables, 18 per cent in the price of bread and 16 per cent in the price of milk. With a median housing loan repayment of around $1,315 a month, families in Charlton have also felt sharply the pressure of rising inflation and interest rates in recent years. It is very important for them that the government does its part to help relieve these financial pressures.

That is why it is so crucial that in the recent budget the government announced the $55 billion Working Families Support Package to help support those who are finding it hard to make ends meet. By any measure, this announcement by the Treasurer in the budget is a hugely significant initiative. It is a substantial package including a number of components that will help residents of my electorate with some of the cost pressures they are now facing. As a whole, these components will benefit residents in my electorate to a very significant degree. I would like to explain briefly some of the components that will assist, but when you look at the combined measures in the budget at an aggregate level and analyse them against the nature of earnings in my electorate you will see just how significant they may be.

Within Charlton, the median family income is around $1,100 per week, or around $58,000 per year. I will outline what, on aggregate, many of the measures in the $55 billion Working Families Support Package in the budget mean to them. For example, it is estimated that a couple in my electorate earning a median income and with two children aged two and four both in long day care will be nearly $3,000 a year, or $57 a week, better off under this package. For a couple with two children—one aged four and in long day care and the other aged six and in after-school care—it could mean an increase of $2,760 a year, or around $54 a week. A couple with two children aged 10 and 13 and, obviously, not in child care could benefit from the budget measures in the order of $53 a week, or $2,775 a year. For a couple with two teenage children, also obviously not in child care, it could mean an increase of $3,300 a year, or $63 a week. For a couple with three children—for example, aged nine, 13 and 14—it could mean an increase in their annual income of $3,600, or $70 a week. That is why it is absolutely absurd and hypocritical to hear from the other side that the $55 billion Working Families Support Package contained in this budget is in some way harmful to working families. These are significant measures that will benefit many, many families throughout the country and in particular in my electorate.

I now turn to some of the individual components of the measures within the budget. The tax cuts contained in the budget total around $46.7 billion. The tax cuts are designed to help alleviate the pressures that people are now facing, while also providing incentives for increased participation in the workforce. The government’s tax cuts incorporate an increase in the low-income tax offset from $750 to $1,200, which will allow Australians to earn up to $14,000—effectively an increase of $3,000 in the threshold—in 2008-09 without having to pay any tax at all. That is a significant benefit for low-income earners and people in part-time work. About 30 per cent of my electorate currently work part time and they will welcome these changes. With a median individual income in my electorate of around $400 a week—only $21,000 a year—the low-income tax offsets will be an enormous contribution to helping family budgets.

The education tax refund is a crucial component of the package. The budget contained funding for the refund to the value of $4.4 billion in total over the forward estimates. Under this arrangement, parents entitled to family tax benefit A or whose children receive the youth allowance or a similar payment will be able to claim a 50 per cent tax refund of up to $750 in educational expenses for each child in primary school—that is a refund of $375—or a 50 per cent tax refund of up to $1,500 in expenses for each student in secondary school, a rebate of $750 per child per year. These are significant amounts of money for people who have children in school, and that is why the education tax refund initiative will be very welcomed by people. In fact, the majority of families in my electorate have two children, and the next highest group or family structure are families with three children. The education tax refund will directly benefit them. For families with two school-age children this new arrangement could mean a maximum family benefit of $14,200 over their full school life, and for families with three kids it could mean up to $21,000 benefit for those families over the full school period. No-one can argue that that is not a significant benefit for many working families, particularly those who are doing it tough in the current environment.

The childcare tax rebate is an extremely important initiative as well, costed at around $1.6 billion for an increase in the rebate from 30 to 50 per cent, and the annual cap in the amount paid increases too in the budget from $4,354 to $7,500 per child. The rebate will be paid quarterly, which will of course assist with cash flow management. But, for an average family in Charlton where one parent is considering returning to work, the increase in the threshold on some estimates could deliver a benefit of $2,000 more than has existed in the past.

Housing affordability measures are also extremely important in the context of my electorate, where about 21 per cent of households are currently renting—and of course many of those would be renting while they are saving to try and put a deposit together to buy a home. For them, the first home saver account to help young people save for their first home is extremely important.

The budget provided $491 million for the Teen Dental Plan. This again will be very important for people. Eligible families will be able to claim up to $150 per year for a preventative dental check for each of their teenage children, making it far more affordable for families to access dental services. The residents of my electorate will appreciate the high costs associated with a visit to the dentist—we all know that. The teen dental health plan can assist in family budgeting when there are teenagers, in their developmental years. Dental costs can be extremely high. As nearly 40 per cent of the families in my electorate have children under the age of 15—that is a significant number—this is a welcome initiative, and people have indicated that to me, for very obvious reasons.

The Medicare levy surcharge is also a measure which can provide significant relief for many people. Under the budget, from 1 July this year singles with incomes of up to $100,000 and families with incomes of up to $150,000 will no longer be subject to the Medicare levy surcharge if they do not take out private health insurance. This simply restores the thresholds effectively to the position that they were in when the levy and the surcharge were initially introduced in 1997. This will mean that singles without private health insurance can save up to $1,000 a year should they choose not to take out private health insurance, and families will save up to $1,500 a year potentially from these changes. That is significant relief for people.

The budget also provides a range of support measures for seniors and carers, and there are also a range of previous measures that have already been implemented. My electorate has a higher than average proportion of retirees and seniors. Many people retire to the electorate and the shores of Lake Macquarie, particularly from the Sydney region. To assist older Australians with the rising costs of living, the government has provided in the budget for an increase in a number of things that came into effect from late March: an increase in the utilities allowance from $107 to $500 per year, an increase in the seniors concession allowance from $218 to $500 per year, an increase in the telephone allowance from $88 to $132 per year and, of course, the $500 seniors bonus. No-one on that side of parliament can honestly look you in the eye and say that that is not significant assistance for seniors and carers in this country. It will result in a substantial rise in the income received by many of the people who are most deserving in our community. With 15 per cent of my electorate over the age of 65, I am very happy to see an increase in the support provided to that group.

These are simply some of the reasons why the budget is extremely important for working people. In aggregate, the budget of course tackles the inflation issue and it provides for the future with the establishment of a number of funds, particularly aimed at infrastructure, education and health. But, most importantly, the budget is designed to assist working families who are in need. The $55 billion Working Families Support Package will help people across the Australian community, in particular in my electorate, and I welcome it.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have had greater pleasure in rising in this place to speak on previous appropriation bills and I can understand why the previous speaker, the member for Charlton, lacked any enthusiasm for Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and related bills. The new government’s first budget has given us all a very grim reminder of what life will be like under a federal Labor government. And it is a classic Labor government. It has increased taxes, it has increased spending and it has done absolutely nothing to ease the pressure on the one issue that it has identified as being a critical issue in the Australian economy—that is, it has not done anything to ease the pressure on inflation or to support families in their ongoing struggle with grocery and petrol prices. At a time when there are billions of dollars as part of the surplus, it has cut funding to some of the most vulnerable groups and programs in the Australian community.

It has actually budgeted—wait for this—for 134,000 people to be unemployed. I thought being responsible and being in government necessarily involved creating an economic environment where people have the best chance of an independent life—and that would be through having a job—and where those who could not have a job would be supported through relevant programs. But, no, what we have is a Labor Party that wants to consign people to welfare dependence through being unemployed. That is a disgrace and that is absolutely irresponsible, and this nation will take some time to recover from some of the disastrous policies that will be put in place over the next couple of years.

The Treasurer’s high-taxing, high-spending budget is a demonstration of what Labor has lacked since time immemorial: economic credibility—and it still lacks it. Those concerns that people had about Labor’s economic credibility are still there, because we have seen this budget fail. In spite of the wealth and the take that the Australian government has received in taxes, it has failed to deliver a safe and secure environment within which families can continue to go about their daily lives, an environment within which people can have some certainty about jobs and job prospects. Imagine if it had inherited an economy with a much lower budget surplus forecast, an economy that was actually in greater danger, an economy that had not withstood the economic problems of our region over the last decade. Imagine how much worse this Labor budget would be.

For the Prime Minister and the Treasurer this was their first test—a test to see whether they had the necessary leadership and discipline to manage Australia’s $1.1 trillion economy. It is very clear from the budget delivery that Labor’s rigid political ideology has come before good economic policy. It might hide it and mask it in all sorts of language, but it is not what Labor says that matters on the ground; it is what it actually does. Mr Swan has been talking up an inflationary crisis in Australia to hide the fact that the government planned weeks ago to cut expenditure in the budget to fund its election promises, but it is actually increasing spending by $18 billion over five years—so work that one out! He wants to ease inflationary pressures and says that all these government programs need to be cut, but he is actually increasing government spending by $18 billion over five years.

The Treasurer is cutting funding to some of the most vulnerable and needy groups in the Australian community. He is cutting funding to rural and regional programs. He is cutting funding to those isolated communities that have benefited from having a growing economy and being a wealthy nation, where we have had—and we have understood—a responsibility to maintain vital services and infrastructure. He has cut funding to those sorts of programs, but somehow the Labor Party still find money to pay for a butler for the Prime Minister and still pay some income to the family nanny. How out of touch is that for a Labor government, the so-called friend of the worker? They cut funding to vulnerable low-income communities but make sure that the PM has a butler. It does not take too long for some of these hypocrites to put their snouts in the trough. The government had an opportunity to lock in our nation’s future and to continue the work of the previous government in delivering for all Australians—not just for their mates, not just for the groups that they think vote for them but for all Australians—but they failed miserably.

I want to concentrate my comments on a few of the important areas that arise from this budget and that impact on my electorate. The all-important policy areas of agriculture, water and regional development have been damaged and hit hard by Labor. Despite promising to govern for all Australians, Labor has highlighted that this style of government does not extend to rural and regional Australians. In the three key areas—regional development, communications and agriculture—Labor has stripped more than $1 billion from rural and regional Australia. Current Howard government programs that are in place in agriculture—worth $334 million—have been culled, with new initiatives worth only $220 million, nearly all of them relating to climate change. There are no plans to extend exceptional circumstances relief beyond the current expiry date of September 2008, and this is of very little comfort for the 1,452 farmers in north and north-east Victoria currently receiving exceptional circumstances assistance.

We have to ask the questions: do we want Australia to have an endogenous capacity to produce certain agricultural products; do we want Australia to continue to maintain an agricultural industry? If the answer is yes, then we need to continue to provide that helping hand through very difficult climatic conditions and through very difficult economic times for certain produce. But obviously the Rudd Labor government do not believe that we need an endogenous capacity to maintain some sort of agricultural production, which is quite evident from their blatant refusal to even contemplate an extension of the exceptional circumstances relief. I am also concerned at the non-existent plans to sustain endogenous capacity in greater efficiency of on-farm irrigation. We have seen the budget slash funding that was previously announced by the former government to support on-farm irrigation efficiency measures.

The first Labor budget in 13 years attempts to demolish much of the hard work of the last 12 coalition budgets, particularly the measures aimed at those living in rural and regional Australia. We all know it is far more difficult and takes much longer to create something than to destroy it. We have seen the culling of community water grants, which has affected many sporting facilities and many schools. We have seen the culling of the Regional Partnerships program and also the culling of the Investing in Our Schools Program, which provided funds for both government and non-government schools. We have seen looming a cut to funding for the Catchment Management Authority programs. All of these are a trail of wreckage that leads to the door of the Rudd Labor government. All of these will result in worse management of our natural resources, our scarce water resources and our environment and are a slap in the face to all of those individuals, both paid and from volunteer organisations, who have put in so much time to put something back into their community for it to have a sustainable future.

The Investing in Our Schools Program delivers immense benefits right across Australia, and I can speak from personal experience about its impact on my electorate of Indi, where 311 individual school improvement projects were funded to the tune of over $14 million—and this funding is separate to the significant capital grants that were given to government and non-government schools in my electorate by the previous Liberal government. The Investing in Our Schools Program achieved so much. It gave power to school communities to fix the problems that incompetent, negligent state governments had refused funding to fix. Let us remember that primary and secondary education is primarily under the jurisdiction of the states. They have the power to set the agenda and they administer the schools, yet schools in my electorate had toilet facilities that did not satisfy occupational health and safety standards. Teachers could not use them, but the students were supposed to use them.

The Investing in Our Schools Program filled the gap at a wealthy time in our nation’s history, when there was a budget surplus, where we could say, ‘Let’s look after the future generation; let’s actually create a learning environment that is safe, that is conducive to their education.’ But that program has been slashed by the Labor government. I find it extraordinary that this Labor government has decided to scrap a policy that assisted so many poor schools. Based on the Treasurer’s speech, there was no glimmer of hope for my local schools that there would be some viable policy to replace the Investing in Our Schools Program. Disappointingly, Labor has also culled important coalition programs such as the Green Vouchers for Schools Program and the national literacy and numeracy vouchers program.

Community water grants in my part of the world have been very important. Indi received $6.1 million in funding from the Community Water Grants program, benefiting over 160 local organisations throughout north-east Victoria. I was very pleased, because north-east Victoria provides over 38 per cent of the water that goes into the Murray-Darling system. It assisted many volunteer organisations, as well as the local Catchment Management Authority. The previous coalition government’s water program has helped over 8,000 communities right across Australia save the equivalent of 40,000 Olympic-size swimming pools of water each year. But, again, that program has been scrapped.

An area that is a huge cost to all Australians, particularly to those who have to travel further—and that usually involves those in rural and regional Australia—is petrol prices. The opposition leader delivered so eloquently what the Treasurer could not bring himself to promise and that was a cut in the fuel excise. The coalition’s plan for fuel excise relief will give struggling motorists the type of real relief that the Prime Minister, despite all his ‘working families’ rhetoric, cannot bring himself to deliver. Since the Rudd government was elected, petrol has become 15c per litre more expensive than it previously was. On 29 May 2007, when unleaded petrol was $1.29 a litre, Mr Rudd said:

Why won’t the Prime Minister finally stand up for working families on petrol prices?

All the empty rhetoric and spin worthy of a brief from Sir Humphrey. A year later, when petrol is $1.46 in Wangaratta and $1.49 in Wodonga, the current Prime Minister, after having been elected, after leading the Australian people to believe he would do something about petrol prices—he would say anything to get elected, he would do anything to be elected—said:

We have done as much as we physically can to provide additional help to the family budget.

Well, you failed again. After only six months, the Prime Minister has failed to deliver on a very basic promise. The Australian people believed him and thought that, under a Rudd Labor government, petrol prices would be lower. They were hopelessly misled and now not just working families but all Australians are getting restless. The only solution he has come up with is to institute Fuelwatch across the nation. We have seen an independent survey by MotorMouth analyse petrol prices over three months, telling us that petrol in the only state which has had a Fuelwatch program, WA, is more expensive than petrol in Melbourne and Sydney. We even had the resources minister warn cabinet that some families would lose out under a Fuelwatch program, but he was ignored. He was overridden because the spin by the Prime Minister is more important than the reality of the problems on the ground.

In the past there have been times when petrol prices have gone up but it has only been the coalition that has provided relief when petrol prices have risen sharply. As a result of the 6.7c per litre cut in excise in 2000, a further 1.5c per litre cut in 2001 and the abolition of indexation, which was introduced under the former Labor government, petrol is currently 17.7c per litre less than it would otherwise have been—because the coalition stands for lower taxes and delivered lower taxes over the last 12 years. The coalition provided income tax relief in 2000, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007. In addition, the income tax cuts in this year’s Labor budget were largely the coalition’s tax proposals. All Labor could do, so that they would not scare people off, was pretend they are a paler imitation of the coalition and said, ‘Me too. We’ll copy most of that tax policy.’

Labor has abandoned so many groups of Australians, not just rural and regional Australians but also senior Australians. If you do not fall within that glib description of ‘working families’ you do not seem to matter to the current Labor government. What about all those Australians who used to belong to the working families category but now are too old to work but expect to live at a reasonable level in a wealthy nation such as ours? They have been ignored by the Labor government and we have seen their protests right around the country.

We have seen Labor’s budget announcement which includes the imposition of an income test which will now include income from superannuation income streams from a taxed source, and income that is salary sacrificed to superannuation in an income assessment for the Commonwealth seniors health card. I do not support these changes to the seniors health card, nor does the coalition. This will hit particularly self-funded retirees, those people who have made sacrifices over their lifetime to make sure they could support themselves to a certain degree in retirement—they have been hit again by this government. But then again, they probably fall into the category of ‘all those rich people we cannot help’. We have had supposedly rich families hit and now all these self-funded retirees have been hit. Why does the Labor Party not go out and tell self-funded retirees, ‘You’re too rich! We don’t want to help you.’ Why do you not have a look at the sacrifices made and the circumstances in which some of these self-funded retirees live. Governments have a responsibility to provide some incentive for those who make decisions to look after themselves, not punish them.

Another sneaky measure in the budget was the disgraceful decision to increase the age of service pension eligibility for veteran service partners from 50 years to 58½ years. I have already been contacted by a number of constituents who are directly impacted by this extraordinary budget decision. One constituent wrote to me saying:

As a Vietnam veteran who served twenty-one years in the regular Army and been employed continuously for twenty-three years since leaving the Army I feel totally let down by this Government measure. Seven months from retirement my plans have to be now reconsidered because of a cheap, discriminatory measure by the new Federal Government.

Another constituent called my office in a highly distressed state yesterday morning. I strongly believe that as a community we are indebted to veterans who fought and defended our country. We cannot support these measures that have been sneakily slipped into the budget which show total disregard for our veterans. It is okay for the Prime Minister to go and have photos with our men and women in uniform to give him some sort of gravitas and authority, but that is not good enough to support our veterans and their families who have served their nation in the past.

We have changes to the Medicare levy, which is an absolute disgrace. It was Graham Richardson, a former Labor health minister, who said, ‘To have a viable Medicare system, you must have at least 40 per cent of people in private health.’ What will happen with the changes to the Medicare levy? Because the Labor Party hates anything to do with people helping themselves and hates anything to do with private health, it will mean that folk will drop out, premiums will go up, older people and families will face longer waiting lists at hospitals and our health system will start to crumble and resemble the disgraceful system in the UK. (Time expired)

Mike Symon (Deakin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It gives me great pleasure as the Labor member for Deakin to speak in support of the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and related bills and this budget—the first Labor budget since 1995. I welcome this budget because it is a good Labor budget. It is the type of budget that people in my electorate of Deakin, in Melbourne’s outer east, elected a Rudd Labor government on 24 November last year to deliver. This is a budget that delivers for working Australians and for the people in my electorate of Deakin. It delivers all that the Rudd government promised at the national level and all that was promised locally in Deakin. I am happy to detail those promises to the House.

Funding announcements made during the election campaign and delivered in this budget in my seat of Deakin include $200,000 to the Ringwood community centre to upgrade the centre’s facilities. This will include improvements to their multipurpose room, toilet facilities and renovations to the hall and kitchen areas. It is a facility that is used by various community groups, including the Italian senior citizens association, playgroups and many others.

There was a pledge in the budget to provide $150,000 towards boosting the capacity of the facilities at Croydon Little Athletics Centre, which services our local sporting community. The funding will improve the pavilion area, upgrade the change room and toilet facilities and increase disability access. This particular facility is used by over 700 children each week and is in dire need of extra facilities as it has not actually had enough done to it in recent years.

The Nunawading gymnastics club will benefit from $200,000 of Rudd government funding to upgrade ageing gymnasium facilities at Walker Park in Nunawading, improving both safety and access for our young gymnasts. The Glen Park Community Centre in Bayswater North is to receive a $500,000 upgrade from the Rudd government for facilities to be used by a range of local community groups. With funding now delivered, the centre has the potential to become a social community hub for the outer eastern suburbs, especially for the East Ringwood junior football club, who now call the oval home. The Rudd Labor government has already committed $80 million to fix the Springvale Road bottleneck—Victoria’s worst level crossing—and it will work cooperatively with the Victorian state government to fix this.

As part of this package, $2 million of funding is being provided in the 2008-09 budget for further planning works in addition to those already undertaken by Whitehorse council. $1.018 million has been delivered by the Rudd government to Whitehorse and Maroondah councils to keep our local roads maintained and safe through the federal government’s Roads to Recovery program. The Rudd Labor government is going to invest $600,000 to undertake water-recycling initiatives at Croydon Leisure Centre Pool and undertake upgrades and sanitation works at the nearby Croydon Memorial Pool.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

At the national and local level, there is no such thing as a non-core promise in this budget or from this Labor government. Unlike the previous Howard Liberal government, we keep our promises. So it is a good Labor budget that achieves a lot of things not just for now but also for Australia’s long-term future. This budget will go far towards tackling the many areas of chronic neglect left to us by the previous government.

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Urban Water) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, I seek to intervene to ask the member for Deakin a question.

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the member for Deakin willing to give way?

Mike Symon (Deakin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! There is too much conversation across the chamber. I should point out to the honourable member for Deakin that there is a provision in the standing orders giving honourable members the opportunity to ask the honourable member who has the call whether they are prepared to answer a question but, under the standing orders, it is perfectly within the right of the member speaking to accept or decline.

Mike Symon (Deakin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The budget puts a long-term vision back into federal government, restores fairness and puts us back on the road of nation building. It recognises that nation building includes what we do in areas like education, health, broadband, innovation and technology as much as what we do in infrastructure such as roads, rail and our nation’s ports. The government will invest current and future budget surpluses in three nation-building funds. The Building Australia Fund will fund shortfalls in national transport and broadband infrastructure. The Education Investment Fund will fund capital expenditure in Australia’s higher education facilities. The Health and Hospitals Fund will finance the renewal and refurbishment of the nation’s hospitals and health facilities and fund major medical research projects. I am confident that the people of Deakin will share in this government’s massive nation-building efforts well into the future.

This budget also has a plan to lock in the future of our water supplies, protect the environment and tackle dangerous climate change, which many opposite to this very day still deny exists. It tilts the odds back in favour of those who are not at the top of the income scale and tackles the real pressures of living that they are feeling more than ever because the previous government fell asleep at the wheel.

This budget meets the Rudd government’s commitment to a $5.9 billion education revolution which will maximise, cultivate and preserve our next generation of thinkers and doers who will drive our economy well into this century. It also begins the Rudd government’s plans to restore cooperative federalism in this country, and end the blame game, to fix our hospitals so that we can invest in a health system for the future. It delivers a strong surplus of $27.1 billion, or 1.8 per cent of GDP, in 2008-09 while finding more than a dollar in savings for every dollar it spends, making it one of the most economically responsible budgets ever landed. In fact, the government has identified savings of $33 billion over four years, including $7 billion in 2008-09. While this budget has exercised a level of discipline rarely seen in this country, more vitally still it manages to put the heart and compassion back into the federal government. These are the key things a Rudd Labor government was elected to do, and this budget puts us on the right track to do those very things.

There is much in this budget for the people of Deakin. As the Labor candidate at the 2007 federal election and a lifelong resident of the area, I know full well how the issues that shape us as a country shape and affect my electorate. The people of Deakin are concerned about securing the future for their families, their children, and also for the environment. But they worry about the household budget, the mortgage and the bills and making sure their kids get the best start in life and they also want to make sure they bequeath to them a healthy environment. These are the things Deakin people are concerned about. As we saw at the last election, they worry when their government loses sight of its long-term vision and runs out of ideas to fix the big problems. As we also saw at the last election, they really worry when their government wastes its energy and spends its time putting in place workplace laws that are unfair and extreme—unfair workplace laws which the constituents of Deakin never voted for or, for that matter, even asked for. Cost-of-living pressures, interest rate rises, concerns about the previous government’s Work Choices laws, addressing climate change, support for pensioners and carers and ensuring their children have the best start in life—these are heart-and-soul matters for the people of Deakin.

I feel it is extremely important to report the ways in which the people of Deakin will benefit from this budget. In this budget the Rudd Labor government has delivered for Deakin families through its $55 billion Working Families Support Package. People work hard to build a future for their families but are now finding it harder and harder to balance the family budget. In this budget, the Rudd government delivers for them by providing $46.7 billion worth of tax relief over the next four years and by introducing a 50 per cent education tax refund to help Deakin mums and dads meet the cost of educating their children, at a cost of around $4.4 billion. Parents who are entitled to family tax benefit part A or whose children receive youth allowance or a similar payment will also be able to claim educational payments up to $750 for each child at primary school and up to $1,500 for each child at secondary school. The budget also increases the childcare tax rebate from 30 per cent to 50 per cent and pays it quarterly to give parents assistance closer to when they incur out-of-pocket expenses, at a total cost of $1.6 billion. What that means for the average Deakin working family—a mum and a dad with a combined income of $87,000 and two kids aged four and six—is that they will receive a tax cut of $1,050 a year along with education and childcare rebates totalling $1,630. That Deakin family will be $2,680 a year better off under this budget. That is money that can be spent elsewhere by that family or saved.

The government has also acted on the housing affordability crisis with a $2.2 billion package covering first home saver accounts, the National Rental Affordability Scheme and the new Housing Affordability Fund. Melbourne’s outer east is a mortgage belt, and decreasing housing affordability has taken its toll on young local families trying to crack into the market out there. I know they welcome the Rudd government’s efforts to give them a helping hand.

Another helping hand is the provision of the Teen Dental Plan to help Deakin mums and dads with up to $150 for the cost of a trip to the dentist for their teenage children, at a total cost of $491 million. Then there is the A Fairer Medicare levy surcharge threshold for individuals and families, and we are implementing the first ever national Fuelwatch scheme, which is derided by those opposite but happily supported by their state counterparts in New South Wales and Western Australia. I note the opposition’s enthusiasm to shoot down an idea that might help Deakin motorists have a better chance to shop around for the cheapest petrol, but they never came up with an alternative plan in nearly 12 years in federal government.

This budget also provides much assistance to seniors, pensioners and carers. My electorate of Deakin has a high percentage of residents over the age of 65, and this budget helps seniors with their cost-of-living expenses by increasing the utilities allowance and seniors concession allowance to $500 per year, delivering the $500 senior bonus and increasing the telephone allowance for those with an internet connection. This budget also provides the $500 utilities allowance to those receiving a disability support pension.

This budget will also provide better access to more affordable health care. There is $3.2 billion for health and hospital reform, including $600 million to slash elective surgery waiting lists in public hospitals, $275 million to establish GP superclinics in local communities and an immediate $1 billion injection to relieve the pressure on our public hospitals. This budget also provides more help for carers, expanding eligibility for the carer payment child and for the utilities allowance and providing lump sum bonuses of $1,000 to the recipients of the carer payment and, to recipients of the carer allowance, payments of $600 for each eligible person in their care.

Another critical element of this budget has been the Rudd government’s recognition that Australians are working harder than ever. They are squeezing more into their day, working longer hours and juggling home and work responsibilities. Australians now work the longest full-time hours in the OECD. Twenty-five per cent of parents in full-time employment with children under 15 are working an average of 50 hours or more per week. In conjunction with household work and childcare duties, that is an enormous load. So too has the number of working mums increased dramatically, with more parents combining child care and other duties with employment. The proportion of single parents who are employed has also risen.

Family budgets and family time are under siege, and housing costs are a large part of most families’ weekly expenses. Working families buying a first home are facing the highest mortgage repayments on record as a share of income, placing a real strain on family budgets. Rents are also increasing rapidly, up by seven per cent over the past 12 months and 12 per cent over the past two years.

So, through the measures in this budget, the government is determined to ensure that families are not paying more than necessary and it is taking action to fight inflation whilst providing more help to working families, pensioners and those many people who are not at the top of the income scale. Underpinning all of those measures is a tight fiscal discipline, a real sense of compassion and a plan for nation building that positions us well to meet the big challenges of today and the future. I commend the bills to the House.

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before I call the honourable member for Mitchell, I want to draw to honourable members’ attention the existence of standing order 62, which says that a member in the chamber must bow to the Speaker on entering or leaving the chamber. Because the Main Committee follows the same standing orders as the main chamber, that rule also applies to honourable members entering or leaving this chamber. There has also been a tradition that, as honourable members cross the chamber and pass in front of the occupant of the chair, similarly there should be, as a mark of respect to the chair—not to the individual but to the institution—a bow to the Deputy Speaker.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Rudd government campaigned on a fresh approach before the last election. The Treasurer and the Prime Minister offered something called new leadership to Australians and so-called hope for working families across our nation. They spoke about things like petrol prices, grocery prices, interest rates and housing pressures. They campaigned on solving emotive issues that were facing the Australian people. This government, the then opposition, portrayed themselves as the saviour of those facing escalating petrol prices and grocery prices and unaffordable housing. Yet, despite those promises, the Rudd government has failed to deliver. It has provided a visionless budget. It is a budget that has not set an agenda for the future and is simply another case of politics as a substitute for substance.

The main component of this budget is in fact a tax cut package that was directly lifted from Liberal Party policy. This has been correctly identified by Ross Gittins in today’s Sydney Morning Herald. He has drawn attention to the fact that the claim made by the Treasurer on budget night that this is a Labor budget is absolutely untrue. This is a half-Liberal budget, as Ross Gittins correctly identifies. It is a half-Liberal budget but—like the USSR, who used to steal technology from the USA and then attempt to use it, not understanding what it was or how it worked—the Labor Party has lifted half the Liberal Party policy but forgotten the other half.

Ross Gittins also highlights that the Treasurer has attempted to argue to the Australian people that he is delivering for people on average weekly earnings a tax cut of $20. Conveniently, the Treasurer has failed to mention that he has cited average earnings of $48,000—which indeed they are when you include part-time workers and all kinds of employees—but adult full-time employee average earnings are actually $60,000 in Australia. Those people will only receive a tax cut of $11.50, not the $20 cited by the Treasurer. It was a very insightful article in theSydney Morning Herald, I remind members here in the chamber. I encourage people to read it.

The spin of the government continues. It is absolutely incredible. They are trying to convince workers on average incomes that they will be getting bigger tax cuts than they actually will. In my electorate of Mitchell, hardworking families will certainly be worse off from this budget. The budget set aside $75 million to tackle urban congestion and begin planning for transport infrastructure in the neediest areas of Australia. There is no place in Western Sydney that is more in need of transport infrastructure than my own electorate of Mitchell, in north-western Sydney. It is one of the fastest growing electorates in the country, but there is no train line and there is no public bus system; there are just 10 years of New South Wales Labor’s broken promises to build a heavy rail line in the north-west of Sydney.

While the most recent reannouncement of the north-west rail line—now repackaged as the North West Metro line—was met with severe scepticism throughout Mitchell, in the local media and in the state media, the federal government had an opportunity to do something about it. What did they do? Absolutely nothing. There was not one transport dollar for people in north-western Sydney and not one transport or infrastructure dollar for anyone in the outer suburbs of Sydney.

When I read the budget, my first impression was the opposite. I saw a line item: the Western Metro link. I could not find any reference to the Western Metro link online. I thought they must certainly be referring to the North West Metro link, which was announced by the state government. It is the only area in suburban New South Wales without access to public transport. But I was wrong. This is a new Western Metro line, a metro line that runs alongside the heavy rail line that already exists in the inner city suburbs of Newtown, Lewisham, Ashfield and Burwood. It is a transport alternative for those in the inner west, while the working families in the north-west and south-west of Sydney are left with no means of transport and no real hope that anything will be done about it.

Two days after the announcement in the budget, it was back to what Labor is all about: all spin and no substance. In an attempt to avoid scrutiny on the issue, Morris Iemma and the state Labor government came out after the budget and pronounced that the North West Metro line was likely to be delivered early and that it would be accompanied by the new Western Metro line, which they announced. The announcement of the Western Metro line was met with the headline ‘Promised north-west metro could arrive early’. This week, only two weeks later, internal documents leaked to the newspaper show that the metro is more than $700 million over budget. It will struggle to be built on time. It will not be able to carry the passengers the Labor government has claimed it will.

With no hope or direction in sight for the transport needs of working families in north-west and south-west Sydney, the Rudd government decided to fund a Western Metro line running alongside the heavy rail line in the suburbs I have mentioned. Where are these suburbs? Whose electorate do those suburbs fall into in the inner city where this duplication of already existing public transport is going to occur? I will tell you: this new Western Metro line duplicates public transport in Grayndler, the electorate of the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. This is an example of the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government carving up the pork, putting it in a barrel, jumping on it and rolling it down the rail line from Lewisham to the city. Mr Albanese, the member for Grayndler, states:

There is nothing more inefficient than a car on the road with the engine on going nowhere.

It is comments like these that show how out of touch the government is. Seventy per cent of the dwellings in my electorate of Mitchell have two or more cars, the highest number of cars per dwelling in Australia. Why? For the reason I have outlined—there is no access to public transport. Every adult in my electorate has to have a car. The electorate of the minister for infrastructure and transport has the third lowest number of cars per dwelling in Australia. Seventy per cent of dwellings in my electorate have two or more cars, compared to 26 per cent of dwellings in the minister for infrastructure and transport’s electorate. But this budget is outlining a new public transport expansion in the electorate of the minister for infrastructure and transport, duplicating an already existing heavy rail line from Lewisham to the city.

For those not from New South Wales here today, let me just say that it is 20 minutes from the trendy, spivvy inner city suburbs of Petersham and Lewisham to the city, and it is two hours for the working families of my electorate, south-west Sydney, Penrith and Macarthur to travel to work every day, facing tolls, traffic and time away from their family. As I said, this is pork-barrelling in Grayndler and the inner city while the people of north-western Sydney and Western Sydney are crying out for one single dollar of transport funding and infrastructure funding. The member for Grayndler, the minister for infrastructure, decides to put more funding for transport services in his own transport-rich seat.

But the pork-barrelling does not stop there. While north-west Sydney barely received a cent in this budget, the member for Grayndler, the minister for infrastructure, also found $14.5 million for a local school in his electorate—a local school, I might add, which over the last four years had on one of the busiest roads of Sydney a ‘No Howard’ banner flying from the school premises. Let me just reiterate that for the benefit of the chamber: they flew a ‘No Howard’ banner from a public school on the busiest road in Sydney, and then in this budget, when the Labor government is elected, they receive a $14.5 million grant. Every year the school holds something called a Tampa day, where students and teachers wear black armbands in recognition of the Tampa being turned around by the previous government.

I want to draw to the attention of this House that public schools are not the political playthings of members in this chamber. They ought not to be politicised. Education is not indoctrination and ought not to be political indoctrination. Education should be impartial and education should be fair, and the funding in this budget—

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Would honourable members on my right remain silent.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The funding in this budget for the Fort Street High School and the duplication of the transport line show exactly the priorities of this Labor government—the inner city at the expense of the working families in the suburbs.

Further to the discussion in another place today, the member for Grayndler challenged me to put my position on the record about the Fuelwatch program, and in the context of the appropriation bills I can do that. Yesterday we had the extraordinary spectacle of the members for Lindsay and Blaxland, representing Western Sydney electorates, attempting to defend a fuel system that will make no difference to the price of fuel in Western Sydney. What neither of them addressed was how a family in Penrith or a family in Greenacre would be better off under this government’s scheme—a scheme, I might add, which fines operators for lowering their petrol prices. Let me restate that for the House: if you dare to commit the sin of putting your price down, of lowering the prices of your goods or services, you will be guilty of an offence under this Labor government and fined for doing it. How is that going to bring petrol prices down for working families? There is no substance in this measure and it is a measure in this budget that I am happy to oppose. This will not achieve anything except to increase the already significant machinery of government. As the opposition leader has stated, how does watching petrol prices bring them down? It is a very good question.

Whilst Labor campaigned and talked endlessly on the problem of escalating petrol prices, we have proposed a 5c reduction in the petrol excise, a practical measure which will reduce the price of petrol—no spin, no politics, just action. The former government took the measure of removing the indexation of fuel excise, which has saved motorists—in Western Sydney, in my electorate and all across this nation—17c on the price of fuel compared to what they would have paid if we had not taken that measure. That is an example of a real measure to deliver savings to families, unlike setting up a scheme where they can simply watch the prices and where all operators appear on an average day to have high prices, removing the peaks and troughs which allow people to decide at what price and on what day they prefer to buy petrol.

On the other side of the fence we have the Fuelwatch scheme. It is a scheme which costs over $20 million, as outlined in this budget. It has been proven not to have reduced prices in Western Australia, where fuel prices are generally higher than elsewhere in the country. The member for O’Connor frequently reminds me—he sits right behind me and my ears get a constant taste of what he is saying—that there is a major refinery in Perth. You might think, ‘Well, if the refinery is in the eastern states and you have to take the petrol from the eastern states to Perth, that might be one factor that makes prices generally higher in Perth.’ But, no, the member for O’Connor—whom I find to be a very reliable figure in the chamber—tells me there is a major refinery in the city of Perth. Therefore, there is no reason why under the FuelWatch system which has been in operation in Perth fuel prices in Perth should be generally higher than elsewhere in our country. The highest price for fuel is also higher in Perth than in Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide. By admission of its own minister, FuelWatch seems to be anticompetitive and could force independent service stations out of business. The refusals of the Prime Minister to guarantee that this will have even a 1c impact on the price of fuel seem to tell honourable members that there is no substance to this measure.

The 2006 census showed that my electorate of Mitchell has one of the highest proportions of mortgage owners—and McMansions—and some of the highest housing-loan repayment levels in the country. While I welcome the allocation of $2 billion to improve housing affordability, the government is not addressing the real reasons for the worsening housing affordability problems in this country. Saver accounts are a worthwhile initiative and something that we should be exploring, but they do not go to the heart of the problem in solving housing affordability. In fact, they seem to tackle the problem at the margins. It seems to be politics as a substitute for substance—that is, looking like you are doing something rather than actually doing something. If the government were serious about housing affordability, they would place pressure on the state governments in the new so-called cooperative federalism, in the new so-called ending of the blame game, and they would speak to their mates in the state Labor Party and say, ‘It’s time to abolish stamp duties on mortgages and business conveyances.’ That would be a practical and real measure to bring down the pressure on housing affordability.

When the GST was introduced in the year 2000 it came with the state government’s commitment to abolish stamp duties, a measure that the majority of state governments are yet to implement. Like every Labor government, like this Labor government, they are addicted to tax. The GST—a growth tax which was designed to provide a direct funding mechanism to the states and a guaranteed increase of funding to the states—came in and they have been addicted to it ever since. Yet their agreement to remove the stamp duties—their agreement to take the stamp duties off as compensation for the increased amounts of revenue they would be receiving from the Commonwealth—was never fulfilled. Today stamp duty, land tax and local government contributions—listen to this, because it is very important—add about 30 per cent to the cost of a new home. That means a third of the cost of a new home comes out in taxes, duties and local government contributions. Many of these taxes are justified on the basis they contribute to local infrastructure, but if you walked down any street in my electorate and said, ‘A third of your housing cost went on infrastructure,’ they would laugh you out of town, and they would be right. It is clear these exorbitant taxes and charges do not go to infrastructure in my electorate of Mitchell.

The Rudd government campaigned on ending the blame game, but it is clear that we now have the federal and state governments covering each other’s backs. They are working together, but they are working together to hoodwink Australians into thinking that things are changing. They are not. Many of the problems of affordable housing in Australia can be directly attributed to government. The lack of land release and the urban consolidation policies pursued by so many socially revisionist state governments have increased the pressure on housing in this country. If the Rudd government do not put pressure on their mates in state governments to cut mortgage stamp duties, they cannot be taken seriously when it comes to having a genuine concern for housing affordability in this country.

I want to turn now to climate change. Prior to the election, Labor ran a fear campaign on climate change—a campaign designed to encourage people in this country to think that they were facing an imminent and urgent crisis of the planet that was going to bring doom and ruin upon them. The Liberals had been asleep at the wheel on climate change, we were told we had to believe. As Peter Garrett said before the election, ‘The government has sat on its hands for 11 years and we are going to do something about it.’ Along comes the first Labor budget, and what is in it for climate change? That was the impending emergency they created prior to the election; what is the emergency following the election? What is the urgent action and what measures have they pursued to do something about climate change?

In fact, if you examine the measures in the budget, as many people have, you will be very disappointed. I am very glad my honourable friend and colleague the member for Flinders is here in the chamber, because the coalition’s $8,000 rebate for solar panels was designed to drive further demand for solar panels in order to drive greater efficiencies in production, installation and research. Yet, despite all Labor’s pre-election climate change trumpeting, the implementation of Labor’s means test for solar panels has led Phil May, the Co-director of Solartec Renewables, to say, ‘They have totally destroyed the solar industry—absolutely and totally ruined it.’ It is becoming increasingly clear that when it comes to climate change Labor do not believe their own rhetoric about it. Otherwise, they are negligent for not doing anything about the matter.

In conclusion, I want to turn to what I regard as one of the most insidious effects of the Rudd government and its budget and also to the change Labor is trying to effect in Australia.

Honourable Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Honourable members ought not conduct a conversation across the chamber.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In recent weeks the new Labor government have directed serious energy towards constructing a narrative about their economic policy. They have cast themselves as being on the side of the ‘poor’ versus the ‘rich’. They have self-labelled themselves as Robin Hood taking on the rich in our country. It is an attempt to claim the role of a hero that acts against a perceived injustice. But what the Rudd Labor government fails to recognise is that wealth today in our society and in our modern industrial economy is earned; it is not taken off people as it was in Robin Hood’s day. For Labor to cast themselves as Robin Hood taking from the rich and giving to the poor is an insult to all working families, who would be insulted to be defined as poor.

Last century there were many socialist, communist and left-of-centre governments that acted on the basis of this idea. Each attempt by these socialist, communist and left-of-centre governments resulted in economic misery on an unimaginable scale. Attempts by government to equalise wealth have been shown throughout history to end in disaster. The most recent attempts are close at hand. You only have to take a trip through a former communist or socialist country to witness what happens when a government acts on the principle that it is Robin Hood taking from the rich in a modern industrial economy where wealth is earned through hard work, determination, innovation, risk taking and doing a job. The Rudd-Swan budget, far from being the Robin Hood budget of the new era, is actually espousing policies that will see the return of welfare dependency, long-term unemployment and a deliberate strategy of bringing down anyone who aims to do better for themselves or their family. In particular, it will not create a better Australia by classing everyone over an arbitrary line of $150,000 as rich and everyone under that level as poor.

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I remind all honourable members of standing order 64 in relation to the fact that honourable members ought to refer to other honourable members by the name of their electorate or their position and not by their surname.

Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to speak in support of Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and the related budget bills. Clement Attlee, a Labour Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, once said that a government’s budget was a natural expression of its character. This is particularly the case in times of economic turbulence. While the previous government reaped the rewards of the Keating government’s tough economic reform and unprecedented growth in international financial markets, the Rudd government is not so lucky. With rising inflation and instability in global financial markets, it is important that this government strike the right balance with this budget—and indeed it has. This budget clearly identifies that the priorities of this government are to focus long term on building the infrastructure that Australia needs while delivering real assistance to those doing it tough in our community.

Over the last decade the previous government ignored more than 20 warnings from the Reserve Bank of Australia about the pressure that rising inflation was putting on interest rates. Yet, from his recent comments reported in the media, it seems that the member for Wentworth still is not certain whether inflation is an issue for Australian working families. I have certainly got news for him. Particularly in the outer metropolitan areas like my electorate of Kingston, rising inflation is hurting families through higher interest rates and higher prices at the supermarket. Lower inflation means lower interest rates and lower costs for families. Unlike the budgets that have been delivered in the House over the last few years, this budget makes the tough decisions that are necessary to cut spending and put downward pressure on inflation.

In addition, this government has not lost sight of investing in the future, establishing three funds with which it will expand productive capacity in our economy: the Health and Hospitals Reform Fund, the Education Investment Fund and the Building Australia Fund. Constituents in my electorate of Kingston have warmly welcomed the $20 billion Building Australia Fund, which will invest in ongoing improvements to roads, ports, railways and telecommunications infrastructure. The growing suburbs of southern metropolitan Adelaide are looking forward to a decent Commonwealth investment in infrastructure—investment that was not provided by the previous federal government.

Already in this budget, the Rudd government have invested in local infrastructure in the southern area of Adelaide. Firstly, we have begun delivering on our promise of a $7.5 million upgrade to one of South Australia’s worst intersections: the Victor Harbor and Main South Road intersection. This will prevent the multitude of accidents and near misses that occur every year. In addition, there is a $6.74 million investment in black spot funding for both the Onkaparinga and Marion councils, which will also help to improve the safety of the roads in Kingston.

Aldinga Beach and Port Willunga are two of the fastest growing areas in South Australia, with many new families moving in every month. Unfortunately, while the beaches are beautiful and safe for swimmers, there is currently a dearth of infrastructure for sport and recreation on dry land. At the election, the government committed $2 million to help the council build a recreation centre in this area, and I am very pleased that this government has delivered on this commitment. In addition, to support the new recreation centre the government has also invested $100,000 to upgrade the Onkaparinga Rugby Union Football Club.

Investing in our universities is also critical to ensure that we are able to turn the tide on the current skills crisis facing this country. In this budget, an extra $8 million was provided to the Flinders University of South Australia for capital expenditure. This investment will ensure that the university can continue to be an example of education excellence in the southern Adelaide area. In addition, this budget delivered on our election commitment of a $10 million upgrade to improve the medical training facilities at the Flinders Medical Centre, Noarlunga Hospital and the repat hospital, allowing for greater capacity for the Flinders medical school to train more doctors in the southern suburbs of Adelaide.

The closure of the Mitsubishi plant at Tonsley Park has affected many people in the south. As I told the House in my first speech, the pain of losing one’s employment extends not only to the loss of income; for many of these workers at Mitsubishi, much of their identity was woven into the pride they took from being part of a team that worked together to build quality cars. However, now we must look to the future, and this budget delivers a $35 million innovation and investment package. This will be provided over four years. It will provide intensive assistance to Mitsubishi workers and will create a South Australian innovation and investment fund. This fund will focus on the Adelaide southern suburbs and will be directed at projects that diversify and strengthen the capacity of South Australia’s manufacturing and industry sector.

In addition, this budget has delivered $900,000 to help the Southern Success Business Enterprise Centre expand the array of services it provides to local small business. This extra assistance will be welcomed by the many small businesses in the southern suburbs of Adelaide.

All these investments that I have described are clearly aimed at investing in the long-term future of the southern suburbs of Adelaide. As I go around the electorate of Kingston, families are telling me that they are pleased with our focus of investing in the future but they also need immediate support to ensure that they are able to make ends meet. This budget delivers the $55 billion Working Families Support Package, targeted to provide some relief for these families. This budget delivers tax relief of over $20 per week to a taxpayer on average weekly earnings and adjusts the low-income tax offset so that taxpayers earning less than $14,000 a year pay no tax at all. These tax cuts reward families who are putting in the hard yards to drive Australia’s economic prosperity and ensure that there is still incentive in our tax system for wage earners at the higher end.

Another key tax measure in this budget was to remove the Medicare levy surcharge tax slug off the back of middle-income earners. When this measure was introduced by the Howard government on 1 July 1997, the surcharge was imposed on only eight per cent of taxpayers. Without the increase of the threshold in this budget, the Medicare surcharge would have been imposed on 45 per cent of taxpayers. I challenge the opposition to find a single person earning $50,000 a year who feels they are a high-income earner and should be penalised if they do not take out private health insurance. It appears that it is the policy of those opposite to fight tooth and nail to stop this measure for tax relief for middle-income earners while opposing a small increase in the luxury car tax. This exposes the true loyalties of the coalition, who are not here for working families but for the wealthy elite, who can afford cars that cost more than most people earn in a year.

One of the most substantial pressures on families with school-aged children is expenses relating to education. The government’s new education tax refund will provide families receiving family tax benefit A with a 50 per cent refund for many education expenses, up to $750 per year for each child undertaking primary studies and up to $1,500 per year for each child undertaking secondary studies. This refund will aid many families in Kingston with the increasing cost of educational materials such as computer equipment and access to the internet. For families with kids at primary and secondary school, having a computer at home is not a luxury; it is a necessity. This measure is important—to make a computer in every home not an unattainable dream but a reality.

Age pensioners have made an immeasurable contribution to our nation. Many worked for four decades or more to support their families. Unfortunately, most age pensioners worked at a time when superannuation schemes for average-income earners were inadequate, if they existed at all. Age pensioners are doing it tough, particularly single pensioners, who are often older women whose husbands have passed away. I have met many pensioners around my electorate who are struggling to afford the basic essentials of life—food, housing, medicine and new clothes. This budget delivers an extra $392 per year to recipients of the utilities allowance and has also delivered a bonus to seniors of $500. Together, this means that age pensioners are at least $892 better off per annum than was projected by the previous government in their forward estimates. The measures to help pensioners are only the first step and the government recognises that there is still more to do to make sure that age pensioners can enjoy a comfortable retirement. I look forward to the report from the Henry review into Australia’s tax and welfare system, which will include recommendations to help improve the living standards of pensioners.

Carers play one of the most important roles in our community. They sacrifice their own personal gain to look after someone they love. The government has recognised their contribution to our community with an extra $822 million package to make their lives easier. This includes a $1,000 one-off bonus to recipients of the carers payment and DVA carers service pension and, to recipients of the carers allowance, a $600 bonus for each eligible care receiver. The budget also includes $100 million for extra capital funding to increase the supply of supported accommodation for people with a disability whose ageing parents can no longer look after them at home.

In summary, the budget delivers on the government’s election commitments. It is a natural expression of this government’s character. It has made one matter entirely clear: under the Rudd government, there is no such thing as core and non-core promises. When this government makes a commitment to the Australian people, it means it. The government is proud that this budget reflects not only its sound economic management but its honesty and integrity with the electorate and its compassion to those in need. I commend this legislation to the House.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise this evening to make my contribution on the budget brought down by the Treasurer, the first budget from the Labor Party in more than 13 years. I have to say that I found it to be just an old-fashioned Labor budget, full of the politics of envy and not governing for all Australians. One of the worst aspects of the budget relates to the Prime Minister, who went to the people of Australia at the end of last year and convinced so many of them that he would do something about grocery prices, petrol prices and housing affordability. It has not taken long—six months—for the Prime Minister to declare that he has done as much as he can. Just last week he said there is nothing more that he can physically do.

Of course, the Treasurer, happy Wayne, says Australians are happy. I have news for the Treasurer, for the Prime Minister and for this Labor government. Let us just have a look at what has happened following this high-taxing, high-spending and, as the budget papers confirm, higher unemployment budget.

Since this government was elected, and notwithstanding the commitments of the Prime Minister as he masqueraded around Australia, what has happened in relation to petrol prices? Petrol prices have risen almost 20 per cent. But it is always someone else’s problem. The Prime Minister said, ‘Oh, it’s something to do with the global oil price,’ or, ‘It’s the subprime market in America.’ When we were in government we faced the ramifications of the SARS crisis, the Asian meltdown and 9-11. They rattled around the world and we got on with governing the country and managing the economy. We did not go around looking for scapegoats or blaming other issues concerning the global economy. But we are talking about domestic issues here at home.

What has happened to milk prices since this government was elected? Milk is fundamental to every household budget. The now Prime Minister said he was going to do something about grocery prices. It was a concern for working families. Milk prices are up almost 12 per cent. Cheese is up 15 per cent. That very basic staple, the daily bread, is now up nine per cent. What is the Prime Minister doing about it? He said he has done everything physically possible.

Honourable Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Robertson will allow the member to be heard in silence.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank Madam Deputy Speaker for her protection. But we also know the very engine of this economy is small business. You look to small business—

Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker, I seek to intervene.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the member for Maranoa willing to give way?

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will take her question.

Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Who does the grocery shopping in your household?

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is a very frivolous point. I often do the shopping in my household. I also am the one who usually buys the meat and fruit and vegetables, but I do not take anything away from my wife, who is a very, very frugal keeper of the family budget for those household items. But I was talking about the great engine room of this economy—small business. What has happened to the confidence of small businesses for their future since this Labor government was elected? Business confidence is at its lowest level since these statistics have been recorded. But let me move to some of the actual programs that are certain to affect my electorate. Something that will ring in the ears of many voters at the next federal election was that great statement from the now environment minister, Peter Garrett. He said, ‘Oh, don’t worry about what we are saying now; when we get in, we’ll just change everything.’ That is exactly what we are seeing from this government.

Let us have a look at what was committed for road funding in rural Australia. I know that in my state of Queensland, where a great influx of people from the southern states are coming and where there is great hope for the future, the two great drivers of our economy—on the value of exports, by the value of dollars—are the coal industry and the beef industry. What do we see is going to be spent on roads? The coalition was committed to funding the second range crossing between Brisbane and Toowoomba, out to the Darling Downs, which is the gateway that links the port of Brisbane to the Surat coal basin, the largest coal reserve in Australia, which is soon to be opened up. It is bigger than the Hunter Valley. We are seeing the exploration of coal seam methane gas, a clean source for the generation of electricity. In Dalby, a town where I have one of my offices, we now have a mini-city of 1,000 people. They are building a coal seam methane gas fired power station. All the equipment for the development of that new power station is going to come from the port of Brisbane, in the south-east corner of Queensland, across the Great Dividing Range to the Braemar power station. What did we hear from this government in relation to funding for the second range crossing of the Warrego Highway between Brisbane and the Darling Downs? Not one dollar was mentioned.

I am pleased that the government has committed something like $55 million to the upgrade of the Warrego Highway west of Toowoomba, but our commitment of $127 million was to be rolled out from 1 July 2008. We looked through the budget papers to see where the money for the Warrego Highway might be—as we always say, the devil is in the detail. But we are still looking for this devil. We are at least comforted by the fact that some $55 million is to be rolled out, but it stands in stark contrast to what the coalition was offering, which was some $127 million for this section of the Warrego Highway.

I will touch on the Regional Partnerships program. We have heard the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government brand the Regional Partnerships program a fraud and a rort. I watched the minister on Channel 7 this week, and he might have been to Damascus; he might have seen the light. I say to him: this is a program, run successfully by the coalition government, that delivered to regional communities benefits that were often unable to be funded through their local government area. I know the Labor government is going to rebrand it, call it something else, but I call on the minister to commit to those projects that have been approved by the federal coalition and have been announced. Those communities out there are desperate to know that they will get that funding—albeit they had not signed the contracts.

One of them, in my electorate of Dalby, has been used as an example by the minister in the House. He was saying that it is a rort when it is, in fact, a great community benefit. They spent a great deal of their ratepayers’ money in preparing the case for the Commonwealth to sign off on the contract. No community can commit $1 million or $2 million to a project, and they cannot go to tender for a project that they have identified, until they know they have the money. When the money is approved through the due process—the area consultative committee, the department and the ministers, under a coalition government—they can then go to the architects and start to spend some of their money. They can go to tender to get quotes for the construction of, in this case, the Dalby indoor-outdoor arena. That takes time. Trying to get builders, as we all know anywhere in Australia, to commit to firm prices is a challenge. Many of my communities have found that not only frustrating but difficult. They have worked through the issues, but, because they were not able to work through those issues before the election was called, the minister has said: ‘We are going to can all those projects. We will not fund them; they are a rort.’

Many of these projects are done through hard-working volunteer organisations that have the support and confidence of their local council. Sometimes, charitable organisations are involved. Jupiters Casino in Queensland provides funds to some of these communities every year. Some state governments provide funds for these projects, as the member for Indi knows. It takes time to bring all those funding sources together, but you cannot start that process until you have the support of the Commonwealth to progress that commitment and the funding arrangements before getting the Commonwealth to sign off on those Regional Partnerships projects.

There is one program in western Queensland that I specifically want to mention tonight—the Darling Matilda Way sustainable region. Its committee included Indigenous people, local mayors and people of great integrity and commitment to the outback of western Queensland. They went through the process of looking at projects that would make a real difference to those communities to ensure that they could be sustainable and create jobs. That was against a backdrop of the extreme drought that is making it very hard for many of these communities. They identified two projects for western Queensland. One of them was the Longreach airport upgrade. As we all know, Longreach is the home of the Qantas Founders Museum—an icon in Australia, I would have thought. Under the Sustainable Regions Program the former coalition government committed $6.6 million to that project.

After due process had been gone through, we also said we would provide $5.6 million to establish a bilby centre in Charleville. The proponents of the project were the Murweh Shire Council. The bilby is an endangered species—and it is Australia’s Easter bunny. Through their great initiative, ideas and enthusiasm the people of the Murweh Shire Council put forward that project in good faith. It was approved by the former coalition government but it now appears that the Rudd government have decided they will not fund it. I call on the minister to look at the Sustainable Regions Program. Following an electoral redistribution the Longreach airport will be funded under the Sustainable Regions Program. Why has the minister approved that? Because it is in the seat of Flynn. But the minister has not approved the bilby centre in Charleville because it is in the seat of Maranoa. That is grossly unfair. To use the minister’s own words, it verges on a rort. I call on him to look at the Sustainable Regions Program and the socioeconomic circumstances of the community out there. He will see that this is a project he must support. If he puts the politics aside he will find that the hard work that has gone on over the last three years should be supported by the government. The bilby is an endangered species in this country. If this minister does not think the bilby is worthy of being celebrated and worthy of being a species to have for many years into the future so that we can tell its story to the children and the people who visit western Queensland then he is out of touch with reality and is becoming blatantly political.

I want to touch on the issue of the so-called luxury tax on four-wheel drives. In western Queensland the roads are not like the Hume Highway—they do not have four lanes divided down the middle. They are often a narrow stretch of bitumen but more often they are a gravel road that has been graded—and you might see a grader once every couple of years. On these long, lonely country roads you find tourists and you also find local people visiting their local communities—women taking their children to the school bus or going to town for the local shopping—and they use four-wheel drives not as a luxury but as a necessity.

Certainly there are some four-wheel drives that are made in Australia but, when you put them to the test on some of the outback roads in my electorate, I can assure you that they do not stand up to some of the ‘real four-wheel drives’, which I know are made overseas. If you go to any mining community you will find that the mining companies and the people who live out there are into real four-wheel drives which are built on a chassis, wide wheel based and quite often diesel powered or petrol powered. They are vehicles that suit the environment. We do need these vehicles and they are not a luxury.

When we were in government we funded some four-wheel drive troop carriers under the Regional Partnerships program for the little kids out at Windorah, Birdsville, Bedourie and Yaraka. They do not have a subsidised urban transport system that is funded by taxpayers. They do not have buses and trains and a half-hourly air service between the major capital cities. They often have to go 300 or 400 kilometres just to interact with other kids or go to a swimming lesson if there happens to be a swimming pool in another community. These troop carriers were funded under the Regional Partnerships program. They did have a little community bus that had been provided by, I think, the Barcoo Shire Council. But I can assure you that, on those 300- or 400-kilometre open dirt roads, those little minibuses just do not see the year out—and the member for Kennedy would know this very well because he shares the sort of electorate that I represent. That was not a rort. That was looking after little children. Those communities often used those buses to take the women of those towns to the larger regional centres so they could attend a mobile breast cancer screening unit on a yearly basis. Those women would have been denied the opportunity to travel to those regional towns had we as a government not funded those troop carriers through the Regional Partnerships program. They were not a luxury. They were an absolute necessity for the benefit of children, women, families and communities.

I want to touch on one other issue before I conclude, and that is the issue of what was or was not in the budget for our senior citizens and our pensioners. We are a lucky country. We are resource rich. We have a strong economy. Our very birthright makes us some of the luckiest people on this earth. So I find it appalling, when we can put $40 billion aside into a fund for some time in the future—possibly to be used as a slush fund—that we cannot find one or two billion dollars to increase the basic pension rate of our senior citizens. The government had the opportunity through a Senate inquiry to respond to that. The work had been done and it could have been in this year’s budget.

Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What did you do?

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When we were in government we did what you did not do for the 13 years that you were in government, notwithstanding what you said you would do every other year. You said not only that you would index pension increases to the CPI but also that you would increase the pension to 25 per cent of male total average weekly earnings. We were the government that did that, not the Labor government. Now we are seeing the old Labor Party policies coming forward.

There was a report to the Senate, which this Labor government could have responded to, on the needs of that wonderful and very special generation of Australians who built this country. They laid down the foundation stones for the legacy we have all inherited and the way of life we have today, and we owe it to those people to increase the base rate of their pension. It is to the absolute shame of this Treasurer and Prime Minister that they have done absolutely nothing to improve the lot of our senior citizens. The Treasurer said this week that Australians are happy, and the Prime Minister said that there is nothing more that he can physically do. I say there is a lot more that the Prime Minister can physically do. He ought to get out of the Lodge and into the real world. He should forget about tripping around the world on VIP jets and talk to the real people. He will find that he is not the popular boy any more. (Time expired)

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Oh dear! How quickly things change in politics. I have sat here for the last hour or so and listened with great interest to a range of speeches from the opposite side. I have to say that I am just a teeny bit confused—though I am sure that if I settle down and think about it I might work it out—because such differing views have been put forward.

It is my privilege to speak this evening on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and the related bills—in other words, the budget for this year—and I rise to support the appropriation bill and those related bills. This is a historic first budget for the Rudd Labor government. This budget—unlike those of the last 11 years, in my view—is designed to meet the challenges of the future and to strengthen Australia’s economic foundations. Broadly speaking, one of the most important elements of this budget is that it has been carefully designed to fight inflation. I am well aware of the hardship that rising costs and interest rates are bringing to all people, in my electorate and around the country.

When the government first came to office in November last year—that is just six months or 21 weeks ago—Australia was facing the highest levels of domestic inflation in over 16 years. That affects everyone. Just to give an indication of that, the price of bread has risen 18 per cent in the past two years alone. I believe that one of the best things that any government can do in these circumstances is to put all the effort they can into fighting that demon called inflation. But, if there is one thing that is going to help the household budgets in my electorate and in other electorates, it is to fight that inflation and ensure that we are doing all in our power to keep that pressure down on inflation and down on interest rates. I know the interest rates that my community and other communities have endured in past times have really put those household budgets under severe pressure. So the best thing for me and one of the most important things for my community is to know that they have a government which is determined to fight that inflation demon and to do what it can to keep control of the economy at that level.

Therefore I am particularly pleased that the first Labor government budget in over 11 years has started a new era of responsible, long-term economic management. The Rudd Labor government has gone beyond its commitment and has delivered a budget surplus of 1.8 per cent of GDP. It is applying an additional two per cent efficiency dividend to most Australian government agencies, producing savings of $1.8 billion over five years, and every single dollar of new spending is more than offset by savings. This is responsible, and it is something we have not seen at that level for quite a while.

For people living in my electorate of Canberra, there was good news over and above the issue I have just talked about, which I think is the most essential one. Local initiatives in the budget for the ACT and the immediate region have included $19.6 million for infrastructure investment in roads across the ACT, and that includes the Black Spot Program, which is continuing, and the continuation of $19 million in federal government funding for the duplication of the Barton Highway. There is also $500,000 to the ACT government for the renovation of the Albert Hall—something very dear to the Canberra community. It is our town hall; it is a very historic building. In fact, the first ever citizenship ceremony held in Australia was held there in 1929. The Albert Hall is held in great affection in this town. It is part of the national capital and the role we play here as the national capital. So I am very pleased with that initiative. There is also $8.2 million—an election promise delivered—to upgrade the Kings Highway through to near Bungendore.

The Rudd Labor government has delivered on its promise of tax cuts for low- and middle-income earners, with $46.7 billion in tax cuts over the next four years. This includes raising the cut-off for the 30 per cent tax rate from $30,001 to $34,001. Medicare will become fairer under our government. We are lifting the threshold for the Medicare levy surcharge from $50,000 to $100,000 for singles and from $100,000 to $150,000 for couples.

I am aware that there is a bit of a debate being urged along by some on the impact this policy may have on the public health system. To those who argue that it will cause a mass exodus from private health insurance and immense pressure on the public hospital system, I say this: those who use the private system and are possibly in this category are more likely to be younger people, who are not high users of the health system in the first place, anyway. People who are high users of the health system and who believe that private health insurance is of value to them will in fact stay in the system. I believe it is only fair to change that threshold to reflect the current economic climate in which we find ourselves.

The Rudd Labor government budget announced many benefits for older Australians. These included the one-off bonus of $500, the increase in the utility allowance to $500 and also an increase in the telephone allowance for those with internet connection. While I do not have time to go through all the details, I am pleased to see the Henry inquiry instituted, which will have a proper, serious, long-term look at pension levels and other tax questions that impact on that part of our community.

In regard to education in Canberra, we were very pleased here in the ACT with a $24 million payment to the Australian National University and more than $5 billion to the University of Canberra. Nationally, $533-plus million will be spent over four years to provide universal access to preschool—that is, 15 hours per week, 40 weeks a year, for all four-year-olds by 2013. This is a fantastic policy for early childhood education.

Rudd Labor will also ease the cost burden on families by providing the education tax rebate. This will allow parents to claim back $350 of school costs per primary school student and $700 of school costs per secondary school student. This government understands how important it is for families to have access to high-quality child care. From 1 July this year the childcare tax rebate will increase from 30 per cent to 50 per cent of out-of-pocket expenses for approved childcare costs. This will deliver $1.6 billion back to families over the next four years, with benefits ranging from $500 to $2,500 per year for the average family. Furthermore, the government will lift the cap from $4,254 to $7,500, indexed, per child per year, for approved child care. From 1 July, payments will be made quarterly instead of annually. These measures, without any doubt, will help parents to get back into the workforce and to undertake training and will definitely ease the burden of cost that they have been enduring in attempting to provide good child care for their children.

A couple of terms ago, I had the privilege of being a shadow minister in the area relating to carers. I am very well aware, from the work I was able to do then and from the work within the community, of the enormous personal sacrifices that carers make through their dedication and hard work and also, of course, of the impact that caring can have on their lives, their families and their lifestyles generally.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker, I am not wanting to interrupt the member for Canberra, but I have become increasingly offended and would ask the member for Robertson to withdraw a comment she made earlier, the comment being: ‘Evil thoughts will turn your child into a demon.’ I ask her to withdraw unreservedly.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Member for Indi, I will ask the member concerned. I did not hear the comment at the time and you should have raised the issue at the time. I can understand that you have been thinking about it and, on that basis, I will ask the member for Robertson to withdraw it.

Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That statement was not made, so I will not withdraw what the member imagines she heard.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, it was recorded in Hansard. You made that comment; it was heard by another member as well. You made that comment. I ask you to withdraw.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Member for Robertson, could I ask you to rise and just place on the record that that is not what you said, because I do actually need it recorded in Hansard. I did not hear the comment, so I cannot comment on it at the moment. Could I ask the member for Robertson to put on the record that she did not make that comment.

Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I did not make the statement that was said to you. You did not hear it correctly.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Member for Indi, I am in an untenable situation; I did not hear the comment. I think the Hansard officer present has put it on the record because you asked her to place on the record what you heard. I am not in a position to ask the Hansard officer to tell me what she did or did not hear, but I do recall you asking the Hansard officer to take something down. The only thing I can do at this juncture is seek some advice from the clerks at a later date, and I will come back to it. But, as I did not hear it, I cannot ask the member to withdraw.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I appreciate the chair is in a difficult position but the member for Robertson, I know, has misled the House on this.

Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I could say I would like to have something put on the record that I imagined I had heard. I think it is highly improper, unless it is actually on the record, that it is recorded at all.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is why I have said I will go and check this later, because if it is recorded in the Hansard we will have to check it. I will take it up with the Speaker and the Clerk at a later stage on that basis. If it is in the Hansard and you are disputing it then we will need to look into the matter.

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was referring to the issue of carers. The Rudd Labor government recognises them and has taken an important first step to meet their needs.

Honourable Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I ask the two of you to desist.

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Among the budget allocations for carers was $293.6 million for 19,000 carers of children with profound disability, and the extension of the $500 utility allowance to 130,000 carers for the first time. The 19,000 people I have just referred to are an increase from the 3,000 people who currently qualify for that payment. I am particularly pleased to see that carers of children with profound disability will now have more access to that particular payment when it comes on stream.

Honourable Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker, I do not know whether it is appropriate for the person on their feet to raise a point of order, but my point of order would be that I implore the member opposite to be quiet so I can deliver my speech.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Canberra has the call and should be heard in silence, as the other members were.

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Help for carers will also be a key plank in the inquiry into Australia’s future tax system and the welfare system. Another important action being taken by this government is the ‘Better care for our carers’ inquiry, which I would like to make mention of during this speech. It is being conducted by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family, Community, Housing and Youth—a committee of which I am extremely proud to be the chair. The aim of the inquiry is to determine how better we can understand and meet the needs of carers who look after those with chronic illness, disability or frailty. I am very pleased that the committee, through the postbudget period, has received that reference.

I am extremely pleased that this budget also addressed an important issue which I believe was ignored by the previous government—that is, dental health care. The government will provide $290 million over three years to state and territory governments to help fund up to one million additional consultations and treatments for Australians needing dental treatments. A further $490.7 million will be provided over five years to help more than one million teenagers with dental health care. These are two very good initiatives that we welcome.

I do not have much time left, obviously, so I will be brief about two other important budget initiatives. One is that the baby bonus will be extended to adoptive families with children aged between two and 16 years from 1 January 2009. I have always had a heavy concern about the fact that, prior to this budget, people who adopted children over the age of two years were not eligible for the baby bonus. We have had debates on this matter in which I have participated in the House in the past. I am particularly pleased that this government has been able to introduce this policy, particularly where it is going to impact on the majority of overseas adoptions. The time lag impacting upon the age of the child has sometimes got nothing to do with anything other than the process that they are going through. It is a very welcome initiative.

Another great initiative is annual funding of $300,000 to Special Olympics Australia, which will give more young people with an intellectual disability the chance to participate in sports. As patron of Special Olympics ACT and having recently seen the Special Olympics national games, held in Canberra just recently, I know that they welcome that payment. It is a very good initiative, particularly for the intellectually disabled community.

Having highlighted some of the many great initiatives in this budget, I have to say—and I am willing to say—that there are sometimes concerns. Budgets do not always give everything to everybody as they would wish. Obviously, as the member for Canberra, I note that many people in my electorate had some concerns prior to the budget coming down as to what may happen in relation to public sector jobs. While I do not want to see anybody lose a job, we have been very up-front and honest with our local community—since last year, in fact, before the election—about what we predicted would happen should we gain government. One of those things was that there would be a change in some areas of the public sector—that there would be government programs of the previous government we would close down.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mrs Mirabella interjecting

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Member for Indi, unless you are taking a point of order on the member for Canberra’s speech, I will wait until the member for Canberra has finished her speech to listen to you.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Chair, there is no-one sitting—

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am here.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

She is here. The House is quorate.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Robertson—

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Indi will resume her seat. The member for Canberra will be heard in silence.

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I was saying, we were concerned but we were also very honest with our local community that there would be changes within the public sector. I was particularly pleased that our government was able to create the Career Transition and Support Centre through the auspices of the Australian Public Service Commission. The job of that transition and support centre will be to manage and coordinate as centrally as possible opportunities for any excess staff. If there are staff who find that a program they have been working in is no longer operative but for whom there are other opportunities in other parts of the public sector, we can assist them by moving them through that centre.

Another point to keep in mind is that we have an unemployment rate in Canberra of under three per cent—it is the lowest in the country. The ACT Public Service is very, very keen to recruit and is finding it very difficult, in that tight employment market, to do so. So, with no forced redundancies as part of our policy, I am now confident that any impact on the public sector that may be seen as negative will be kept to a minimum, and for those who are affected we will be doing what we can to ensure that they have as secure a future as we can possibly offer.

The last, very quick issue that I want to talk about is the indexation of Commonwealth superannuation pensions. I know this is a very important issue for many people in my electorate, let alone around the country. I understand the disappointment that they may be feeling at the moment with the rate of progress on this important policy issue, but I want to take this opportunity to assure everyone concerned in that sector of my continuing efforts and those of my ACT colleagues to further this matter through government, and we will be doing that. In summary, I think this budget is a step in the right direction for Canberra, and I want to congratulate the Rudd Labor government on the initiatives, the ideas and the long-term vision that they have displayed in producing this budget. I thank members of the House for their courtesy during my speech.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Canberra for her participation under difficult circumstances.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There has been a lot of noise made about inflation and interest rates. For those who like reading economics books written by Nobel prize winners, you can read Samuelson or Milton Friedman, and they will tell you that if you increase money supply but you do not increase goods and services then you will have inflation. That is what you want to concentrate on, instead of listening to silly Treasury advice about how interest rates are going to save us all from inflation. Our inflationary rates are not much different from those of the United States, and yet their interest rates have been less than half Australia’s interest rates. The people I represent have very high debt, so they have to pay very high interest. It is a huge burden upon them. They ask themselves: ‘Why am I charged twice as much in interest rates as the people in the United States? Don’t they have any threat from inflation in the United States?’

Then, of course, there is the matter of the Australian dollar, which has risen from around 60c to around 90c, which has taken some 30 or 40 per cent off the value of our cattle producers, our sugar producers, our mine workers and everybody else who exports. Those are the people I represent. Australia has the worst current account, probably, of any country on earth but there is no mention of it by any speakers on the budget; we could just keep going on each year rolling up a massive amount of debt and not having to worry about it!

If you think that Treasury are clever people, you do not know much about Australian history. Treasury are the people who brought us the recession that we had to have. They brought us the credit squeeze which almost destroyed the Menzies government in the sixties. They brought us Sir Otto Niemeyer from the Bank of England who created the Great Depression. Treasury brought him out here to advise us on how to run our economy. So Treasury have a very lamentable history in Australia and I see absolutely no reason to believe that they are any wiser today than they have been throughout our past history.

An interest rate double that of the United States and 20 times higher than that of Japan—our two major trading partners over the years—is disgraceful. It is an absolutely disgraceful performance. The previous government must take the criticism for that—they were there for 11½ years. The governments before that—effectively the Keating government; he claimed he was running the country through the Hawke years and I think he probably was—must take the blame for destroying the manufacturing base in Australia.

Let me be very specific. I do not like making assertions without backing them up. In 1985, the year before Mr Keating introduced his enlightened free market policies, 79 per cent of Australian motor vehicles were Australian made. Last year, only 19 per cent of our motor vehicles were Australian made. We do not thank the penguins in Antarctica for that; we thank the successive governments that have ruled Australia for the last 20 years. They have completely destroyed the manufacturing base of this country. Very few people are aware that they have all but destroyed the agricultural base in this country. Their work will finally be completed when they take away half of the irrigation rights from the people on the Murray Darling, reducing Australia’s agricultural production to about 30 per cent—depending on what data you want to look at. In any event, our cattle numbers are down 17 per cent and our sheep numbers are down 50 per cent. I will not comment on wheat. Our milk production is down 17 per cent. The final one of the big four is sugar and we are closing three mills every four years. We only have 24 mills left.

What a sorry tale we have to tell. But Treasury tells us that all the indicators are wonderful. The American treasury, in September 1929, told the American government that everything was rosy in the garden. Our Treasury told us that before the infamous credit squeeze, they told us that before the recession we had to have and they are telling us that again now. For those of us who take a keen interest in these things, we place no credibility in what Treasury tell us. We do know what we are paying in interest rates. Any fool can find out that it is twice what the Americans are paying and has been for the last seven or eight years. We can answer that question all right. We can answer the question about balance of payments. This is rather intriguing. Everyone is aware that we are a big mineral-producing nation. I am probably the only person in parliament who has ever been involved in mining in a real sense both as a labourer at Mount Isa Mines and as a producer and mine owner in my own right. I know a little bit about the mining industry. The average price of our coal, base metals, iron ore and gas has gone up 300 per cent how come our balance of payments has not? I will tell you why it has not. It is because the government sat on its hands and allowed our seven major mining companies to be purchased by overseas corporations. So the 300 per cent increase in value, whilst it makes a big difference to our trade deficit, which is now a trade surplus, makes no difference to our current account because when it comes in it has to be sent overseas to our owners, the seven mining companies that are now all foreign owned. Who do we blame for that—the penguins in Antarctica? No, it is the free trade policies of successive governments over the last 20 years.

I heard myself on the national news commenting about Senator John Button and thought: someone out there loves Senator John, arguably one of the two or three finest ministers since the Second World War. People claimed he was a free marketeer. If you take $400,000 million of public money and invest it in an industry to render that industry competitive, I would not call you a free marketeer. In fact, I would think that is the absolute height of interventionism. He introduced the round robin arrangements for the car industry, which again is the complete opposite of the successive government policies of non-intervention. Bumping into Senator Button in Melbourne, I said to him, ‘You rendered the steel industry internationally competitive, taking us from 80 tonnes per man per year to 720 tonnes per man per year and you rescued the car industry and got sacked for your achievements.’ To prove, as Button did by actually doing it, that Mr Keating’s policies were deadly wrong was actually a sackable offence, and for doing that he got sacked. He did not say that to me but he roared laughing when I said it to him.

If we continue to apply these policies, the future for our nation is a very sorrowful one indeed. If you are elected by the will of the people to be leaders of your country and you have not got enough gumption to read a couple of books, check up on a few figures and realise the extent of the lies you are being told, you have sorely let down your country, and history will pass enormously harsh judgement on you. It is amazing how history works in the long run. Mr Kerin, whom many of my friends had a very low opinion of, secured a subsidy scheme as an exit package for the milk industry. Again, it was really a cross-subsidy arrangement. I will not go into the details of how or why it emanated. Suffice to say that he got a small subsidy from the consumers of Australia to help the manufacturing sector, which effectively is the export sector. We went from around $600 million a year in exports—do not quote me on the figures, but you will find they are roughly correct—to about $2,500 million a year under the Kerin Plan. When the Kerin Plan was abolished and the government deregulated the dairy industry, the Labor state governments participating up to their eyeballs, the export industry collapsed almost completely.

I do not know if people in this place are interested in history, but when former Minister Anthony introduced the wool industry scheme, the price of wool doubled over the next three years. When Mr Keating abolished it, the price halved over the next three years. When Mr Kerin introduced the subsidy arrangement, we put an extra $2,000 million in export earnings, a 300 per cent to 400 per cent increase for that industry. When it was abolished, the export part of the industry collapsed almost completely.

Changing pace completely, at the summit I drew a map of Australia on the board and I drew a line from Port Hedland across to Gladstone. Some of the great mining magnates of Australia were in that room of 20 people, as also was Minister Albanese and Treasurer Swan. I said, ‘Everyone in this room is aware that all of our base metals are above that line, in the top third of Australia.’ The honourable member representing the Northern Territory is nodding in agreement. We know the Olympic Dam and Coolgardie are not—there are some exceptions—but it is a fair call to say that all of Australia’s base metal income, which is maybe about a third of our export earnings, is above that line.

To process metals you have to have cheap electricity. There is not one single baseload power station north of that line. In Queensland our base metals are not processed at all from any baseload power. They have to generate their own power by diesel, the most inefficient method known to man, and by very expensive gas. To put a figure on that, the price of gas is about $10 a gigajoule and the price of baseload coal-fired power is about a dollar a gigajoule. So it is about 1,000 per cent higher. Needless to say we are not processing a lot of our metals; they are going out of Australia unprocessed.

During Cyclone Larry, a big ship going out of Karumba nearly tipped over. It was carrying zinc concentrates; it was not carrying zinc—and it cannot until some baseload power stations are built. My colleague from the Northern Territory will be well aware that north of that line lies over 300 million megalitres of water. South of that line there is hardly any water at all; there is only around 80 million megalitres. Madam Deputy Speaker, do I have to tell you where 95 per cent of Australia’s agricultural production is? Yes, you are right: it is south of the line.

We can say a lot of things about ourselves, but if you were an objective observer you could not say that we are a particularly clever country when we are trying to do all of our agriculture where there is no water and doing none of our agriculture where all the water is. The honourable member from the Northern Territory will tell you about the vast open spaces and beautiful soils of the Barkly Tablelands, the Daly River basin, the Fitzroy and Ord rivers and the mighty Gulf Country, where seven million hectares of land, an area of the size of Tasmania, is taken over by dirty, filthy weed.

Finally, we would all be disappointed if I did not mention the word ethanol. Future generations of Australians will be quite fascinated. Here is something that cuts the price of petrol to 75c to 80c a litre. When I go home I tell people: ‘We spent the whole of the last two days arguing about whether we should watch petrol prices.’ Who the hell is interested in watching? Really, you might get it 2c cheaper here or 2c cheaper there. What in heavens name does that do about the petrol prices in Australia? In the meantime, the Americans and the Brazilians—and the Chinese and Indians, because they are now both producing ethanol, as the Russians soon will be; the European Union has already recommended it—must think we are the most stupid country on earth. But we are not. Our leaders are, but we are not. We Australians are not, but the people we constantly elect into government are.

When I became an Independent I had a close look at what happens to you as an Independent. I found out that, until Ted Mack came along, not one single Independent ever got re-elected to this place. Now we are getting re-elected continuously. That must tell you something. We had Pauline Hanson, whatever you might have thought about her. I would have doubted that she was the sort of person who could take 15 or 20 per cent of the vote in Australia, but it has to tell you that many people are pretty unhappy with the political parties in this country that have delivered to us the complete destruction of the manufacturing sector, the imminent collapse of the agricultural sector and, of course, the blood sucking off a mining industry that is finding it enormously difficult to survive when it cannot get any power to process its metals. And with the huge cost of transportation now, and with diesel and petrol prices going through the roof, how the hell can we get our metals out? If we process them, we will only carry away maybe one-tenth of the weight that we are carrying away now.

But we cannot do it without baseload power stations. Under free-market policies you have to be able to sell the entire capacity of that petrol station. I have been trying to do it for the last four years at Pentland, which is the nearest coal seam to north-west Queensland, this giant mineral province, and I have to tell you it is pretty difficult because, when that power station comes online, there will have to be 1,000 megawatts worth of customers to buy every single megawatt.

I will conclude on what good government does. I have mentioned Senator Button and John Kerin before. I have also mentioned Doug Anthony’s wool scheme before. The nation’s biggest export item is, of course, coal. Very few people in Australia are aware that, in the 1950s, Australia was a coal importing country. We imported coal! By 1966 Queensland was the biggest coal exporting state on earth. I will tell you how it was done, because I happened to be there. I was a very young person at the time, a protege of the great Ron Camm and Bjelke-Petersen. We knew that we had the reserves. We drilled for them. We knew Japan wanted to buy them. Mr Theiss—God bless that very great Australian; a man who finished school at sixth or seventh grade and who was one of the giants of Australia—spent about $100 million drilling for coal. He did not know whether he would be able to sell it. He did not know whether he would be able to find a market. He did not know whether he could get a government to help him transport the coal to a port to get it out of the country. But he spent that money anyway.

The Utah Development Company realised that Japan was never going to be able to buy its coal entirely from America, so they had to find another source to supply Japan. They came to Australia and drilled beside Mr Theiss. He had already found coal, and Utah reckoned that the easiest way to find coal as well was to drill beside him. As luck would have it, they did find coal. Theiss and Utah said to the government, ‘We can’t get it out unless you build a railway line.’ The government said, ‘We’re not going to build a railway line unless you have coal mines working’. Theiss and Utah said, ‘We can’t build a coalmine until you build the railway line.’ It was a classic chicken and egg situation. This went on for about seven or eight years. Then Bjelke-Petersen was elected and the railway line was built by government.

But there was no way in the world that two small mines could service a huge government expenditure of $1,000 million. With our free market policies today, it would be utterly impossible. Not only did the Queensland government make that investment but it built the port in Gladstone—one of the sixth biggest ports in the world. That was another $600 million or $700 million. The government then built the biggest power station on earth. Unlike today, where we have to sell every single megawatt out of Pentland before we can pour any concrete, not one single megawatt of electricity was sold then. The government built this huge, giant power station with not a single customer for it. We have a free market policy today that says, ‘You can’t do that.’ But in those days it was different, which is why aluminium and coal are the two biggest export earners for Australia today. (Time expired)

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank my friend and neighbour the member for Kennedy for another eloquent erudition of his particular views, which are topical.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A railway line from Mount Isa to Tennant Creek?

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like one. If you care to put it in, it would be great. I am obviously pleased to contribute to this debate. I will not be referring to the interests of my portfolio in this budget address. I want to talk about impacts upon my electorate. This budget, despite the protestations of some, is a nation-building budget. It is a budget that we have waited for for a long time. It is a budget which clearly heralds a new strategic approach to investment by the Australian government so as to harness our future opportunities and deal with future challenges.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Potential nation building. I’ll give you that.

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am with you. I am not going to claim that we have built the nation yet, but I am confident that, with the wise guidance of the Labor Party and under the wise guidance of Kevin Rudd as captain of the ship, we will get to that objective. And I am sure you will support us in that aim. It is a budget which is also aimed squarely at giving Australians a fair go.

It is really a first instalment of a coherent agenda to deal with the realities of 21st century life and it puts the importance of education and a smarter society squarely at the forefront. The measures and priorities in this budget are clearly an investment in Australia’s future and an investment in the Northern Territory, not the least of the reasons being the nature of the socioeconomic disadvantage that exists within the Northern Territory. This is recognised in the budget with a record amount of spending on specific purpose payments to the Territory up by 41 per cent over the previous year. This money is being invested in our Territory communities and, through those, in our future. This budget achieves on all fronts. It provides projects to improve our communities today, it invests in tomorrow and it is responsible and fiscally sound. Most importantly, from my personal perspective, it provides for the people of my electorate of Lingiari.

I want to pay particular attention to the resources made available for Indigenous Australians who live in my electorate and comprise about 40 per cent of my constituents and a significantly larger percentage of my voters. When it comes down to it, we know that budgets are ultimately about the implementation of policy. This budget does delivers on our policy commitments prior to the election. The single most important element of those in the context of Indigenous Australians in the Northern Territory is our commitment to closing the gap. This budget is testament to that government commitment, tackling inequalities between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, about which I have spoken on many occasions in the parliament since I was first elected almost 21 years ago. I will continue to make comments about those inequalities for as long as is required, and I will call all governments to account because it is absolutely imperative, if we are to address Indigenous disadvantage in this country and if we are to address the terrible problems that beset many Indigenous Australians, particularly those who live in the north in my electorate, that we have the type of commitment which this government has shown under the leadership of the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, and the Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, Jenny Macklin.

In this budget we have contributed $1.2 billion over five years to tackling the inequalities between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. Of this, $666.1 million, more than half, is dedicated to addressing the dire situation of Indigenous communities in the Territory, with more than $320 million allocated in the next financial year. This is being spent across a number of areas and involves serious, practical measures. They include investments in Indigenous health, with $90.3 million over five years for national Indigenous child and maternal health services, $7.4 million in 2008-09 for school nutrition in the coming year and $10 million over five years to upgrade remote health clinics. Nationally, there is also $49.3 million over four years to improve access to drug and alcohol services, $14.5 million over four years to help tackle high rates of smoking in Indigenous communities and $9.5 million in 2008-09 for youth activities which are an alternative to drinking and other substance abuse.

I am most heartened by an allocation in the budget following the apology on that momentous day in this place, which I am sure was felt deeply by all Australians who observed it and most keenly by those who participated in it and, most importantly, by those people who were the subject of it: those Indigenous Australians who were members of the stolen generations. I am pleased to see that there is $15.7 million over four years committed to reuniting families of the stolen generations. These are positive steps which form a solid starting point.

I have said on many occasions in this place how important I believe education is to improving the opportunities for Indigenous Australians. I have commented on many occasions in this place about the dearth of opportunities that exist for Indigenous people in the Northern Territory. I have observed on many occasions the paucity of services available, the fact that, in my estimation, there are between 3,000 and 5,000 young Territorians over the age of 13 without access to any educational services. It seems to me that we have to do something real to confront those issues. I am pleased to see that this government is committed to doing so.

Significantly in this budget, something which is dear to my heart is a commitment of $28.9 million to provide three boarding colleges to service the educational needs of Aboriginal students from the remote parts of the Territory. This is long overdue. I am pleased to say it is a commitment which I was able to obtain from Mr Rudd when he was opposition leader and is something I have been advocating for over a decade. I am very pleased to see that this significant contribution is being made available in this budget. It will do a great deal to demonstrate the importance of educational opportunities for secondary age students in particular in their home communities. It will provide them with the capacity to attend school, building upon the work being done by the Northern Territory government in providing secondary opportunities for these students, opportunities which were neglected, indeed deliberately bypassed, by the previous CLP administration in the Northern Territory, which of course was kicked out in 2001.

In addition, this budget provides $98.7 million for 200 additional teachers in remote locality schools in the Territory. Both of these commitments will be supported by over $19 million for the continued professional development of teachers of Aboriginal children. I recall representations I have received from teachers at Minyeri and other places on the importance, value and need for this aspect of teachers’ professional development. Indigenous children will also benefit from $56.4 million over four years to assist in the delivery of literacy and numeracy programs. After too many years of neglect, Indigenous students in the Northern Territory will have real opportunities thanks to this government, opportunities which were denied to them by the lack of interest of the previous administration.

Indigenous employment, along with Indigenous education, provides for life opportunities and is a major focus of this budget. The federal government in this budget provides a much-needed $66.3 million in 2008-09 to enhance employment opportunities and to provide employment services to Indigenous job seekers who were previously on remote area exemptions.

There is a range of other employment initiatives, not the least of which is a review of CDEP underway at present, as well as a review of labour market programs being undertaken by my colleague the Minister for Employment Participation, Mr O’Connor, along with the minister responsible for Indigenous issues, Ms Macklin. The initiatives contained in this budget aimed towards achieving real outcomes for Indigenous people in the Northern Territory are many. Another interest is the investment into ranger programs, which I have commented upon on many occasions in this place.

It is not my intention to canvass all the other features of this budget as they impact upon the Northern Territory but I will say that, in investing in the future of Australia, there can be no more important investment than that being made into the development of opportunities for Indigenous people in my own electorate.

I say to people in this chamber and to people who might be listening to this debate elsewhere that until we address the fundamental issue of the poverty which exists among Indigenous Australians we will not improve the outcomes for them. We will certainly not improve the health outcomes. That requires us to accept the duality of  approaches providing not only for social programs and educational opportunities but also for infrastructure such as housing and roads, both of which are addressed in this budget, for Indigenous people and people who live in remote communities.

There are many other aspects of this budget which are worth commenting on but which I am unable to comment on this evening. I do want to make this observation as I finish my contribution: this is the first government since the mid-1990s which has absolutely committed itself to improving the lot of people who live in the bush. My colleague the member for New England, who will be speaking shortly, will no doubt be making comments about the National Party and even about the Labor Party, and I expect him to do that with much vigour. But I say to those in the National Party: a once-proud organisation is fading, fading, fading. It is fading because of its lack of commitment to representing the interests of people who live in the bush and the contorted way in which it administered policy under the last government—the way in which it corruptly administered public policy; the way in which it actually drove public policy and the public purse by personal political preference rather than by need or what is in the best interests of all Australians. More is the pity. I say to the people in the National Party: I would listen to what the member for New England is about to say. I will certainly be listening to it. I often feel chastened when he gets up to speak. I do not always agree with him, but on the issue of the National Party I think he is right on the money. As I travel round the bush, as often I do, I do not hear many people say they think the National Party is doing much for them. And when I see proposals for it to become something that it is not: another Liberal Party—

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The minister might come back to the bill before the Main Committee. I have given him a lot of—

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a very important comparison.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Minister for Defence Science and Personnel will either resume his seat or listen to what I have to say. I have given him a lot of latitude. There have been some comments I could have pulled him up on. I will now bring him back to the bill before the House or I will sit him down.

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You will be pleased to know I am about to finish, Mr Deputy Speaker. Without wanting to repeat what I have just said, I mean it most sincerely.

Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Without wishing to repeat what the member for Lingiari had to say, I agree with many of his comments. Before the member for Lingiari leaves the room, I congratulate him on his strident views and representation of Aboriginal people. I would like to place on record the feeling that was in this building the day that the apology was made. I think that was one of the outstanding days of public life. It will live in my memory for a very long time. The thing that will come back to me is when the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition had both spoken and they walked together towards the back of the chamber, where there were Aboriginal elders. There was a moment of virtual silence. A woman in the Speaker’s gallery—I presume it was an Aboriginal woman—said two simple words: ‘Thank you.’ I know there were interpretations of who said what, the politics of it all, but I thought the conduct of the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, particularly at the moment, was something unique in our parliamentary process.

I agreed with a lot of things the member for Lingiari said a moment ago. I will not go into them, but I know that a lot of his lobbying and representations over the years probably in no small way led to that exchange on that particular day. That does not mean the problems are solved. I think we are all very much aware of that. I think it was a very good start for this parliament—all of us, irrespective of some of the reports that were made.

The budget paper is an interesting one, obviously, the first one for the new government. There are a number of comments that I would like to make in terms of positives and negatives as I see them. The member for Kennedy spoke earlier about inflation. Inflation is obviously something that the government is worried about and they should be, because, in my view, it is possibly the only thing that will defeat this government in its first term—if inflation actually gets out of control with the consequent management of interest rates et cetera.

I do not believe—and I hope I am wrong—that the government did enough in terms of inflation. I think the government fell for a trap that was set by the previous Prime Minister, John Howard, on day one of the election campaign when the matter of tax cuts was raised. The former Prime Minister promised the tax cuts and the current Prime Minister had a strategy worked out of agreeing with most things and there was enough of a margin in Work Choices of five or six per cent to win the election, which worked out to be quite correct.

The agreement on tax cuts did a number of things. It restricted—a great political ploy on behalf of John Howard—the spending capacity of the then opposition in terms of promises. If they made wild promises, they were obviously irresponsible in their economic management. But it also did another thing in my view, it restricted their ability to deal with the inflationary problem. In fact, it led them to a real issue: how do you restrict spending while you are throwing cash on the fire? How do those things work together? Obviously their strategy was: we have to abide by the tax cuts but we will make cuts in other areas. In some of those areas I do not think they were warranted. They would not have been required if the tax cuts had not been made in the first place.

As I said, I hope I am wrong because I remember, as would Deputy Speaker Scott and others, what happened through the late eighties when inflation and interest rates galloped away. The government does have a number of exterior issues to deal with—the high price of fuel, energy and what is happening there, and the climate change debate and the way in which that may interact with energy prices further down the stream. A lot of them are external factors. The price of fuel has some domestic factors that are quite involved and I support the Leader of the Opposition in a reduction in fuel excise. The fuel excise was brought in many years ago to get us ready for some sort of oil shock. Then it was supposedly some sort of road maintenance arrangement. We spend about 16 per cent of it at the moment on road maintenance or construction—very little. But it has gone on and on.

Then some—the Greens and others—have in their minds that you have to have a high price to deter people from actually driving fuel guzzling vehicles. We had a rather absurd debate today about a luxury car tax. In fact, in the four-wheel drive market that most country Australians would require because of the state of their roads et cetera, the piece of legislation passed today will drive people back to buying V8 Land Cruisers rather than more fuel efficient diesel motors, because those are more expensive and more of a luxury, apparently. I made my point in the other chamber in relation to those particular issues. But there are contradictory messages constantly out there.

The member for Kennedy made a point about biofuels. We are told we have an energy crisis; the price of energy is going through the roof. How are we going to address that? What about emissions? How are we going to address those? We have some people looking at an emissions trading scheme at the moment. How is that going to filter through our economy? How will that affect the price of fuel? Then we have these sorts of side debates about a global food crisis being driven by the price of energy, and Australia has to make a contribution—a major one in some people’s eyes—to feeding the globe. And we have this food versus fuel argument wandering around out there. Different people pick it up and argue the bit that suits them.

All of these things will have an impact in the next few budgets. If you follow the food versus fuel issue, for instance, and pick up on some of the things the member for Kennedy was talking about on ethanol or biofuels, we currently grow food—grain—and we sell 80 per cent of it overseas or attempt to. Occasionally, we have to bribe someone to try to market it. We market that overseas and then we enter another corrupt market, the oil business, and bring energy back to Australia. I think the point that the member for Kennedy was trying to make was that, surely, there is a way through this whereby we can do some of those things at home, where we have a positive impact on climate change emissions, on carbon footprints and on the health of people who breathe in exhaust fumes et cetera. There are a whole range of potential positives.

The fuel debate has been on all this week and last week and there was not one mention of those things by either side of politics. There is an assumption that we have to accept what the international community does to us in terms of our energy and that there is nothing we can do about it, according to the current debate.

I will rerun a scenario that I painted in the other chamber earlier today, and I will use the Walgett wheat grower as an example. We in this state overproduce grain—and the same thing happens in Western Australia—and we have to find markets elsewhere. The Walgett wheat grower has a carbon footprint and will have one in a legislative sense in a couple of years if we get into emissions trading. He has a carbon footprint growing his crop; he has a carbon footprint when he puts it in a truck to get it to the silo. The train has a carbon footprint when it carts it to the port. The ship has a carbon footprint when it takes it to Egypt or wherever, and the load that the ship is carrying is partly starch and it also has a carbon footprint. Who is going to pay for all those footprints? Is there a need for those footprints to take place if we are looking at the climate change debate? When the ship gets there, they hire another one and go to another corrupt market and buy a bit of oil—a fossil fuel, which everybody is saying we have to get away from— and bring it all the way back to Australia. That has a carbon footprint. They will not put it on a train because there are no trains carrying oil anymore, so they will put it on a truck at the port and drive it all the way back to Walgett. The farmer will get on his tractor to drive around in a circle to produce grain and produce another carbon footprint. Who pays for the return trip? How is that going to filter through in an emissions trading scheme?

I do not know the answer to those questions. I do not think anybody does at the moment. But surely we can see the simple relationship between what the Walgett wheat grower is doing in growing grain and energy. Rather than exporting the grain to buy energy—and the member for Kennedy was not far wrong when he was talking about the prices in Brazil and the United States and the biodiesel market in Europe—surely we can see that the production of energy internally could circumvent this trade situation that we have assumed we are locked into—both corrupt markets. Surely, we have to start looking beyond those things.

Some would say, ‘Yes, but we have a moral obligation to provide food for the starving millions.’ Australia produces 1.75 per cent of the world’s grain, so there is no way we are going to save the starving millions, particularly if we are restricting the area of land use. We are told we have this obligation. If you look at the Sudan in Africa, for instance, we see all sorts of political problems, and they are part of the starving millions.

One thing that Australian agriculture—Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, you would know this more than most in here—does have in terms of a comparative advantage is our capacity to grow food in a dry climate using some of the technologies that are out there at the moment. Some of those may have a positive carbon footprint, soil sequestration for instance. I am pleased the Prime Minister is actually looking at that issue. I know there are difficulties in terms of measurement et cetera, but we might end up with healthier soils and more productive capacity as well.

The Sudan, for instance, has the capacity to produce six times what Australia produces in grain. The Sudan could more than feed Africa. Here we are running around in a circle, growing stuff and leaving carbon footprints all over the world trading with them, when in fact what we are doing when we dump food into their marketplace—thinking we are granting them a great largesse by delivering another boatload of grain—is actually destroying their own infant grain markets. The Sudan has the capacity to produce 200 million tonnes of grain if using the right sort of technology. The soils are there to do it. They are no different to those of a Walgett farm or some of the country on the Darling Downs—or Emerald, as you would be well aware of, Deputy Speaker.

I would implore the government, instead of being locked into Fuelwatch and the debate going on at the moment, to look at some of the other options that we can do something about in terms of our energy. Biofuels must be one of those. For the food versus fuel people, who feel so strongly about this moral obligation, I would like them to start explaining who is going to pay for the footprints. Who pays? I would like them also to explain what happens when we move to second generation biofuels—biomass, cellulosic ethanol, which is technically possible now. What happens when we go down that road? Does government suddenly legislate and say to the Walgett farmer, who used to grow food: ‘Excuse me; you’ve got to stop doing that. You can’t grow biomass. You’ve got to grow food.’ Is it going to legislate land use or determine what people grow, irrespective of whether they can make a profit out of it? The obvious answer is no.

The Americans are pursuing the cellulosic biomass ethanol path quite strongly at the moment with a grass called switchgrass, which grows two metres high and has a root system two metres deep. The production of ethanol or fermentation of the starches in these long molecular structured grasses has the capacity to produce even more ethanol than grain. If we are going to pursue that path in Australia, how is the policy mix going to handle those sorts of issues? These are the questions that I think we really have to think through. If the prairies of the United States, for instance, went back to their original grass—switchgrass was one of them and we have similar grasses in Australia—what would the environmentalists say about that? What if we changed some of the highly erodable soils in the world back to something that was producing energy and not being eroded? What would the environmentalists say about that? What if it was shown—and early evidence is suggesting this—that a return to a grass, a perennial, which is not planted every year, had a positive carbon footprint? Who would get the benefit of that? What if there was a natural sequestration of carbon process going on in a natural grass based operation?

There could be an enormous number of positives. I have been a bit critical of some people in agriculture who have been frightened of this whole climate change debate. I think there are real positives there. If we do not engage in it, agriculture could get judged for its negatives—some methane and nitrous oxide issues—without accumulating any of the positives. But government has to start to talk about alternatives to fossil fuels. Otherwise, they are contradicting themselves in this overarching climate change debate. I was interested to see that buried away in the budget papers there is some money for renewable energy and some money for research into using non-grain feedstock for ethanol, for biofuels. It is essentially biomass.

I am pleased to see that in there but, in terms of the taxation review and a whole range of other economic activities that are going to be happening in the next few years, the government has to make up its mind whether in 2011 it is going to impose a fossil-fuel tax on the production of renewable biofuel. As of the moment, thanks to the legacy of the previous government, that is the existing policy. And the current government has not done or said a thing about modifying that. I know the minister for energy is having a review, and I would urge him to make sure that renewable fuels are part of this overarching renewable energy structure, which is supposed to attack the climate change issues.

There are a number of issues that I think are absolutely critical to next year’s budget, to send a signal that we are serious about some of these issues. But you cannot have a renewable energy debate and leave some things out of it because you think, ‘Well, it’s uncomfortable to send a message.’ It is an absurdity for some people in this place to say the removal of a tax from a renewable fuel source is a subsidy to that industry. It is an absolute absurdity in economics to say that the removal of a tax from an industry is in fact a subsidy to it, when it could be a highly valued part of our energy process. (Time expired)

Craig Thomson (Dobell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The 2008 budget delivered by the Treasurer two weeks ago put to work the mandate that Australian people trusted the Australian Labor Party. Already, before the budget was delivered, we had seen—and the member for New England referred to it in his contribution in this place—the apology to the stolen generation. We all were very privileged to be part of that tremendous recognition and ceremony, which, unfortunately, was 10 years late but still worth waiting for for what it did in reconciling differences in this country. Also, before the budget had been handed down, this government, the Rudd government, had signed Kyoto; authorised the Garnaut report; introduced and had legislation passed that did away with some of the particularly obnoxious issues in relation to Work Choices, principally the making of Australian workplace agreements; and brought together the best and brightest of this nation to look to the long term in the 2020 Summit. That happened not only here in Canberra but around the country, with MPs conducting their own local 2020 summits to look at the best local ideas that they could feed into the national 2020 Summit.

The budget sets out the government’s agenda very clearly. It is careful in dealing with our present economic climate. We must all remember that we are dealing with the Howard government’s inflationary legacy, fuelled by reckless spending and characterised by its largesse and short-termism. The government’s first budget has set a new benchmark by delivering on our election promises made prior to the last election. It is very important that we have delivered on all our election promises. The government has delivered on all its election promises in my electorate of Dobell and indeed Australia wide. We all know John Howard’s record on keeping promises. The Prime Minister, the Treasurer and the new Australian government are clearly making a break from Mr Howard’s legacy of deceit. The Rudd government believes that all promises are core promises.

This budget will be seen in years to come as a historic budget because it looks at the long term. It is not a budget that just looks to the immediate electoral cycle. It is a budget about nation building. It looks to the future and sets a path beyond the immediate electoral cycle. And it is a budget that is consistent with this government’s approach to looking at long-term solutions, making sure that we put Australia on a sound economic footing and making sure that we can deliver to working families across Australia.

The 2008 budget has put working families on the Central Coast at the centre of the Rudd government’s commitment to tackling inflation and laying the building blocks for a stronger, more modern Australia. At the centre of the budget is a $55 billion Working Families Support Package, which delivers on the tax cuts we committed to in the election and helps Australian families with childcare and education costs. This is welcome news to the thousands of hardworking Central Coast families who, last November, said they wanted an Australian government that was on their side. They rejected the coalition’s Work Choices laws and the policies of division. They embraced a team that was more concerned with their concerns.

The budget contains a $40 billion investment in Australia’s future, to fund new and improved roads, hospitals and schools. The budget is the first step towards building a more modern Australia with first-class economic and social infrastructure. By making Australia’s finances more sustainable, we can now start investing in the schools, hospitals, roads, rail and communication projects which families in the Central Coast rely on every day but which were neglected by our predecessors for over a decade. This has only been made possible because we have had the courage to make the tough decisions that may cause some pain but in the long term will make Australia stronger.

Key initiatives of the Rudd government’s first budget include strong economic management with a surplus of over $21.7 billion, the abolition of $7 billion of the Liberals’ reckless spending and the Working Families Support Package worth $55 billion. There is unprecedented investment in Australia’s future: around $40 billion put aside for infrastructure, education and health improvements; $15.2 billion for sustainable water initiatives and to help tackle climate change; over $22 billion for road and rail projects; and an investment of $2.4 billion for Australian seniors and carers.

I would like to congratulate the Treasurer on this budget. He has shown an extensive knowledge of the economic barriers that working families face in outer metropolitan communities. These families were looking for more than just the previous government’s bias towards handouts at election time. These are the families that delivered us government and we are intent on delivering for them. By investing in infrastructure, water, child care, GP superclinics and an education revolution, we are telling these families that they now have a government with them at the forefront of its mind.

I consider this budget a win not only for Australian working families but also for specific projects on the Central Coast and, in particular, in my electorate of Dobell. In this budget we saw significant local road funding, a GP superclinic in the northern area of the Central Coast and $20 million funding to help restore the health of the Tuggerah Lakes estuary system. Tuggerah Lakes is one of the jewels in the crown of New South Wales and it is certainly the jewel in the crown of the Central Coast—one of Australia’s high-growth population centres. Under the five-year program, the government’s contribution to implementing the Tuggerah Lakes Estuary Management Plan will help reduce sediment and nutrient inputs to the lakes, improve the quality of stormwater entering the lakes from the catchment, reduce weed build-up on the lakes foreshore and regenerate salt marsh, and stabilise and rehabilitate the banks of the lakes.

These lakes are under pressure from urban development, with seagrass beds declining by over 50 per cent in the last 40 years and salt marsh declining by over 80 per cent. The Rudd Labor government is committed to improving the quality of our waterways on the Central Coast. Our Tuggerah Lakes plan will also improve recreational facilities around the lakes and creeks, to provide more sustainable fish and prawn populations for long-term recreational and commercial fishing. It will also have a significant effect on tourism in our area, by returning the beautiful Tuggerah Lakes to their once pristine condition. The federal government is committed to restoring the water quality of our major population centres, building healthy and sustainable communities and ensuring our lakes and rivers are in good shape for the future.

I also welcome the GP superclinic that is to be built in my electorate. The government’s investment of up to $2.5 million in a new GP superclinic in the growth areas in the north of the Central Coast will deliver improved services to the residents of this community. This will bring together a range of health services under one roof and help attract doctors to the area. It will also take pressure off the Wyong Hospital and its emergency department, which is one of the busiest in the state. The Labor government are not blaming the states for the problems in health—we are not saying, ‘These are your problems alone,’ but rather, ‘We’re here to work cooperatively.’ We are in a position on the Central Coast in my electorate where the number of doctors is now just over 80 and the average age of those doctors is over 59. On the Central Coast we are facing a real crisis in relation to the number of doctors that we are able to attract to the area.

A GP superclinic is not the silver bullet that will solve all of those problems, but it is a significant investment providing much needed medical services in my electorate which the previous government neglected and had no plan for. The federal government’s GP superclinics, by co-locating specialists and allied health services such as physiotherapists, mental health counsellors and dieticians with GPs, will enable patients to seamlessly access the range of health services they need to improve their health. The Rudd government will work closely with local doctors and health professionals to ensure that services offered at the new north Central Coast GP superclinic will complement and enhance existing services.

The local community will also be closely consulted to finalise the preferred location and the precise suite of services to be delivered at the north Central Coast GP superclinic. The government has chosen the north of the Central Coast because it is a growing area with many young families—young families who decided at the last election that they had had enough of a short-sighted federal government that had totally lost sight of them. The government’s commitment to a GP superclinic in the north of the Central Coast will service the health needs of this area and surrounding communities by helping to attract more doctors and other health professionals to the area. Once completed, the Central Coast GP superclinic is expected to include privately practising GPs, after-hours services, chronic disease management services and a range of allied health services such as physiotherapy, dieticians and podiatrists. It is a practical example of how our policy of establishing GP superclinics can benefit families and improve health services. It will help to take the pressure off the very busy Wyong Hospital and, by working co-operatively with the NSW government, it will help the health system respond to the community’s needs and avoid the blame-shifting and cost-shifting of times past.

The strategic regional program supports land transport projects that support the growth of regional industry, respond to structural change or develop local social and economic opportunities. We have put $2.5 million into the Watanobbi to Warnervale Link Road. We have also put a further $460,000 into the Ridgeway Road upgrade. Black Spot Program projects target those road locations where crashes are occurring. By funding measures such as traffic signals and roundabouts at dangerous locations, the program reduces the risk of crashes. Funding of $15.9 million will be provided to black spot projects in New South Wales in 2008-09. Roads to Recovery funding is provided to local government authorities and to state and territory governments responsible for local road maintenance and upgrade in areas not covered by local councils. This government has put $1½ million into Gosford and close to $1 million into Wyong roads.

The Rudd government’s first budget will also provide $250,000 for Central Coast business mentoring services. This is part of a $42 million allocation to fund one-stop small business advisory centres across Australia. The previous government provided some funding in relation to small business, but the promises made in respect of my electorate have doubled that funding. The Rudd government truly is now the party that supports small business. As we all know, in many areas small business is the heart that keeps pumping the economy. That is certainly the case in my electorate. These valuable centres provide much-needed advice for those wanting to establish or improve a business. This funding is part of the government’s overall small business strategy that includes cutting red tape in 27 areas of business regulation. The funding decision meets Labor’s election commitment to support more than 30 business advisory centres around Australia.

I would also like to mention the funding for the so-called missing link pipeline in my electorate between the Mangrove Creek dam and the Mardi Creek dams. This is a commitment of over $80 million to make sure that, in conjunction with the state government’s plans for a dam in the Hunter area, we can actually drought-proof the Central Coast once and for all. This commitment will see the missing link pipeline completed in 2010. The Central Coast, like much of Australia, has been in an unprecedented drought. Only 12 months ago, the Central Coast’s dam levels were as low as 13 per cent. We have had level 4 water restrictions on the Central Coast for many, many years.

What did the previous government do in relation to this? This project was spoken about for many years, but they did nothing—nothing until the Labor Party started to campaign on this with a grassroots campaign asking people to sign petitions calling on the government to act. We made an initial commitment to this and we then saw that the whole $80.3 million was finally committed to ensure that the Central Coast in the future will have a secure supply of water. This is part of this government’s Water Smart Australia program. I think my friends on the other side should also think that this project is well worth supporting.

We look at the approach that this government has taken to the economy in this budget and we have to compare it with what we inherited and the record of the previous government. The member for New England, in his contribution here, actually understood one of the real problems that was facing this country and facing this government in framing the budget. He identified, as we have identified, the problem of inflation. We inherited an economy that had inflation at a 16-year high. But what do the opposition say in relation to this problem? They do not adhere to our advice. They do not even adhere to the sound advice of the member for New England. What they say is that there is not a problem with inflation; it is merely a charade or a fairytale—or sometimes it might be a little problem but not a problem that we need to address seriously. Quite frankly, that is the reason we are in this difficulty with inflation at a 16-year high. That is the reason the Reserve Bank of Australia, on over 20 occasions, warned the previous government of the dangers of not acting. We have seen interest rates go up 12 times. These things are not unrelated.

What we also saw from the previous government was reckless spending. They were lucky enough to be in government while we had this incredible resources boom. But what did they do? Did they look at nation building? Did they look at infrastructure issues? Did they look at trying to make sure that our skills shortage was addressed? No. All they did was fritter away money on short-term political expediency. The previous government were the best friend inflation ever had and, while they were in government, they were asleep at the wheel. That has meant that this government have had to take the tough economic decisions in relation to inflation, making sure that we can bring it under control while delivering on all of the promises we made before the last election.

Inflation hurts families. It certainly hurts families in my electorate of Dobell. We have the lowest median household incomes in New South Wales. A large proportion of people in my electorate are on fixed incomes. They have seen the effects of inflation. They have seen supermarket prices skyrocketing. They have seen the increase in petrol prices. We have seen a 33 per cent increase in mortgage defaults in the last year. These are all as a result of the pressure that inflation has been putting on the economy. It took the Rudd Labor government to front up to the plate and say, ‘Not only are we going to deliver on our election promises but we are going to make sure that we put downward pressure on inflation because we understand that working families and those on fixed incomes are hurting and the best thing we can do for them is make sure that we bring inflation under control.’

Let us look at the response we have had to this budget from the opposition. Quite frankly, they have no plans of their own. They are bereft of ideas. It is a bit like any issue that has come before this parliament, such as Work Choices. Do they support it or do they not support it? Some days they do and some days they do not. Perhaps it depends on whether you are from Western Australia or from another state. It is something that they still have not made up their minds on. We heard today the shadow Treasurer in the luxury car tax debate arguing what a bad tax it was et cetera. But then, when it came to his position, he said, ‘We do not have a position; we do not support the increase in the tax but we are not against it either.’ It was the same with alcopops. We had the Leader of the Opposition saying what a tremendous idea it was and then suddenly he backflipped on it because his party are bereft of ideas and do not know where they are going. This is a good budget. This is a budget that should be supported. This is a budget that delivers for working families in Australia.

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The previous government, the Howard government, left the Australian economy in tiptop shape. Any reasonable assessment by any independent analysis, particularly one devoid of the commentary that goes along with Labor’s spin machine, will understand that the Australian economy inherited by this government was in tiptop shape. Surplus budgets are now the norm. When we came to government in 1996 they were unheard of. Surplus budgets are now the norm. You can have a surplus in this budget because of the surplus budgets that went before.

It is amazing, when sitting in the chamber each day we are there, to hear the chest beating of the government as it talks about the heroic effort it has made in achieving this surplus, when surplus budgets were something that the coalition made standard practice in Australian fiscal policy—unlike the previous Labor government. Debt was repaid and we had a Future Fund and a Higher Education Endowment Fund—$60 billion invested back into the future of this country. That was the product of responsible fiscal policy. Now this government shows up and beats its chest about the surplus which it had no role in creating. I also note tax cuts became a norm in this country as a result of the previous government. The tax cuts which were delivered in this budget, which I will touch on later, were a straight carbon copy of those offered by the member for Higgins, the former Treasurer.

This budget is a higher spending, higher taxing budget that will deliver, by its own admission, higher unemployment. Higher spending, higher taxing and higher unemployment is what I would call an old Labor recipe for running the Australian economy. That is what we are seeing in this first Labor budget of the Rudd years—and may they be short. It shows that they are all hype when it comes to responsible economic management, particularly when it comes to fighting inflation. Basically, what we have here is $19 billion in new taxes and $30 billion in new spending. They are the key statistics of this budget. But the other key statistic in this budget is 134,000 people who will not be in work, as a result of this government’s management, within the next 12 months and to 30 June of the next fiscal year.

When it comes to fighting inflation, this budget really is an absolute fizzer. As Paul Keating used to say, ‘It is all tip and no iceberg’. What we see with the government when it comes to fighting inflation is a five-point plan and lots of slogans, and they probably have a wristband to go with it as well. But at the end of the day, what we do not see in their five-point plan is anything to do with wage pressures. Since this government was elected, what has happened as to unions’ expectations is that inflation has risen from three per cent to four per cent. The latest edition of the Reserve Bank Bulletin showed that, since this government has come to office, the expectations of prices and the expectations of increases in prices by union officials have been going up. That is no surprise because the government has been talking it all up.

The opposition understands the challenges of fighting inflation. We understand the challenges of repaying debt. We understand the challenges of responsible economic management. It is not a flyer for us; it is not an advertisement. It is something that we believe in. I remember the member for Higgins used to say that if you are thinking about being an economic conservative you are thinking about becoming very focused on responsible economic management. The local branch of the Labor Party was not the place you would turn up to. It is not the first cab off the rank you would take in order to fulfil your dreams and aspirations of being an economic conservative.

When it comes to fighting inflation this budget is a real fizzer because it does not address one of the fundamental issues that drive inflation—that is, wage pressures. The big difference between what we have seen with the resources boom in recent years and what happened in the early seventies is that in the most recent years we have had a flexible labour market. In the seventies, we did not. As a result, inflation went through the roof. Without a flexible labour market going forward, this government has no plan for fighting inflation. It only has a plan for paying off its Labor mates in the unions who spent $30 million to put them here.

With those comments more generally, Madam Deputy Speaker Vale, I want to talk about a few local things, which I am sure you would have a very keen interest in, in the Sutherland shire. In the Sutherland shire this budget has not been well received. As I have stood at street stalls and in shopping centres on the weekends we have been not in this place, there have been people coming up to me time and again, raising the issues of concerns of people on fixed incomes—as we heard the member for Dobell talk about. People on fixed incomes are not as happy as the Treasurer might suggest. People on fixed incomes, people who are carers, people looking after people who have disabilities as well—these are not happy people as a result of this budget because they have been completely missed out.

What was established in the budget was a $20 billion building fund. The government like to talk about the fact that they have created a surplus, but what they have actually done is create a massive billion dollar slush fund which they are going to spend. They are not putting money away, as the coalition did, into an investment fund where you spend the earnings. They are blowing the capital. They are going to blow the lot. With the Higher Education Endowment Fund, they took all of that $6 billion, took a bit more of the surplus, put it into this fund and they are going to spend the lot. No endowment fund, no future earnings; they are going to raid the cookie tin and go crazy with it.

If they are going to spend $20 billion on infrastructure, maybe there are some projects they might want to spend some money on rather than just handing over money to Morris Iemma to cover his shortfall on a whole range of already announced projects in New South Wales. He is the last person I would be giving money to in all the state governments. I would strongly support every state government other than the New South Wales government. I would prefer to write a cheque to the Western Australian state government, or even the Victorian state government, but the last state government I would write a cheque to at the moment, in terms of their ability to manage infrastructure funds, is the New South Wales state government. But, if the money is going to be spent, let us make sure it is spent on projects that can actually make a difference.

In the Sutherland shire, the most pressing road need, which has been on the agenda since 1951, is the upgrade of the F6 and the building of the F6 extension. I do not hold out a lot of hope that Labor will reverse decades of neglect and of ignoring this, particularly at a state level, but it is a project that Infrastructure Australia should be looking at and ensuring as part of their audit, and it should have a bullet on it. It should have an absolute flag against it as a critical infrastructure project for Sydney. This is a road extension which links the booming Illawarra with Sydney. There is an absolute missing link between Sydney and ports like Sydney airport, Port Botany and Port Kembla and the distribution network of Western Sydney.

At the moment, trucks roll up from the Illawarra—and there will be many more of these trucks as Port Kembla expands—through the Sutherland shire, going down suburban streets. These are suburban streets where there are ordinary family homes, where once upon a time kids used to play footy on the nature strip. Madam Deputy Speaker, remember those times when they did that. But they cannot do it now because the trucks are rolling down these streets. We need to get trucks off those streets and the heavy traffic off local suburban streets in the Sutherland shire, and the F6 extension is the way to do that. For 57 years, Labor had the perfect opportunity to make good on its infrastructure promises, and we have not seen it happen, particularly at a state government level, when it comes to the F6. We really need to see this on the boards as soon as humanly possible.

The NRMA recently undertook a study on the F6 extension. The report indicated that there would be economic flow-ons arising from the construction of this project that would not just be confined to the local region but be shared throughout New South Wales and Australia. The report shows that more than 1,000 jobs—that will at least make up for 1,000 of the 134,000 jobs that are going to go as a result of this government’s budget—will be created directly as a consequence of undertaking the project—that is, at least 1,000; in fact, more than 1,000—and the total of the project is worth $3.4 billion to our economy, at a cost of just $2.3 billion.

There is something interesting about that $2.3 billion figure. Basically, that is what it is costing to build Labor’s famous desalination plant at Kurnell—a desalination plant that we do not need, a desalination plant that we do not want, a desalination plant that was imposed on the people of the Sutherland shire, particularly at Kurnell, and broke the promise of the Premier made in March 2007 that it would only be built if dam levels hit 30 per cent. Well, dam levels never did hit 30 per cent. Dam levels are now over 65 per cent, and the building work goes on at Kurnell in the slush and in the mud, and often building work has to be delayed because it is washed out on the desalination site, which is an irony not lost on the residents of Kurnell.

Despite the benefits to the region and the Sutherland shire more specifically of the F6 extension, the state Labor member for Miranda maintains his opposition to this project while vehemently supporting the desalination plant that nobody wants or needs. If we were to have the choice—if there is $2.3 billion on the table, and there is: there is a $20 billion fund that has been created in this budget—between a desalination plant at Kurnell and building an F6 extension, I have no doubt what the people of the Sutherland shire would like. We would be bowled over in the rush to build the F6 extension. But they are not the priorities of the Labor Party. They are not the priorities of the federal government and the federal Labor Party. They are not the priorities of the state Labor Party. I will be very interested to see how much of that $20 billion slush fund is going to go to bail out the costs of not only the $2 billion plus they have to spend on the desalination plant but the $2 billion they have to spend on the wind farm to power the desalination plant. So we have a wind farm which could have been built to offset carbon emissions in New South Wales, but, no, now we have to go and spend $2 billion on a wind farm to power a desalination plant that we do not need, so it is up to $4 billion. And then, how are we going to get the water across the Sydney water network?

It was revealed fairly recently that once the pipeline goes across to the eastern suburbs of Sydney it needs to turn left; it needs to go to the Potts Hill reservoir. The problem is that the Potts Hill reservoir is uphill. The pipes that run from the Potts Hill reservoir are currently gravity feeding water to the rest of Sydney. For the water to turn left from the desalination plant, you have to pump it up. So we are going to have another pipeline—not only the one that destroys Botany Bay. We are going to have a pipeline making its way up to Potts Hill to capture water being generated by a desalination plant. Someone said to me, ‘But we already have a plan for water recycling in Sydney.’ The plan is to let it rush out to sea, suck it back in and then send it across Botany Bay to the eastern and inner western suburbs. The desalination project, which we will have more to say about in this place next week, is not necessary. It is an example of a project which has been perpetuated as a political con by the state Labor government, which I suspect will get its hands into the $20 billion building fund.

Another project which has been axed by this government in the budget is the Investing in Our Schools Program. Local schools, especially primary schools, will be hit hard by the abolition of our Investing in Our Schools Program, which, in my electorate of Cook, under the good stewardship of the former member for Cook, the Hon. Bruce Baird, was able to receive $3.7 million for equipment and facility upgrades. These funds were used for vital new equipment and facilities like classroom upgrades, new shelters, playgrounds, computer upgrades, redevelopment of sportsgrounds and rainwater tanks. Now the parents of children in Sutherland Shire schools are going to have to rely on Morris Iemma for these things. Heaven forbid. God help them, literally. We pray for them because, if they have to rely on the New South Wales state government, they will need prayer to ensure that they get the funding they need in their schools. Sutherland Shire will be sadly neglected, as it has been by the successive Labor governments at the New South Wales level.

Shire schools that benefited from the program included the Caringbah Public School, which received $150,000 for music and drama facilities; the Gymea Bay Public School, where similarly there was $150,000 for new walkways; Endeavour Sports High, which received $128,800 for a home economics-hospitality room, computer upgrades and sporting equipment; Laguna Street Public School, where there was $113,800 for computer upgrades; and in Bundeena there was over $100,000 for a new computer room. There are actually computers in schools. They were being delivered under the Investing in Our Schools Program—and not just for years 9 to 12 students. Kids aged 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 in Bundeena have a great new computer room, which I had the privilege to visit and open recently with the parents and citizens. They were delighted. They had never thought this was possible. If they had had to wait for the state government to do it, it would never have happened. And not just public schools received that support; $319,000 went to local non-government schools, to Our Lady Star of the Sea School at Miranda and St. Aloysius Primary School at Cronulla. This program was set up so that schools could get vital equipment and facilities when they need them rather than being forced onto endless waiting lists by greedy state governments.

The Prime Minister has thrown shire schools back on the mercy of an inept New South Wales Labor government that has failed students time and again. With the loss of the Investing in Our Schools Program, shire P&Cs will be forced to raise this money themselves. They cannot afford to wait. I have had a letter from the Lilli Pilli Public School. They wrote to me after this program was axed and said they had a range of needs to be met. These include covered walkways, new fencing for security, new playground equipment, covering for the playground areas. They have thrown up their hands and said, ‘How is this going to happen?’ They certainly were not getting any support from the state member for Miranda. They certainly were not getting any support from the state government on these issues—no comfort from them. They said, ‘Where are we going to get this money?’ The sad answer is that they are going to have to raise it themselves.

Under the Investing in Our Schools Program, those funds would have been provided to take the pressure off families. We talk a lot about working families in this place—at least those opposite do. But it is working families who actually sit on P&Cs, and they are the ones who are now going to have to hold extra raffles and fairs and dip into their pockets again and again to provide this sort of equipment in their schools. Of all the measures—and there are many to be upset about and not happy about, as the Treasurer would like us to be happy—this one I just do not get because it puts a burden back on parents and citizens who are trying to support their local schools. Those opposite should think long and hard about what they have done with this. They talk about education revolutions, but honestly the dropping of the Investing in Our Schools Program is an absolute disgrace.

Private health insurance is another measure. There are 92,272 people who live in my electorate of Cook, which is more than 70 per cent of the residents, who are covered by private health insurance. That is 25 percentage points higher than the national average. One of the reasons people in the shire are so supportive of private health insurance is that they understand the philosophy of taking responsibility for yourself. On the weekends, while not in this place, I have talked to older residents in the shire who came to me and said, ‘Look we have been investing in these schemes all of our lives. We want measures in place that encourage young people to do the same.’ But in one foul stroke, the government have removed that incentive and that element of the system which has seen private health insurance in this country grow and grow. The result of that measure will be quite simple. The result of the government’s measure on private health insurance will simply mean that, for those who decide to stay in the system, premiums will go up and, for those who decide not to go into the system, they will have the privilege of being let down by the state hospital system. They will have the privilege of joining those queues, and there are 59,000 people on those elective surgery waiting lists in New South Wales. So you either have to pay more through private health insurance or you have to wait longer in the public system. That is not what I call doing something about dealing with health issues in this country.

The tax cuts I mentioned were simply the tax cuts outlined by the member for Higgins prior to the election. They are the tax cuts outlined by the coalition. The coalition are the ones with the form on tax cuts. The only form of relief that people and families across Australia could find in the budget as they looked at it were those tax cuts—the architects of whom were not those who sit opposite. The architects were those who ran the previous responsible financial and economic management policy of the previous government—that is, John Howard and the member for Higgins. They were their tax cuts and, if they had never announced them, then we would never have been seeing tax cuts in this budget.

The government ran a campaign of deceit. That deceit is writ large in this budget. They paraded themselves around Australia promising to bring a change to grocery prices and fuel prices, and to ease the burden and all the other rhetoric they came up with from focus groups, which the minders wrote into the Prime Minister’s speeches as he moved around the country as the Leader of the Opposition. There was no mention of $19 billion in new taxes. There was no mention of means testing the baby bonus. There was no mention of dismantling private health insurance. There was no mention of U-turning on the Northern Territory intervention and allowing pornography into Aboriginal communities. There was no mention of those things. But there was one person who made mention that they would change things and we all know who that was. That was the member for Kingsford Smith, who said, ‘We will change it all.’

The government never really intended to follow through on any of these things, and that is the great deceit. The PM has now been found out. He has been exposed. He has made his bed on fuel and grocery prices, and he can lie on it. For people and families in the shire looking to service their mortgage, pay their grocery bills and put fuel in the car, there is no relief in this budget, save for the tax cuts Labor copied from Peter Costello, the member for Higgins, before the last election.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am proud to be here today to stand and support the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and related bills, bills that make the first Labor budget in more than a decade. I want to start by talking about the budget’s impact on my electorate of Franklin. The seat of Franklin has been a Labor seat since 1993. As a safe Labor seat under a coalition government, it had been ignored. In fact, it was not until 2005, when the sitting member announced his plans to retire at the next election, that the coalition government took any notice at all. For the first time in over a decade, the coalition saw Franklin as a seat that was winnable. In fact, only then did the federal Liberal politicians with any real clout even remember the name of Franklin, even though sometimes they forgot the name of their own candidate. It was only then that the electorate saw any substantial commitment of funds from the then coalition government. I am proud and pleased to say that this budget has honoured every election commitment made by federal Labor to the seat of Franklin. As an electorate that rarely saw anything under the former government, it is now the recipient of nearly $50 million worth of vital infrastructure projects and other initiatives.

Two critical and desperately needed major infrastructure projects have been funded through the federal government’s $12.9 billion Water for the Future package. In the Huon Valley south of Hobart, federal Labor has pledged $12 million to improve the quality of water provided to residents. Residents are on bore water alerts in summer and they live only 30 minutes from the city. The Huon Valley water scheme will also help to secure up to 200 local jobs in the aquaculture industry, an industry which is vital to the region and is a major contributor to the state’s economy.

The Clarence municipality will also be sharing in the funding from Water for the Future in this budget. The federal member for Lyons and I lobbied hard for the $10.5 million water recycling and reuse scheme in the Coal River Valley, which is delivered in this budget. Irrigators in the region have been looking for an alternative source of water and I am pleased that it has now been delivered. In addition to providing irrigators with this alternative water source, the scheme will also reduce the level of water discharge into the River Derwent, making this project both an economically and environmentally important initiative.

The Kingston bypass has been talked about for many years. Prior to the federal election, Labor committed $15 million towards the Kingston bypass with the Tasmanian government contributing the remaining $15 million. This project is now a reality. The Kingborough Council is among the fastest growing in the state and this infrastructure project will help remove some of the traffic congestion which has plagued the district’s commuters. In the next financial year, as outlined in these budget papers, the federal government will be spending $1.1 million on the project as part of the initial planning phase. At the moment, land acquisition and initial planning on the bypass is well underway. Approvals are expected to be finalised by June 2009 with construction expected to begin in November of that year.

The Tasmanian government anticipates that the project will be completed by June 2012. Dennes Point on north Bruny Island will receive more than $140,000 in this budget to redevelop their community hall. The money will give the north Bruny Island community group and the Kingborough Council the chance to refurbish the hall and build much needed infrastructure including a shop, post office, dining area, gallery and medical rooms. Another key infrastructure project in Franklin is an upgrade of Bridgewater Bridge, with the Commonwealth providing nearly $11 million towards this $14 million project. More than $800,000 has been allocated to the Esperance Coast Road upgrade. The Esperance Coast Road is a gateway to a number of remote and incredibly beautiful tourism destinations in south-west Tasmania. Tourism is a major contributor to the Tasmanian economy.

The federal Labor government has committed funding to the tourism environmental audit project—or ‘Green TEA’—in the Huon and Kingborough regions. $166,000 has been allocated to this new project to encourage tourism operators in southern Tasmania to adopt environmental best practice by cutting their water and energy consumption. This will cover around 40 tourism operators and has the potential to be expanded to other parts of the state. Tasmania has long been renowned as a clean, green tourism destination and many fine environmentally friendly tourism operators are based in the Huon and Kingborough area.

Federal Labor is also providing the people of Franklin with more than $60,000 for various sporting and recreational facility grants. The electorate will also benefit from the establishment of a GP superclinic on Hobart’s eastern shore in Bellerive. This will involve GPs, nurses, allied health professionals and other healthcare providers. I am expecting consultation to begin soon with the Tasmanian government, medical professionals and other relevant stakeholders. This will ensure that the services provided through the new superclinic will be best tailored to the needs of the community.

Franklin is a diverse electorate. It will experience considerable benefits as a result of this budget, benefits stemming from both the initiatives I have outlined above and more general measures that are of benefit to all Australians. Indeed, the federal government’s pledges in the areas of health, education and affordable housing will be of major value to the people of Franklin. We have $3.2 billion for the Health and Hospital Reform Plan; $1.2 billion to deliver information and communication technologies to all students in years 9 to 12; the $1.2 billion to help first home buyers save for their home; and, the $55 billion Working Families Support Package. These are all initiatives which will assist the people of Franklin.

More than half the families in the electorate survive on a gross income of less than $60,000 a year. As a result of federal Labor’s tax cuts, families on a single income of $40,000 a year will receive an extra $29.19 a week. The tax cuts Labor has included in this budget are not the same as the former Liberal government’s tax cuts, as they would have us believe. They are in fact tax cuts that we promised in the election campaign and we have included as part of our package an education taxation refund for families. As the elected representative of Franklin and a working mother, I am pleased to see that the tax cuts are going to the people who need them most.

This budget is also about the future. It provides for three new funds—the Building Australia Fund, the Education Investment Fund and the Health and Hospitals Fund—with an initial investment of around $40 billion over the next two years. It is a budget which balances the long-term needs of the nation and the more immediate pressures faced by all Australians. On the one hand it is a budget with a focus on nation-building after 12 years with none of that from those on the other side. On the other hand it is a budget designed to benefit working families, all working Australians and those doing it tough. It was framed within the tight parameters of being economically responsible about putting downward pressure on inflation, delivering on our election commitments and planning for Australia’s future. It is a budget I am sure Tasmanians will be proud of and, with nearly $50 million in funding for initiatives in a previously ignored electorate, it is a budget the people of Franklin can be proud of. It is a budget I am very proud to support.

Michael Johnson (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am honoured to speak in the Australian parliament yet again as the member for Ryan. In the election in November last year I had the great privilege of having the endorsement and support of the people of Ryan. I take this opportunity to once again express my deep gratitude to them for their confidence. We all know it was a very tough election. For those of us who believe in democracy very strongly, whilst we might disagree with the result and the judgement of the Australian people, we respect it very much because the Australian people have the ultimate say about who comes into the parliaments of this country to make decisions on their behalf. I am particularly pleased to speak tonight on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and related bills because this legislation is very important and relevant to the people I represent. The seat of Ryan is based around the western suburbs of Brisbane. It is essentially residential. It is very much a family electorate. We also have a significant number of students because the very famous and very highly regarded University of Queensland is located in the Ryan electorate.

It is really important for me to speak on this budget tonight. I want to let the people of Ryan know that the budget the Labor government has delivered does absolutely nothing for them. The Labor government said it was going to be delivering a budget for working families to ease the cost-of-living pressures, the cost of groceries and the cost of petrol. Labor said this budget would help put a lid on inflation and put downward pressure on interest rates. The people of Ryan are of course very keen to have the pressure of grocery and petrol prices eased and to have downward pressure on interest rates, and they were anticipating that the government would deliver a budget that would have an impact on those issues. Alas, they were very disappointed. I have had much feedback that they were anticipating a budget of some significance. In fact, it turned out to be a complete fraud. This was a fraudulent budget.

During the election campaign last year and throughout this year we have heard the government talk about, amongst other things, an education revolution as one of its cornerstones. But this budget did not say anything about an education revolution. It did not touch on education in a meaningful sense at all. As I said, it was really a fraud on the Australian people. The new Prime Minister and the new Labor government have really let down the Australian people and the people of Ryan. There was so much expectation, yet they delivered a non-event.

The budget is really an old-fashioned Labor government budget—a high tax and high spending budget. It is also a very flawed budget. What a shame for the people of Australia. What a shame for the constituents whom I represent. This is a wasted opportunity, given the massive budget surplus left to the Labor government by the former Howard-Costello government as a result of its management skills and stewardship over the previous 11½ years. The coalition government left this new government a $22 billion surplus. I know that the people of Ryan will continue to be interested in this point: quite often in parliament during question time, the Labor government talk about the massive $22 billion surplus they have very proudly created. Of course, that is nonsense. The $22 billion budget surplus was left to them as a result of the stewardship and skill of the former Treasurer, Peter Costello, and the leadership of John Howard. The Labor government are wrapped more in political spin and style than in substance and real policy solutions. Such is their spin that they would make Shane Warne very happy; he would be very proud of them. This government would be good competition for Shane Warne and the Sri Lankan spinner, Mr Murali.

Something of deep interest to the people of Ryan, whom I have the great honour of representing in this place, is petrol. The budget makes some observations about funding the introduction of a national Fuelwatch scheme. Of course, this is going to be another of Labor’s spin policies. At the last election, Mr Rudd pretty much guaranteed the Australian people that, if he were elected, his government would have significant capacity to bring down petrol prices, yet we all know that the price of petrol has gone up some 13c since November 2007, when the last election was held. At the end of the day, we all know that spin will go only so far. And the truth about this issue finally came out last week, at a press conference in Adelaide—Mr Rudd’s famous ‘Adelaide declaration’. It is so famous that even the people of Ryan are aware of it.

The Prime Minister’s comments were about his capacity to represent the people of Australia and his ability to bring down petrol prices. The residents of Chapel Hill know all about the Adelaide declaration. My residents in Kenmore know all about the Adelaide declaration. The students who go to the University of Queensland and who rely very much on petrol to get around know all about the Adelaide declaration. So what is this? This is the Prime Minister of Australia hauling up the white flag. The Prime Minister of Australia is saying to the people of Australia: ‘I don’t really have any thoughts about how to do this. I don’t really have any meaningful thoughts or policy suggestions to address increasing petrol prices.’ As a resident of an electorate, as a constituent of this country and as an Australian, I certainly do not want my Prime Minister hauling up the white flag. I certainly do not want the head of my government running up the white flag, shrugging his shoulders in the face of adversity and saying, ‘I’ll just watch the problem along with you. We’ll just sit by and watch it.’ I certainly do not think that any Prime Minister should do that. But, unfortunately, our current Prime Minister is very much in the business of hauling up the white flag. I will quote the Prime Minister’s comments at this Adelaide press conference for the benefit of the people of Ryan. The Prime Minister said:

We have done as much as we physically can to provide additional help to the family budget.

This is a disgrace. It is an absolute disgrace for the Prime Minister of Australia to say: ‘We’ve done all we can and now we’ll just watch. Pensioners of Ryan, sorry about that, we’ll just watch. Students of Ryan, sorry about the petrol prices going up, we’ll just watch. Working families of Ryan, sorry, but today’s petrol prices in Ryan, in the western suburbs in Brisbane, are $1.40. That doesn’t matter, we’ll just watch.’

The opposition, led by Dr Brendan Nelson, has come up with a significant measure whereby petrol would be 5c cheaper at the bowser—it is as simple as that: whatever the market rate it would be 5c cheaper. The Labor Prime Minister cares so much that he has run up the white flag. He has let down the people of Ryan and he has let down people throughout the country.

It is unfortunate that the people of my electorate of Ryan are paying the price for the new government’s inability to address this very important issue. The Labor Party surfed into office on lies, deceit and misrepresentation, and guess who now pays the price: the hardworking men and women and the struggling families of the Ryan electorate. It is a disgrace and I will be absolutely vigilant and proactive in informing the constituents whom I have the great honour of representing in the parliament as their Liberal member that the new government is not up to the task of representing them or of delivering meaningful solutions to the great challenges that this country might face.

The Labor government’s solution is to appoint a petrol commissioner, who will oversee the national Fuelwatch scheme. He will have the magic wand. He will bring down prices, by all accounts. He will bring transparency to petrol prices and give Australians and the residents of Ryan cheaper fuel. I am all for a petrol commissioner if he is able to deliver the goods, but I just do not believe he is. If this petrol commissioner can make an impact on family budgets, that is great, but I am not sure that a petrol commissioner who is being paid a salary of some $304,000 is really going to be able to make a difference. To the families of Ryan, someone being paid $304,000 to watch petrol prices is a travesty of justice. That is some $25,000 a month, or $5,861 a week, just to watch petrol prices. Petrol prices will not go down by just watching them. We need meaningful solutions. As the Minister for Resources and Energy said in the parliament today when representing the view of the Labor government and the Prime Minister: ‘Well, this is just a little problem.’ That is a quote. They are the exact words that the Minister for Resources and Energy said in the federal parliament of Australia today. In reference to this issue, he said, ‘It’s a little problem.’

Let me say to the government, to the Prime Minister, to the minister for energy and to Labor members: petrol prices going up is no little problem. It is no little problem to the families of Ryan, it is no little problem to the students of Ryan, it is no little problem to the self-funded retirees of Ryan, it is no little problem to those struggling individuals seeking to make their way in the city of Brisbane as they look for employment or go about their daily lives. When prices are increasing it is not a little problem, and I think the minister’s comment reflects the arrogance of the new government. They have been in office for six months and they are already showing incredible arrogance.

Let me go to another point that reflects the arrogance of this new Labor government. The budget that was delivered on 13 May reflects so many broken promises that it is astonishing. One key measure in the budget that really upset the families of Ryan was the solar panel rebate means test, which now means that households with a taxable income of $100,000 will not receive the solar panel rebate. That is an absolute disgrace. We all know that during the election campaign the Labor Party made it very clear what their position was. This was their position in November—and I quote from the Labor Party website:

A Rudd Labor Government will implement a Clean Energy Plan to help Australian consumers and Australian businesses work together to tackle climate change.

Federal Labor’s Clean Energy Plan will help ensure all Australians reap the benefits of the latest clean energy supplies and energy saving technologies.

They are fine words, but when it comes to action we see the true colour of the Labor Party and this Labor government. All the rhetoric and chest beating that it would only be Labor that could actually deliver meaningful measures for Australians to address climate change, to bring cleaner and greener energy to this country—all that was just complete rhetoric. Now we have action in the form of a budget measure that says, ‘If you receive over $100,000 combined taxable income you will not be eligible to receive rebates for the installation of solar panels.’ I know that the people in the western suburbs are hopping mad about this. The installation of solar panels is very popular, but this announcement will stifle any progress made to deliver a cleaner and greener Australia.

I think the people of Ryan will agree with me that the government’s green credentials have been totally ripped to pieces after this budget. Whilst I do not want to proffer any counsel to the Labor government, I am sure that the wiser heads amongst them will not underestimate the impact of this measure. It really has been felt far and wide in the community, and of course the solar power industry in particular is predicting sharp declines in sales, with businesses and households cancelling orders after the budget announcement.

I want to refer to a gentleman by the name of Mr Phil May, whom I had the pleasure of having a conversation with today. I phoned Phil May today because previously he was filmed with the then opposition leader, Mr Rudd,  and the then shadow spokesman for the environment, Mr Garrett. I think Mr Phillip May has become quite well known. He was happy to pose with Mr Rudd and Mr Garrett because he believed that they were genuine about the rebates and about encouraging cleaner and greener energy solutions, and especially—given that he ran a solar panel installation business—about solar energy. This is what he had to say following the budget announcement:

‘I am absolutely heartbroken that they could bite the hand that helped them promote their policies.’

So this really is a government that is all about hypocrisy and misrepresentation. As I said, I took the liberty of phoning Mr Phillip May today. He lives out at Queanbeyan. He said to me that he has certainly made it his business to let everybody that he knows—former clients, friends and family, neighbours—know about the hypocrisy and misrepresentation of the new government. He is bitterly disappointed. This is someone who was happy to have his photograph taken with Mr Rudd and Mr Garrett to promote solar energy and to promote companies that were in the business of being clean and green and helping Australians to address climate change in their own individual way, yet he is bitterly disappointed. I am sure the wiser heads in the Labor Party, the wiser heads in the government, will look back on this announcement by the Treasurer of means testing solar panel rebates as a very, very flawed decision—a very poor error of judgement that will come back to bite them very severely.

I want to end my remarks in relation to solar panels by reading a letter from a constituent of mine who lives out at Karana Downs in the western suburbs of Brisbane in the Ryan electorate, because I think his email to me of 16 May 2008 really does embrace the entire issue. I do not know Mr Harris. I look forward to meeting him sometime in the weeks ahead; we are going to meet up and he is going to, I think, deliver in person the thoughts which he delivered to me in an email. He says:

Dear Sir,

I’d like you, as my Ryan representative, and your party to very seriously consider blocking the discriminatory measure of means testing the solar rebate in the senate. The $100,000 mean test is ridiculous policy. It simply is an attempt to minimise expense in this area—an area which the labour government contested the election arguing they had more progressive principles and would invest more heavily, than your government. Obviously not so! It is purely discriminatory to those that are modestly financially successful—not even well off—just not completely struggling.

These sort of moves, which introduce huge marginal tax rates, simply encourage people to ensure they don’t earn too much. It is bad destructive negative policy against the innovative end of society and needs to be really enthusiastically fought.

I will not be installing solar on my roof now, and as an electrical engineer will not be pursuing a business plan I had to enter this area. My feeling is this is exactly what this government hoped to achieve in making this change. I just can’t imagine why they don’t like solar electricity!

I want to thank this gentleman from Karana Downs for very eloquently expressing his position on the budget measure. I share that view with him, I know that all of my colleagues share that view, and we will certainly do all within our power to oppose that measure.

As I keep saying, I know that the people of Ryan will be bitterly disappointed. They are very much a community that looks to make their individual contribution to issues of climate change and solar panel installation is one of them. My constituents who earn over $100,000 are certainly not rich residents of the suburbs in Ryan. They are bitterly disappointed and hope that this new government will see the light. As I say, I am sure that some of the wiser heads will ask for smarter policy implementation to make a difference to this important issue. (Time expired)

Laurie Ferguson (Reid, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Multicultural Affairs and Settlement Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In the months after the election we have seen many of those opposite rush to repudiate the former Prime Minister. Everything that happened was now his individual fault. They were all forced to their policies. They sought to resist him, but they were unable to overcome the way in which he drove them to defeat. We have seen the rewriting of history, with people trying to cut themselves off from that history and, in a way, to blame him for all the vicissitudes. The response of the opposition to this budget is along the same lines.

Their major initiatives in regard to fuel excise are obviously in total contradiction to the position the former Prime Minister took. He clearly said that it was irresponsible to embark on those kinds of policies, but the opposition leader, in a populist bid to avoid eventual replacement, rushes around the country knowing full well that the huge thrust in international petrol prices has more to do with the long-term deterioration of supply and the problems of the Middle East than it has to do with Australia taxation policy. What we have seen in this response is total irresponsibility from those opposite. It really represents a very strong repudiation of the historical background of conservative politics in this country. Not only do they talk about their attitude in regard to this fuel measure but they actually threaten to block the budget measures in the Senate. It has been enlightening.

On a broad thrust, this budget does indeed supply a $55 billion Working Families Support Package. That represents one of the main reasons those opposite were rejected at the last election. For a decade, the previous Prime Minister accomplished the holding of middle-class and parts of working-class suburban Australia around a policy of social conservatism. Basically, he was able to appeal to them in the same way as Ronald Reagan in the United States appealed to the hard-hat, blue-collar Reaganites. At the last election we saw the reality dawning on those people that, after a decade or so of conservative government, they were financially going backwards. Many of the people who put trust in the Prime Minister and the Liberal Party failed to really gain in material fashion over the period.

In this budget, as I say, we see a very strong commitment with a number of funds being established: $20 billion towards infrastructure in connection with roads, ports, railways and telecommunications; and $11 billion for an Education Investment Fund for our TAFEs and universities. Over the previous decade, just how interested in education were those opposite? They were more interested, for industrial relations purposes, in establishing an alternative to the TAFE structure. They were more interested in running around our tertiary education sector, trying to force universities down a particular industrial relations path of forcing people to compel individuals on to AWAs, rather than worrying about their wholesale neglect of education in our country. That, of course, was part of the reason they were rejected at the polls.

Similarly, $10 billion is going into a Health and Hospital Reform Plan for better hospitals, better health care generally and, more importantly, medical research. Similarly, with health care, many people now have been liberated from being compelled—this was from the party of freedom, the party of choice—or forced to buy a product that they did not want: private health. The former government put in a series of measures, both penalties and financial incentives, which affected a group of the population who did not want a specific product and who basically were, in a way, subsidised by the previous government over a period of time. That is what we see on a broader front.

Education, of course, interrelates with the failure to train people in this country and the severe skills shortage that we are now experiencing. One of the budget measures is to, again, increase the skilled migrant intake into this country by 31,000, which is a 30 per cent increase. In some senses, that is unfortunate. To have people in our workforce who have no previous experience of the nuances of our industrial relations society and who are without those ties and reassurances when they engage with employers creates a situation that can sometimes be manipulated by employers to undermine conditions. So there will be unfortunate by-products in having a huge skilled intake.

Of course, we also face the reality that many of those who are brought here purportedly for skilled purposes find themselves doing extremely unskilled work. The Joint Standing Committee on Migration in the last parliament, in a non-partisan fashion, determined that that was occurring around this country. There was evidence in particular from the meat industry about Filipino workers in North Queensland; they were brought here under the highest qualification in that industry and given the most menial tasks to do, while being isolated in remote areas and unable to obtain support from other Australians. In this budget, because of the failures of the previous government concerning training, we now have this situation. Of course, one must concede the realities of what has generally been a booming economy. Those two pressures have required again, under this budget, a large rise in our skilled intake.

In addition, in the budget we have seen an overdue increase in our humanitarian intake. Quite frankly, the increase of 500 is welcome, but very large parts of our electorate feel that Labor and Liberal governments can do better on this issue. Unfortunately, regarding that 13,500 intake, in the lead-up to the last election, when the—let us say—‘correct’ decision by the previous government was made to diversify our intake and bring in more people from Iraq, we heard the previous minister make racist attacks on African migrants. I know that he knows our reason for changing the intake and reducing the African component was that the United Nations said that the major responsibility internationally now was to those two million people from Iraq in Syria and Jordan. But unfortunately the previous minister decided to go in for a bit of political opportunism, by saying that it was because Africans had social problems in relocating in this country.

However, this government has gone further. It has, as I say, increased that intake by 500. That has been accompanied by a decision to bring in 600 people. Regardless of what people’s views are regarding our original engagement in Iraq—regardless of whether you were for or against it—one obvious outcome is that a number people who have been allied with Australian and other forces are now in danger from militias in that country. They can be assassinated, they are being murdered, and we have sought to do something about that. The budget also allocated $10 million towards our displaced persons and refugee fund for Iraq.

Another really necessary budget measure is the commitment, made at the last election, to put $50 million into helping people with poor English outcomes in the refugee humanitarian intake. For many years there has been a debate over whether five to 10 hours for the vast majority or nine to 10 hours for those aged under 25 with limited education is sufficient. I think we know that we would all have great difficulty picking up another language in that limited time. But there are important initiatives in this budget to address that, with the expenditure of $50 million in this area.

There will be a Pathways program to help people with the lowest levels of literacy learn English in formal and informal settings while being introduced to the Australian workforce. There will also be traineeships to help new migrants continue to learn English while they develop skills and experience in workplace culture. Both of these programs will be funded over four years. They are designed to help migrants pursue an ongoing pathway to successful employment opportunities. Ensuring migrants are equipped for the workforce is an important economic objective in an environment of labour shortages. We are seeing—and this is why there is an inquiry at the moment into adult migrant English—whether we are getting practical outcomes from migrant English which will create pathways to employment. Without belittling the need to understand literature and to get a grasp of the grammar of our language, obviously for most people coming to this country the most desirable outcome of learning English is that it leads them to employment and gives them the ability to support their families and interact with the Australian population in employment. As I said, the budget commitments will be accompanied by a very worthwhile and overdue investigation of the way migrant English is delivered in this country.

Another aspect of this budget is the government’s decision that there will no longer be any temporary protection visas. This means that a number of people who have been determined to have valid refugee claims will, in a very real sense, become part of the Australian general public and will move towards citizenship. I commend the bill to the House.

Debate (on motion by Mrs Hull) adjourned.