Alby Schultz (Hume, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. I ask whether the Prime Minister stands by her comments in this place on 20 October this year when she stated:

I do commit to keeping the promises at a local level that Labor and Labor candidates made at the last election.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Herbert is out for one hour under standing order 94(a). The offence was the display of a headline or something. Regrettably, I had just warned him after trying not to warn him for about an hour.

The member for Herbert then left the chamber.

Member for Mackellar, regrettably I can hear every sotte voce thing you say. He did not have the call and you know that that is outside the guidelines that we thrashed out last parliament.

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: the member for Denison asked precisely this question as his first question in the parliament.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think that even the preamble might give me the hook that it is a different question. The Prime Minister will take the call and respond to the question.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I did answer a remarkably similar question from the member for Denison and I stand by the answer that I gave to the member for Denison. We had a proper process of making local promises. We costed them. As a result of costing them, we then had them included in the Charter of Budget Honesty process, and in that Charter of Budget Honesty process we found offsetting savings. That is why we can say in this parliament—because we properly costed policies, because we had them properly put through the Charter of Budget Honest process—that we are in a position to honour them. That is, we made the promises that we could afford to make because we had found matching savings for them. That was a stark contrast to the process that the opposition went through where it just went around saying whatever it wanted to in various electorates—never properly costed the promises—and we all know how that ended. It ended with an $11 billion black hole.

Alby Schultz (Hume, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I have a point of order on relevance. The question was quite specific in that it asked the Prime Minister whether she was going to honour the commitment she gave on 20 October.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The standing order is now directly relevant and again, as I said, that still allows for a—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister has the call. If members do not want responses to points of order, I am happy not to give them and I am happy to give the call to the Prime Minister.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My answer to the member’s question is that we made promises, we costed them, and because we costed them we can stand by them and bring the budget to surplus in 2012-13. The opposition made promises it never costed, never accounted for, and had it been elected as the government it would have been headed for an $11 billion black hole, or it would have wholesale marched away from those local commitments, indicating that it would have breached its word to local communities. I say to the member opposite that I stand by the answer I gave the member for Denison and if he cares about local commitments then he will be very happy that the government has properly costed promises that it made.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I ask a supplementary question to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to Senator Lundy’s letter to the member for Hume dated 18 November and I ask her: why has the government broken a commitment made to the people of Hume by her candidate in the election to provide $100 million to Goulburn Base Hospital?

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As usual, we will have the matter looked at and the facts checked because the Leader of the Opposition never comes to this place with the facts.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Prime Minister is responding to the question and she will be heard in silence.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The research I was referring to was not looking at Parliamentary Secretary Lundy’s letter but looking at the assertion that the Leader of the Opposition and the member made about promises by this government. As I am advised by the Minister for Health and Ageing, no such commitment was made. I am very happy to stand by local promises we made. It would be very intriguing indeed to see if the shadow Treasurer and the shadow finance minister could ever spend enough time together to give us a costed list of the local promises they made, because as we know they allowed local candidates to make, and they themselves made, promises that they never bothered to cost. They were heading for an $11 billion black hole and a fundamental breach of trust with local communities.

So I presume that the member for Hume is fairly embarrassed by that performance by his political party. He might therefore want to advocate to the Leader of the Opposition that, in preparation for the 2013 election, the Leader of the Opposition should try to find a way to live by the Charter of Budget Honesty. He promised to do so in the run-up to the 2007 election but did not do it because he was covering up an $11 billion black hole and the littering, right around the country, of promises made to be broken.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I seek leave to table the article from the Goulburn Post making the commitment and the letter from Senator Lundy breaking the commitment.

Leave not granted.