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

I have received a letter from the Leader of the Opposition proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The failure of the Government to deliver an agenda for Australia’s future

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

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

On the third anniversary of the election of the Rudd government, I regret to say that this has been possibly the most disappointing government in Australia’s history. It has put off decisions, it has botched programs, it has broken promises, it has completely failed to develop any vision or agenda for our country and it has embodied the dictum of Senator Faulkner that the modern Labor Party is ‘all cunning and no courage’. Above all else, it has disappointed its own members. The stream of leaks that we are now seeing from inside the government, most recently today with the full caucus minutes of 24 June, is a sign of just how betrayed by this government even good Labor people feel. I say this not in any spirit of gloating over the misfortunes of this government but, frankly, as a lament over the decline of a once great political party, which might have just held on to government after the recent election but which has obviously comprehensively sold and lost its soul. This government has not been overwhelmed by an external crisis; it has proved itself completely incapable of building on the strengths of this nation. It has demonstrated that after 25 years of good government we have now had three years of bad government, three years of drift and three years of squandering the built-up inheritance of a quarter of a century.

Three years ago we knew what good government in this country was like. Then we had a $20 billion surplus and no debt; now we have a $50 billion deficit and we are borrowing $100 million a day. Then we had three boats a year; now we have three boats a week. Then we had a government that was frugal and prudent and responsible with taxpayers’ money; now we have a government which proposes to spend $43 billion without a proper cost-benefit analysis. This government has been an exemplar of how not to run a country. In the first three years of the Howard government, we saw semiautomatic weapons banned. We saw a 50 per cent improvement in waterfront performance. We saw the independence of the Reserve Bank of Australia. We saw the $10 billion black hole bequeathed to us by the former government fixed. It was the greatest fiscal repair job in Australia’s history. And we saw the holy grail of policy that had defeated successive generations of governments—tax reform—finally begun. That was what a real reforming government looked like and that is not this government.

But lest members opposite think that I am incapable of extending credit where it is due, let me concede that the first three years of the Hawke government were three years of genuine reform. In the first three years of the Hawke government we saw the deregulation of our financial sector, we saw the allowing into this country of foreign banks, we saw the floating of the Australian dollar and we saw the substantial elimination of tariffs. These were serious reforms from a serious government. These were real nation-building initiatives by a government that did not lack courage. By contrast, what have we seen from the current government over the last three years? Well, I have a list of failures that I will shortly go through, but I want to look at the successes. Lest I be accused of not giving credit where it is due, let’s look at the successes. There is a website and there has been a modest extension of welfare quarantining in one territory of this country—two modest successes, both of which build on the reforms of the former government.

But, essentially, what this government has done in the last three years is spend money—and haven’t they spent! They have turned a $20 billion surplus into a $50 billion deficit. They have turned $60 billion worth of net assets into $100 billion of net debt and they are borrowing $100 million every single day. Millions and millions just in the course of a parliamentary session are going out the door because of the profligacy of this government. But if you listen to ministers you hear them say it was all worthwhile because the one thing you cannot take away from them is that they kept Australia out of recession. If the economic policies that kept Australia out of a recession, as in the words of members opposite, were so smart, why did they sack the Prime Minister who presided over them? If this government was so good at keeping Australia out of recession—if that is the ultimate boast of this government—why did they sack the member for Griffith, the most unfairly treated man in Australian political history? If the economic policies were so good and this government is such a good economic manager, why did the one truly economically literate and numerate person in this government, the former minister for finance, Lindsay Tanner, quit in disgust when the prime ministership changed in this country?

Let me make it absolutely crystal clear: the reforms of the previous governments, not the spending spree of the current one, have kept Australia in the relatively good economic health that we currently enjoy. What we have seen from this government is a comprehensive and complete failure to deliver on its program. We know about the modern Labor Party: they are good at politics but they are hopeless at government. Let us go through the list. There is the Home Insulation Program, an absolute disaster. In fact, it is more than a disaster; it is a tragedy. We know about the 207 house fires and we know about the four deaths but, tragically, it seems there might even be more. There is a quarter of a million Australian families living in such houses now—nearly all unchecked—that have dodgy or dangerous roof insulation because of the waste and incompetence of this government.

The Building the Education Revolution program should have been called the botching the education revolution program, a monumental waste of public money to be eclipsed only by the coming National Broadband Network disaster or school halls on steroids. There is the border security disaster. Since members opposite changed the laws that were working, we have had 9,188 illegal arrivals on 190 boats. There is the mining tax, the dagger aimed at the heart of the most productive sector of our economy. There is the emissions trading scheme. First of all, it was delayed because of the deep loyalty of the former Deputy Prime Minister who is the current Prime Minister—such loyalty and solidarity amongst that group—and now it seems to have been dumped by the uberloyal former Deputy Prime Minister, who is also uberhonest. The Prime Minister was telling us before the election that there will be no carbon tax under any government that she leads and is now telling us that there will be. There is the East Timor processing centre that is never going to happen. There are the domestic processing centres that are bursting at the seams. There is the takeover of public hospitals that was supposed to happen in 2009 but which is now bogged down in the kind of bureaucratic mess that we have come to expect from this government. It is typical of the work of this government that, after spending billions in its first year, I think there are 11 extra hospital beds in New South Wales as a result of all that extra federal spending. There are the GP superclinics: 36 were promised; four are fully operational. There is the Indigenous housing program whereby $45 million was spent without any actual work on the ground being done. There was the computers in schools program: a million were promised; 340,000 have so far been delivered. There are the trade training centres: 2,650 were promised; only 22 have been delivered. There is the Fuelwatch that never happened. There is the GroceryWatch that never happened. There were the 260 childcare centres that were scrapped after just 38 were built. There were the green loans: only 1,000 were ever made although 140,000 assessments took place and thousands of assessors are $3,000 out of pocket. That was a $275 million complete waste of money, and then there was the citizens assembly, which lasted perhaps three weeks before being dumped.

It is a bad government getting worse. If we think they were indecisive with a majority, they are now absolutely incoherent without a majority. Let us pause for a moment to think about the absolutely shambolic nature of this government. We saw a slight window of it in the Financial Review this morning in an article by Laura Tingle, who said not only is there no published business case for the National Broadband Network but there has been no cabinet submission on the National Broadband Network and there has not even been a proper cabinet briefing. What we have instead are these duelling cabinet subcommittees competing with each other to stymie proposals because the senior members of this government do not trust each other. That is the truth: they do not trust each other. And why would they trust each other now that we know how it all works, because we have been told thanks to the leaker of the caucus minutes and thanks to the lament of the former Prime Minister, perhaps the most unjustly treated senior politician in recent Australian history.

But let us consider what has happened since the election. We have had the mining tax, which has been made less favourable to the mining industry. We have had the emissions trading scheme, which has been replaced by the carbon tax. We have had the detention policies, which have been dramatically watered down. We have had the privatised National Broadband Network, which has now been replaced by the permanently nationalised national broadband network, some kind of latter-day Postmaster-General’s department. Imagine that: the Postmaster-General’s department trying to deliver faster speeds! But that is what we have got.

What is the common ingredient in all of this? It is the fact that Labor are in government but the Greens are in power. Every policy change since the election demonstrates the Green-lean which the Deputy Prime Minister alluded to today and said that Labor have to reject it. How can they possibly reject the Greens on whose votes their government crucially depends? Then, of course, there is the gay marriage distraction which is going to rip the Labor Party to pieces over the next 12 months precisely because of the influence of the Greens.

It is just not good enough. The Australian people want a political party in government which knows what it stands for. Here on the coalition side of the parliament we stand for lower, simpler, fairer taxes. We stand for moving from a welfare state to a society of opportunity. We want to see genuine people-power in our schools and hospitals and we want to see a new standing green army to give our land the care that it really deserves.

We are Liberals who believe in smaller government, lower taxes, greater freedom. We are Australian patriots who want to see strong families and respect for values that have stood the test of time. Unfortunately, what we have is a government which has comprehensively let the Australian people down over the last three years. There are two questions the Australian people should contemplate over the summer. Is your life better? Is our country stronger? Thanks to this government the answer is a resounding no. (Time expired)

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker Slipper. I do not know if you noticed but, while that speech was being delivered, there was plenty of chatter going on behind the Leader of the Opposition. This is the second last day of parliament under the new parliamentary arrangements in which the opposition leader said that he would be delivering alternative policies for Australia. He could have brought in some supporters but, instead, what he had was just chatter and a very, very flat effort indeed.

This is a debate, ostensibly at least, about government and opposition agendas—policy agendas. That is what the parliament should be debating, so I want to address that directly in terms of the government’s agenda. I will go through our budget policy which is to return the budget to surplus in 2012-13, which would be the fastest fiscal consolidation since 1960 and we would be the only major advanced country to achieve this.

The Leader of the Opposition has said repeatedly that we should not have gone into deficit, that there should not have been deficits in this country. When more than $100 billion, and at one point an estimated $200 billion, is slashed off the nation’s taxation revenue the prescription of the Leader of the Opposition would have been then to cut a corresponding amount out of government spending—that is, to double the negative impact of the deepest global recession since the Great Depression by keeping the budget in balance at a time of severe trauma for the nation’s revenues. In that decision he would have destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Australians who wanted the dignity of work but who would have been thrown out of work through the cold-hearted policies of the Leader of the Opposition. Fortunately he did not get a chance to implement that particular policy prescription.

As a result of Labor’s efforts through economic stimulus and the efforts of small and larger businesses in this country, instead of losing jobs, hundreds of thousands of jobs have been created in Australia at a time when millions of people lost their jobs in Europe and North America. The government have set about implementing an agenda to deal with some other major economic difficulties bequeathed to this nation by the previous coalition government. I refer to easing capacity constraints and lifting productivity growth. We need to ease the capacity constraints, namely the skill shortages and the infrastructure drought, inflicted upon this country by 12 years of coalition sloth and neglect.

The former Treasurer of this country, Peter Costello, said that infrastructure investment is not a responsibility of the Commonwealth of Australia. They are saying that they did not believe in investing in infrastructure, including in regional Australia, and they failed to invest in the necessary skills formation to enable this country to deal with those bottlenecks. As a result there were inflationary pressures and, right now with the two-speed economy that we have, these capacity constraints are increasingly severe. It is because of the foresight of Labor governments in understanding these problems and dealing with them that we are making the necessary investments, and I call that a very positive agenda for the nation’s future.

The government are setting about dealing with another great legacy from the previous coalition government, and that is a massive slump in productivity growth in this country. Why is this important? Because today’s productivity growth is tomorrow’s prosperity. Yesterday’s productivity growth was negative. Multifactor productivity growth in this country between 2004 and 2008 was negative. Australia was less productive at the end of the period of the previous coalition government than four years before that. We are revitalising productivity growth through our efforts in creating a seamless national economy and, of course, in rolling out the National Broadband Network, about which I will have more to say in a moment.

We are embracing important elements of tax reform by giving small businesses much needed tax relief. So much for the coalition parties being the parties of small business! What are they doing in terms of our efforts to provide tax relief for small business? They are opposing it. What about our efforts in providing infrastructure investment in the regions? They are opposing it. What about our efforts in increasing the superannuation guarantee payments from nine per cent to 12 per cent to give people a secure income in retirement? They are opposing it. Why? Because they are opposing the minerals resource rent tax that would fund these important productivity-raising initiatives.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr McCormack interjecting

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In hospital and health we will have as a result of our reforms more doctors, more nurses and a higher quality health system, which this country deserves. I remind members of this parliament what the Leader of the Opposition said when he was the health minister. He said:

No one should fret over an “unreformed” Australian health system.

He has never believed in reform.

In the last few moments I have begun to explain the government’s policy agenda, and that is what this debate is about. But of course we all remember when it was not exactly determined who would be forming a government in this country.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr McCormack interjecting

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

Order! The member for Riverina will remain silent.

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Members might recall that the opposition leader convened a shadow cabinet meeting to which he invited the media, and he described the shadow cabinet—that is, the coalition shadow cabinet—as ‘a government in waiting’. If you are a government in waiting, then there is an obligation on you as an alternative government to develop alternative policies. But what have we heard from the Leader of the Opposition in respect of alternative policies? Nothing but three-word slogans. Remember he took to the elections, and has been saying ever since: ‘Stop the boats. Stop the waste. Stop the taxes.’ Never mind that his policy of stopping the boats involves Admiral Abbott sitting at Kirribilli overlooking Sydney Harbour, taking phone calls from north-western Australia and deciding which boats are going to be towed back out to sea. That is a policy: stop the boats! That is their policy.

He says, ‘We’re going to stop the waste.’ That is very interesting, isn’t it! They are going to stop the waste, but they go to the election with an $11 billion gaping black hole. How is that stopping the waste? Then the costings were released. I remember the fantastic media performance from the shadow finance minister and the shadow Treasurer, who could barely be in the same room at the same time so much do they despise each other. The shadow Treasurer revealed later that he had seen the costings—how long before? Two weeks? Two days? Five minutes! Five minutes before the press conference was actually held—out of his own mouth. He then said, hand on heart, ‘These costings all add up.’ It required the intervention of the Independents to insist that those costings be subjected to Treasury and Finance costings, truly independent costings, and it was Treasury and Finance who identified an $11 billion black hole. So much for the slogans.

Geoff Lyons (Bass, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Lyons interjecting

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

The member for Bass will remain silent, particularly because he is not in his seat.

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Then he said, ‘Stop the taxes.’ ‘Stop the taxes’ was the third slogan. What is their position on tax? Their position is to apply a great big new tax on everything you buy to fund the Paid Parental Leave scheme, which they now oppose and which, obviously, the Leader of the Opposition said back in 2002 would happen over his dead body. But then he had a metamorphosis and said, ‘I’ve got a good idea. Why don’t we increase taxes to pay for my Paid Parental Leave scheme?’ And now he says, ‘We’re going to stop the taxes’! In fact, they would increase the taxes.

These three-word slogans are really catching on, Mr Deputy Speaker. What is his climate change policy? No carbon price. What is his telecommunications policy? Demolish the NBN. What is his health policy? Local hospital boards. What is his budget policy? An $11 billion black hole. What is his education policy? Cut school funding. They are very catchy, aren’t they, these three-word slogans? That is the depth of the work that the Leader of the Opposition has done this year and in the lead-up to the election. He has no policies. All he has is slogans.

And you do not need to rely on me, Mr Deputy Speaker, to accept that analysis. Just ask the member for Moncrieff, because the member for Moncrieff has expressed today in the media the frustrations that so many members of the coalition are expressing about this totally negative, totally opportunistic Leader of the Opposition. Why wouldn’t the member for Moncrieff become frustrated? He was actually in shadow cabinet at one point, then he was demoted from shadow cabinet to the outer ministry and now to the back bench. Why? Because he has got some ideas; he has got some alternative policies. I do not agree with his alternative policies on bringing back unfair dismissal laws for small business, but at least he has had the courage to say, ‘I’ve got some policies and I think as a coalition we should debate these policies and we should substitute reasonable policy’—‘reasonable’ from the coalition’s point of view, not from our point of view. But at least he has policies in place of these three-word slogans. I do not know that this intervention by the member for Moncrieff is going to help his career, but maybe he will be joined by others with similar courage who will say they have had a gutful of the Leader of the Opposition believing, as he says, that the coalition is ‘a government in waiting’ and that he can skate through with focus tested three-word slogans.

I heard during question time the Prime Minister talking about the National Broadband Network and the ongoing demands for the coalition that there be cost-benefit analysis and so on. The Prime Minister made the perfectly valid point that it would not matter what happened; the coalition would never support the National Broadband Network. And the Leader of the Opposition said, ‘Wrong.’ Well, the Prime Minister is right because even now in his contribution to the matter of public importance he described the National Broadband Network as a disaster. Does this sound like a policy that at some point the Leader of the Opposition might embrace and that at some point, if there was a cost-benefit analysis, he would support? What did he say earlier, in May this year, about this? He said, ‘I think it’s a bad idea.’ What did he say on the Alan Jones program? He said, ‘Well, we won’t go ahead with it, Alan. We just won’t go ahead with it.’ That sounds like a pretty conclusive ‘no’ to me, and that is what the coalition’s policy is: no to the National Broadband Network, no to lifting productivity growth in this country, no to supporting the regions.

I have listened to the interjections from a new member of the National Party in this parliament, the member for Riverina, and he should be supporting the National Broadband Network. He should be supporting regional development in this country. He should be supporting the regions. But, no, again the National Party falls in behind.

Warren Truss (Wide Bay, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Truss interjecting

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Here we have the ostensible Leader of the National Party, Mr Who. In surveys he actually rates below ‘Who?’ and ‘I don’t know’ and such answers when people are asked who is the Leader of the National Party. ‘I don’t know’ actually rates above the current Leader of the National Party.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, I raise a point of order. The minister really should refer to the National Party leader by his correct name, not Mr Who.

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

I call the minister, whose time is rapidly running out.

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for that wonderful point of order, that I should not call the leader Mr Who. I will call him Doctor Who.

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

I draw the minister to the provisions of standing order 64. He ought not to refer to other members by terms other than their position or the name of their electorate.

Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. When the Leader of the Opposition was contributing to a debate here, I think it was his first contribution in the new parliament, this is what he said:

The Australian public expects the government to keep to its commitments. If this government could not keep to its commitments, the Prime Minister should not have accepted the Governor-General’s commission.

Okay, a commitment that we made at the last election was the National Broadband Network. Hold us to account, insist that we implement the National Broadband Network, but don’t get in the way and don’t try to stymie it. After all, the opposition leader said this government should keep its commitments, which include a commitment to the National Broadband Network, a commitment to GP superclinics—an entire election program. But this Leader of the Opposition, who has spat the dummy, has just been spoiling and sulking and thwarting every piece of legislation he possibly can in this parliament because he has no policies. He is still grumpy, he is still mean and upset because, under the born-to-rule mentality of the coalition and of the Liberal Party, he did not get the nod. So he said, ‘I’m going to wreck and ruin and rant,’ and that is what he has been doing ever since.

This government will get on with its agenda of implementing good economic policies for a stronger economy, for a prosperous economy, for a fair society and for a sustainable environment in this country.

Warren Truss (Wide Bay, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When judging incompetence in government, most people regard the Whitlam government as the benchmark. ‘Worse than Whitlam’ has become a sort of mantra that we are hearing quite a bit around this place lately. The Whitlam government is the illustration of shoddiness in government. It is interesting to note that the Whitlam government lasted three weeks short of three years. They were considered to be an abject failure when it came to fundamental areas like economic policy and competent management. Today on the third anniversary of the Rudd-Gillard Labor government, perhaps we should compare their performances. This government has had three years—three weeks more than the Whitlam team did. For all its chaos and its scandal and the rampant debt and unemployment and economic misery and raging political incompetence, at least the Whitlam government did something. At least Gough Whitlam tried. At least the Labor Party of the 1970s had a core and a heart and some mojo. Just compare it with this soulless and short-sighted and inept mob, paralysed by focus groups and liaison with the Greens, with a stunning lack of imagination and poise and focus—a government by zombies, as one of their own numbers has suggested.

In the first 14 days of the Whitlam government there was just a two-man band running the country, a gang of two. Yet this gang of two made 40 far-reaching decisions, largely in the areas of social reform. Some of them were good and most of them were bad, but at least they made some decisions according to the Whitlam government’s own plan for Australia’s future. If we compare what the gang of two did in their first two weeks, now we have got over three years a gang of four, although we have now learned that no decisions were made when one of the gang was present. They had to wait for the former Minister for Finance to leave before they could actually tell the truth about what they wanted to do. So we have got double the number of people but none of the calibre and none of the firepower—twice as many suits in the room but they are all empty. When decisions were made they were all about overblown rhetoric and promises about the greatest reform of all time, the biggest projects imaginable. Insulation, school halls, green loans, CPRS—all of them were going to save the world or save the economy, save the nation. All empty rhetoric, although in some cases they have had appalling consequences. They were going to turn around the boats, they were going to deliver all sorts of change that simply has not happened.

Most of the programs that they have put their effort into have proved to be such an appalling disaster. There was the insulation program—a program that goes on killing. How much longer can this government stand aside and refuse to level with the Australian people about the horrors of this program and what is actually going to be done to fix it? What about the billions lost in school halls, the green loans program which has left hundreds of thousands of Australians short, the assessors who paid for training and now are getting nothing in return? This is the example of this government. In the words of Dougie Cameron, the zombies who underwent a political lobotomy are not consulted at all. The remainder of the cabinet ministers are left in the dark. I am not saying they would have read the report or the cabinet documents even if they had got them. It seems no minister has bothered to read the plan for a $43 billion program. If they are not going to read about what it is proposed to spend $43 billion on, how can we rely on them to deal with programs which have significance but do not involve such high-profile activity?

Now we are told there is going to be a change. Now we are going to have caucus have a brainstorming program. After three years, nothing to do, bereft of ideas, finally the zombies are going to be allowed to have a say. They can at least put in their ideas. I guess they will be ignored and disregarded from then on, but at last, after three years, caucus is going to be allowed to have some brainstorming.

Let us be aware that Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister tried to undertake some significant initiatives. He regards his greatest achievement as saying sorry for the injustices to Aboriginal people, but there has been no plan to address the chronic Indigenous disadvantage. The report has shown no progress. If this was the most important issue for his government to address, you would think he would have achieved something. There was $45 million spent before the first house was built, and even now only a handful of houses have been completed. We have been bombarded by all sorts of words and reviews and promises, reports by the dozen, but nothing actually happens.

Now we have a new Prime Minister—five months in office today—but nothing has changed. The front page headline of today’s Australian Financial Review describes the forlorn way in which this government approaches decision making. The headline is ‘Gillard’s way: a more inclusive form of indecision’. There will still be indecision but it will be more inclusive than it was previously, so all the zombies can be a part of the indecision. They can all play a role in the future. And—oh dear!—isn’t that headline so apt? We are told that cabinet is going to meet early tomorrow morning because it needs to make a decision about anti-siphoning. This issue has been around for a year. The people of Australia, and particularly those in regional Australia, want to know whether they are going to be able to watch the football in the months ahead. The decision has become desperately urgent because the current rules expire in a few days. Finally, the cabinet has to make a decision. What a terrifying prospect—the whole cabinet in the room having to make a decision on who can watch the football and who is going to miss out. To do this, they have to start at seven o’clock in the morning, it seems. They have to get up really early to make this decision that they needed to make 12 months ago.

Is it any better with the National Broadband Network—a really big decision? We are told it is the most important piece of social infrastructure our country has ever seen, but it is $43 billion with a secret business plan that no-one is able to see. Those who are able to see it have not even read it, yet they are asking the Australian parliament to vote on accepting a scheme where they do not even think the review and the business case is worth reading.

Kevin Rudd, from the caucus minutes of five months ago, said there were three great failures in the government. He named them as the mining tax, the BER and the emissions trading scheme. But what he made absolutely clear was that these were not his decisions alone; the decisions were actually made by people like his deputy and the Treasurer. They were urging him to make the decisions that have proved so disastrous for the Labor Party and for the Australian people. So they were a part of the decisions but now they have been rewarded. The people who made the bad decisions in company with the former Prime Minister are now filling those high offices.

Of course, Treasurer Swan has been a real part of the failure of this government—Australia’s weakest Treasurer. He talked up inflation, he blew the surplus, he plunged the budget into deficit and drove the nation into debt. It is no wonder that not even the banks will listen to him any more. He has become a laughing stock and now he makes promises about balancing budgets—something Labor never does. Something Labor never does is repay debt. In reality, this government will be no better.

As we look at the progress of this government, there is no doubt that Julia Gillard got it right when she said—also five months ago today—that Labor have lost their way. It was her job to try and find the map and to get Labor going again in the right direction. But the party have been absolutely clueless. They know deep down that they have nobody else to blame for this than themselves. Launching a book today, the Treasurer was trying to blame the coalition for all Labor’s failures. It is our fault that all their programs have turned into lemons, that they have been a failure in what they wanted to do.

The reality is that this government have no idea where they should be going. It has been a government that has delivered a crisis in confidence. They lack the quality to be able to make the decisions that matter for Australian people and, even worse, once the decisions are made for good or for bad, they do not have the capability to implement them in an efficient and reliable way to deliver results for ordinary Australians. The Australian people know that government is for grown-ups, for people who will make decisions and get on with the job, not factional machine men who care only about their own jobs. This government cannot govern. They have failed and it is time they handed over to somebody who can do the job. (Time expired)

Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this MPI on the Gillard government. I welcome it because I am very proud, as all of us are on this side on the House, of the good work that this Labor government has been doing and has committed itself to do, together with the crossbenchers in this House, and the support it has for the work being done within the community. Members of the crossbenches and the government alike, the Australian public and our constituents in our electorates will be able to take pride in the substantial very important changes to which we are making a positive contribution and which will affect a variety of important, if not critical, areas of our lives and the lives of all Australians.

If we look back over the period of the Howard conservative government, we saw inaction and we saw neglect for many years. Of course, it is up to a Labor government—here it is again—to deliver to the Australian people. There is no alternative, as the opposition do nothing but obstruct. All we heard today at question time—and all this week and in the lead-up in the last couple of weeks—was how they will obstruct, how they will delay, how they will oppose and how they will be wreckers. The opposition have not come up with a positive strategy. There are no positive policy plans. All we see is obstruction, opposition for the sake of opposition, and the destruction of anything good that will better the lives of Australians. As they have removed themselves from the political debate by their opposition and their destructiveness, they have made themselves irrelevant. We see that through the inept policies that they have not been bringing to this House.

I take this opportunity to speak to all of us in this place, but especially to the crossbenchers and the Australian public at large, about just a few of the improvements that we are making through working together and the few improvements that we can all anticipate. We can reflect on one of the strongest policy initiatives of this government, that being a new telecommunications network for this new century, which is again being opposed by those on the other side for the sake of opposition. It is a substantial reason for this government’s coming into being.

There is a commitment to replace our reliance on century-old technology with a network that will have the capacity to deliver all that we require. In this period of radical communication change, the National Broadband Network is not a once in a generation initiative but a once in a century initiative. Again, this is being opposed. The acute increase in broadband capacity and speed that this network will give us will see changes in many parts of our lives and will affect Australian lives all over this country.

We have heard about some of those anticipated improvements in question time this week. These include better access to markets, better access to professional services, better access to information and education, and better access to our friends and loved ones around Australia and the world. These are just some of the areas that will improve but which those opposite are opposing just for the sake of opposing, destroying and delaying.

The network will also give us remote access to professional health services, which is just one area where it will better the lives of Australians. This will be just one part of the transformation of our health and hospital system that had $1 billion pulled out from it under the former government. Labor invented universal health care in Australia. The conservative Liberal Party privatised it. Labor re-created universal public health care and the previous Liberal Prime Minister described it as a rort.

Again, it falls to Labor to restructure our old, failing health system, which for far too long was a hot potato passed between federal and state governments. In the lead up to the 2007 election we saw the report The blame game: report on the inquiry into health funding. Anything and everything that was discussed in health was the fault of the states, and the blame would be handballed to the states and they would have to deal with it. Well, this is a government that is dealing with the issues.

As I said, at last we have a national government doing what is required to improve the health system through the restructuring of funding responsibility and improving services, and not just passing the buck to the states. By introducing clarity and certainty for the first time, the public will know who is responsible. This government will fund substantial improvements in this area, such as a four-hour emergency department turnaround guarantee to ensure patients are admitted, referred or discharged within four hours of arrival at an emergency department. That is what we stand for; the Liberals are opposing this measure.

Further improvements include targets for maximum waiting times for elective surgery and a guarantee that 95 per cent of surgeries will be delivered on time. Again, this is opposed by the opposition. There will also be extra GP services in aged care homes to improve access for older Australians to primary care services. These are the people who have paid taxes all their lives and have fought in wars, yet the opposition opposes these important policies. These are just some of the benefits that we can anticipate as a result of this Labor government’s national health agenda. This is the agenda the public supported in the lead up to the last election. This parliament makes the rules and, most importantly, the majority of members in this House support that agenda.

As it will with health care, the NBN will increase the access of Australians to information and education resources. It is clear that part of the strategy behind providing a higher value education to the next generation is this government’s substantial direct investment in the IT capacities of our schools. As a direct result of this government’s education agenda we will have schools with the computers they need to supercharge our children’s education through the resources and materials they will be able to access through—here it is again—the National Broadband Network. Again, the opposition are opposing our children having the tools to access the information and technology needed to make us a better nation.

The opposition are opposing, blocking and delaying for the sake of opposing. In spite of those opposite, constituents absolutely welcome this government’s investment in their schools—public and private alike—and in their children’s future. We heard from earlier speakers about the Building the Education Revolution. The investments made by that program have been a tremendous success. We have seen how those opposite all clamour to have their photographs taken when there is an opening of a BER project in their local electorates even though they are opposed to it.

The BER has been a tremendous success in our electorates. This is evident from those on the ground. All of us on this side speak to the principals, teachers and students in our electorates. They have all welcomed it and said how much it was needed after so much was taken out of the system during the many years those opposite were in government. In ceremony after ceremony that I attend for the opening of BER projects, the people on the ground who I speak to support the government’s agenda and more than welcome its ongoing fulfilment. This is because they know the value of education. We all know that a good education in our society will improve the future chances of those students. They know how important it is to get the skills needed to get and hold a job.

Even with all the turmoil in the world—such as the recent turmoil felt in Ireland—we are continuing to grow our economy and workforce. This is an outstanding achievement that continues to get better. If we had listened to those on the other side who opposed our infrastructure programs and stimulus packages, who knows where we would be today? Additionally, if they had won government with their $1 billion budget black hole I think we would have been in very dire straits. We know that many jobs were created in the economy through the infrastructure packages from this government. For example, well over 600,000 jobs have been created since this Labor government came to office.

The students of today can take great heart from the condition of our national economy and their likelihood of securing, with requisite training, work to fund their lives well into the future. What this Labor government has done will enable our economy to grow by 3¼ per cent in 2010-11 and in 2011-12. So this government’s actions have kept people in work. This is very important to consider when you think about how those on the other side opposed all of the packages designed to keep our economy going. This government’s actions have kept people in work through the worst financial crisis in over half a century. (Time expired)

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is a scholar and a speaker in the United States by the name of Joel Barker, who is known in corporate circles as the paradigm man. He is said to have popularised the concept of a ‘new paradigm’. So there is nothing original under the sun. Mr Barker begins his lectures on leadership and vision with these words:

Vision without action is just a dream. Action without vision is just passing time. Vision with action can change the world.

What do we make then of a leader with no vision and no action—not dreaming, not even passing time, just a hollow vacuum occupying the job of Prime Minister, courtesy of the factions that put her there and holding onto government courtesy of the Independents? That is the legacy three years on of this government.

It is not as if the Prime Minister has not been pressed endlessly to come up with a vision or a plan for Australia. Just before the election on 20 August, News Ltd published an article by the Prime Minister. It was in response to a request for her to lay out her vision for Australia in 2013. It was a free kick for the Prime Minister. Supported by her army of ministers, advisers, bureaucrats and not to mention the highly paid speechwriters and consultants, she had to come up with a plan for the nation. How timely was that? Just days before the election it was an opportunity for the real Julia to show real leadership—to inspire, to move people by her insights, to lay out a path and an agenda that would carry the nation to greater heights for the betterment of all. No, we were not expecting soaring rhetoric. We were not expecting a Chifley ‘light on the hill’ rallying call. We were not expecting a Menzies ‘forgotten people’ masterpiece. But we were expecting more than a depressing and dreary insight into this Prime Minister’s limited depth and breadth of thought. Her article started off, predictably, with her usual declaration of a belief in the power of hard work and education—okay, so far so good. She then went on to say we should:

… show simple courtesy and respect by caring for each other in times of need.

Fine. The Prime Minister said that she will be guided by those values. That, members of the House, was it. The reader should have been really worried by that stage. Surely, this Prime Minister realises that those principles have been advocated by every Prime Minister and virtually every parliamentarian in history. If this is her vision, with whom is she trying to contrast herself by sprouting motherhood statements? Hard work, education, courtesy and respect are all laudable, but, seriously, this was meant to be her vision, her agenda and her plan for 2013. This was meant to inspire people to vote for her in 2010, yet she could only sprout sentiments held by every politician in the past 100 years.

The Prime Minister listed her priority of investing in infrastructure and nominated as key the National Broadband Network, the trade training centres for schools and the GP superclinics. These were the central planks for her vision for Australia. It was strange that the horrendously overpriced school hall program did not appear on her list, given that she had personally presided over that $16 billion disastrous program. One could almost forgive the Prime Minister for being embarrassed about that program with billions wasted due to her incompetent administration. As we know from the leaked Labor caucus meeting minutes of 24 June, the Building the Education Revolution was deemed to be one of the three great failures of the Rudd government. It was strange that the Prime Minister failed to mention her delivery of the trade training centres, and that is because she did not deliver on Labor’s 2007 promise. It was also strange that she failed to mention that Labor failed to deliver any but a small fraction of its 2007 promise on GP clinics. That was it for her vision. She summed it up this way:

My vision is for a country that works, step by step, towards better jobs, better opportunities and better services for all Australians.

‘In contrast with whom all those governments that actively work to ensure, step by step, worse jobs, fewer opportunities and worse services.’ Perhaps we do have the key to her vision after all: the Prime Minister was comparing her agenda with that of state Labor governments. This Prime Minister’s benchmark for achievement is to aspire to be better than state Labor. That lowest common denominator thinking will be the hallmark of federal Labor forever more.

One of the more depressing aspects of the Prime Minister’s statement of vision for the nation was that of the 650 words in her statement about 200 were dedicated to personally attacking the Leader of the Opposition. So 30 per cent of her vision for Australia involved a personal attack on the Leader of the Opposition—so much for courtesy and respect. This is where the slag and bag began—in that vision statement and the attack on the Leader of the Opposition. What a depressing, disappointing and lazy effort it was by someone campaigning to be the Prime Minister of Australia.

Perhaps I am being too harsh, because it is entirely possible and becoming more plausible by the day that this effort was in fact her most honest revelation, that it is the extent of this Prime Minister’s vision—empty, vacuous and hollow. Since the election there has been a vacuum of leadership by the Prime Minister. A government’s agenda should be designed to give people hope that it is capable of improving their lives, making things better not worse, ensuring the government passes on to the next government a better set of circumstances than it inherited. Governments should build on the policy agendas of their predecessors and further expand economic reforms put in place by successive governments. The Hawke and Keating governments built on the work of the Fraser government by opening up and liberalising our economy, particularly the financial sector. The Howard government implemented economic reforms that built on the Hawke and Keating agendas.

One of the great legacies of the Howard government that was bequeathed to this Labor government was zero government debt. The Howard government paid off the massive debt accumulated under Labor—$96 billion of debt was paid off over 10 years. Then with $60 billion in savings and a budget surplus of more than $20 billion, this Labor government inherited the best set of books of any incoming government in our nation’s history. It was presented with an opportunity unlike that of any incoming government, which put this government in a stronger position to weather the global financial crisis than virtually any comparable economy. Yet when it was in opposition Labor opposed every reform of the Howard government and now deludes itself that it was good luck, not good management, that it inherited such a fantastic set of books.

To the great cost of this nation, it is only now clear that it was not luck but the good management of the coalition government. And, despite her professed belief in hard work, the Prime Minister lacks the grace and dignity to acknowledge the Howard government’s achievements. In a number of manifestly visionary moves, the coalition established the Future Fund so that future generations of taxpayers would not have to foot the bill for the superannuation entitlements of those in public service in this generation. The coalition established the $6 billion Higher Education Endowment Fund and the Leader of the Opposition, when health minister, established a medical infrastructure fund. Our vision was for these growth funds to exist in perpetuity to provide universities and hospitals with an additional source of funding for their infrastructure needs. The first thing this government did was raid those funds and spend that money, and this Prime Minister is personally responsible. She pillaged the Higher Education Endowment Fund.

Labor has spent these funds while at the same time plunging the budget deeply into deficit. It has managed to plunge the government back into the depths of Labor’s debt last seen in 1996. This government will never repay its debt. It never has; it never will. And despite its rhetoric no-one seriously believes this government will ever deliver a budget surplus. This government will go down in history as providing a far worse set of accounts than it inherited by providing economic ‘reforms’ that take the country backwards not forwards. It will be the first government in living memory that leaves this country far worse off than it was under the preceding government—apart from the 1996 Labor government. What a poor and sorry history and what a poor and sorry example of leadership for this country.

Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am surprised and delighted to be able to speak on this matter of public importance. I am surprised because the opposition has actually come up with an MPI that has the word ‘future’ in it. I am surprised because I have been overwhelmed since arriving in this place by the backward-looking whinging of the leaders of the opposition. Their focus on negativity, on wrecking and on fear-mongering is like a disease that they are trying to spread throughout the entire place.

For every word those opposite speak on any policy matter that relates to a positive future for Australia we could just get rid of all the clanging, booming backward-looking words we hear over and over in the disguise of different language and replace them with this: ‘We was robbed. We should’ve won; we could’ve won. We were the best. We still can’t believe that the Australian people didn’t give us the job.’ They are the party looking to the past, longing for the past and realising only now the opportunities that they squandered in those 12 long years when they failed to invest in critical reform and infrastructure.

The reality that they just did not get it at the time of the election and they still do not get it now, as the parliamentary year 2010 draws to a close, shows just how out of touch those opposite are. The Gillard government won because our agenda was clearly offered to the Australian public before they voted us in. It was fully costed, it was fully funded and it was clearly articulated. We are getting on with delivering that future here in this parliament. No matter how much those opposite obstruct, we are bringing a better future to this great nation.

I said that I was surprised and delighted. Now it is my pleasure to turn to the matters that delight me. I daresay that what I am about to delight in is also delighted in by the people of Robertson and any other Australian who has a sense of vision for the future of this great nation. The people of Robertson totally understand that it is only a Gillard Labor government that has an agenda that looks to our future, and I want to talk about three key areas: education, health and infrastructure.

On school reform, the Gillard Labor government’s vision is absolutely crystal clear. It is to make every school a great school, because in the 21st century a great school and a great education are the keys to unlocking an individual’s potential and our nation’s future. It is only with a world-class school system that we can build a high-productivity, high-participation economy that gives all Australians the opportunity to engage in rewarding and satisfying work. We are going to continue to push forward and deliver these ambitious reforms, achieving more for our schools in less than three years than the coalition delivered in almost 12.

The government is making major investments to reverse the underfunding that has held our schools back for too long. We are looking to the future, doubling the funding for Australian schools, because we know that no other investment will generate the enduring, long-term results and returns like our investment in human capital, our investment in young Australians, our investment in Australians who want to retrain, our investment in Australians who, unlike those opposite, believe that our best days are still ahead of us.

Quality of schooling matters, and we need to invest in making schools great places in which communities can gather. That is why the government have invested in modernising infrastructure with the Building the Education Revolution program and trades training centres, together with our investments in improving teacher quality and the learning outcomes for young people.

What a future we have for the people of Robertson. The Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth today indicated that there are 23,738 projects underway around Australia, and there are pages and pages of those programs just in Robertson.

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

Read them out.

Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I do not have time if I am to tell our story for the future of this country. There are so many things that we need to get out there.

I really want to talk about Building the Education Revolution because it is too badly maligned. At St Edward’s Christian Brothers College on the Central Coast we have a trades training centre which has been developed in concert with St Joseph’s just across the paddock. Those visionary projects are the things we need to invest in. I have knocked on 20,000 doors in my electorate but I have not met one parent, one grandparent or one kid who does not want the new things which have come to their school. They understand that halls are places in which we gather to celebrate what we have learned, where we gather to celebrate as a community, and that halls are places in which the school can truly act as the hub of the community. We need to continue delivering our vision for the future in education. But wait; there is more. Let us have a look at the health agenda. Let us have a look at what Nicola Roxon said in her press release today. She said that 76 per cent of Australians ‘support the Gillard Government’s historic health reform agenda’. That is a pretty good number.

Government Member:

Government member—Who are the other 24 per cent?

Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Maybe they have not heard yet because all they are hearing on the media of this country is the negative carping of those opposite. We have to tell our positive story—and it is a positive story. It is an investment in our country. It is an investment in our future. We have an agenda and we are delivering. I welcome the fact that 76 per cent of Australians are keen on Australia’s health reforms. I also take the opportunity to mention that, in addition to health reforms, we have plenty more to deliver. But critically for the people of Robertson and critically for regional Australia we need to talk about the infrastructure agenda. The Gillard government, with a vision for the future, are committed to delivering. We have to clean up after more than a decade of neglect. Infrastructure bottlenecks were the hallmark of the Howard government’s failure to invest, failure to have a vision for this country and failure to get on with the job of building a positive future.

We are making sure that we have key achievements in many areas but nothing more clearly indicates the difference between those opposite and the visionary agenda that we have here on the government benches than the National Broadband Network. It is a vision for the entire country. It is not for some city slickers or for some country people. It is not either/or; it is an and/and. It is for all Australians. It starts from our efforts right here on the government benches pushing forward with a vision for what Australians might be capable of as we give them a pathway to the future. We are replacing core infrastructure. We will build along the pathway an opportunity for many other people to provide a range of services, so that Australians will get a much better deal when they sign up to high-speed quality internet access for their kids. All of a sudden they will have this fantastic optical fibre cabling to their place—it is going to make a big difference.

This country has a future; a future which is possible because we have a healthy economy delivered by a Labor government. When things got tough, we got on with the job. We rolled up our sleeves. We delivered across the entire nation an investment in infrastructure for the kids in our schools and an investment in jobs for every community that benefited from the Building the Education Revolution.

Despite the whingeing of those opposite in this place, they know that their communities back home—real Australians—are in real schools. They are in real school halls and real classrooms doing real learning and gathering together learning as communities. They are learning about their future, they are believing in their future and they are in buildings ready to last into the future, not in the decaying infrastructure that would still be there if those opposite were still in charge of this country.

We have a vision for Australia’s future and that is why the Australian people elected us and not those on the other side. We are getting on with delivering an enabling agenda, a positive and visionary agenda. We will do it for the Australian people, despite the carping negativity, the whingeing, the fear mongering and the wrecking ball mentality of those opposite.

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

The discussion is now concluded.