Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before the debate is resumed on this bill, I remind the Committee that it has been agreed that a general debate be allowed, covering this bill and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I appreciate the opportunity to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 and cognate bill, although, sadly, what I am going to have to say will not fill the Australian people with joy. What we are seeing from the Gillard government are overruns on so many programs and such waste that one wonders about the long-term future of the country, unless the government can stop behaving in such a reckless manner.

Recently we have seen a $2 billion tax for the flood levy. The government started by asking the Australian people and Australian businesses to contribute to the flood and also to the cyclone damage. Then, after the Australian people through hard work had given dollars, they found themselves whacked with a levy on top of that, which will not do anything to help people continue the volunteer effort, if all their efforts are just going to end up with the government just coming over the top and taxing them.

One of the great things about this country is the volunteer spirit and contribution we have, and I think that is something that we need to protect and cherish. If the government had stuck with its budget six months ago the levy would not have been necessary. This tax, which came on top of such a great volunteer effort, would not have been necessary.

The simple take-home message from these appropriations bills is that the government needs to live within its means. The Gillard government is a government that taxes, spends and borrows on repeat. It is a bit like the old cassette recorder that gets stuck in the car. All we seem to get is the message ‘Tax, spend, borrow, tax, spend, borrow’, until you have to give it a hard thump to try to get it to stop. I think the only way we are going to be able to get a hard thump is at the next election. We will be doing all we can to point out to the Australian people that we have to change the government because this one just taxes, spends and borrows.

It is also a government that shies away from hard decisions. It could have found the $2 billion it needs from the flood levy by making some hard decisions, but unfortunately it did not have the political courage to do so. This is a government that is borrowing $100 million a day. Interest rates are increasing and will continue to increase while the government continues to borrow $100 million a day. Sadly, this will hurt Australians. This will hurt Australian families, Australian small businesses and Australian farmers.

These appropriations are a symbol of the huge waste of this government and they are there for everyone to see. Like every family in Australia, the government needs to manage its budget. If Australian families have to live within their means, then why shouldn’t the government? Australian families know that if they were borrowing the equivalent of $100 million a day in their budgets they would be in big trouble and would have to change the way they were going about things. Sadly, this government does not see it that way and if we are not careful our children are going to face a huge debt that future governments will have to make drastic decisions to help pay off.

Responsible governments, such as the Howard government, put money aside for a rainy day. If the Gillard government were a responsible government it would not be in the position it is now—with the spending in these appropriation bills and the need to tax the Australian people further to pay for the $10 billion to 20 billion necessary for the flood and cyclone recuperation.

While I am talking on this subject, I would like to touch on a point that was raised in the Herald Sun today about how we are still yet to see a plan from this government on how it is going to help western Victoria recover from the floods. We have seen a government which has focused heavily on twisting arms and doing backroom deals to get its $2 billion levy in place, yet we have seen nothing from the Gillard government on how it is going to help those communities in western Victoria that are struggling with the flood recovery. If there was a simple message I would like to give today it would be: please stop focusing on taxing our communities and please focus on a plan that will help them recover from the devastation that has been wrought upon them.

Today’s Herald Sun highlights that 13 mayors have written to the transport minister asking how the minister is going to help as they want to get on with doing repair work—fixing the roads and rebuilding bridges—and, importantly, doing it in a way which improves the infrastructure so that with future flooding there will not be such severe damage. They have not heard back from the government, so they are sitting there waiting and wanting to know where they can spend money, how they can spend money and what contribution they will get from the federal government to help in that regard. What has made this all the more difficult for them is that previously they have seen government programs where money has been wasted. So we have a vital need at the moment for government money to go into important projects, yet they are getting nothing of that and they are looking back and seeing programs that have wasted Australian taxpayer dollars.

In my electorate of Wannon there was a huge problem with insulation batts, in Hamilton, Warrnambool and Port Fairy. In Port Fairy the installers, who like many established themselves overnight due to the hasty, poor policy created by the Labor government, left without a trace. They had been staying at a local caravan park and they left clients with no reliable contact details, unfinished work and insulation material strewn all over the road. These people were the ones who benefited from the government’s pink batts program, who profited from the Australian taxpayer dollars that the government so carelessly threw away, leaving behind pensioners and families wondering what type of insulation they had in their roofs and whether the way that it had been installed was potentially a severe fire hazard for them.

There was a storage company in Warrnambool who were left with a shed full of batts that no-one came to collect. It is important to point out that not only were they left with those batts but they were left with no direction as to what they should do with them. So that storage space, which could have been used to earn that company more money, could not be used as the batts had to remain there while the company waited for the government to tell them what they could do with them. Sadly, it took six to nine months before they could get any direction from the government as to how they could deal with the batts that had been left there. During the months that the batts sat in their storage shed with no payment this business lost income. Not only did this business pay through their taxes for the government’s wasteful program but they also paid through lost revenue. There was no recompense for the business. Now they will pay again as a result of government waste, this time in the form of a new levy.

Only four months ago, Edy Foster and her family, from Simpson, were living in darkness in certain rooms of their house because batts that had been installed around downlights smouldered when the lights were on. Mrs Foster feared for her family’s safety because despite her warnings to her children there were times when they turned the lights on without knowing the danger of the smouldering batts in the roof. Not only did Mrs Foster have to get an inspector out to inspect her home and the insulation that had been installed by a company going by the name of SS Greenforce, at additional cost to the taxpayer; she then had to wait for months, while fearing for her family’s safety, for someone to finally come out to remove the dangerous insulation. Mrs Foster called the government hotline three times to try to gain assistance to get the unsafe insulation removed. It was not until the issue had been raised by the media that she finally got some action from the government and had some contact about getting the insulation removed. Sadly, we are still hearing similar stories about waste. We are hearing stories of government contractors coming down to inspect flats and doing four flats and then another inspector coming down a week later to do the remaining two flats. All this is an additional expense to the taxpayer.

The pink batts program was a complete and utter waste of taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars. Sadly, in my electorate we have also seen this with the BER program. We have examples of contractors heading from Geelong, travelling 2½ hours, to do garden remedial work and then driving back again, and that remedial work took half an hour. Why couldn’t a local contractor have been used? We have schools getting $800,000 halls where there are six students at those schools. We have Dunkeld Primary School where they wanted to use the classrooms which were to be demolished to build new change rooms for the local cricket club. They could not. They also wanted to construct the building using local labour, and that local labour put off work for 12 months while they waited for the approval process, only for the state government, through the federal government, to decide that what they were going to get were demountable classrooms from Melbourne delivered up to the school. This type of gross waste hurts local communities and especially regional and rural communities. Because those businesses put off work they would have had in order to help with the school, they lost income and they cannot grow and expand as they should be able to.

In contrast to what the government are doing, the coalition are committed to doing everything necessary to rebuild and repair the budget. We have outlined savings. In fact, last year the coalition set out $50 billion worth of savings and cuts to the Rudd-Gillard government’s reckless and wasteful spending. And earlier this month the coalition outlined more than $2 billion in further savings measures that the Gillard government should adopt instead of its flood tax. If Labor had been taking proper care of their finances, as the Howard government did previously, they would not be in the position where they were caught off guard and felt they needed to add another tax to dig themselves out of their budget black hole.

Instead of a new tax, the government needs to cut wasteful spending such as government advertising, reduce consultancy expenses, put a freeze on Public Service recruitment and cancel the National Broadband Network. It also needs to stop its mantra of tax, spend and borrow. If it continues to head down this path, the long-term future of the Australian economy is going to be very bleak indeed and the long-term future for our local communities is going to be very bleak indeed. If Australian families can live within their means, the government should be able to do likewise. It needs to stop borrowing $100 million a day. It has to learn to live within its means. It has to stop taxing, spending and borrowing in a way that is going to hurt us for the years ahead.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I just remind the member for Wannon, after listening to you discussing exceptions rather than the rules, ‘I’d rather be negative than positive,’ and then reading the rest of the speech as a template by your party for presentation in both chambers, that not only do you not have a sense of history, my friend, but you have a selective memory and, in some cases, you have got total amnesia. First and foremost, I have listened to the mob on the other side trot this stuff out day in and day out as if, in the historical context, we have never faced a global financial crisis: we didn’t face it, it didn’t happen, and so any measures that we put in place were not necessary and did not help. But, of course, they know deep down that that is absolute rubbish. It did occur. We acted and—I see he is being fed lines now by his colleague. He couldn’t dream something up himself!

Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Member for Braddon!

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek to intervene.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, you can’t. Sit down. I will be using my time, thanks.

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

Is the member for Braddon willing to give way?

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, I do not accept his question.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise, then, on a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I wanted to remind my dear friend opposite that we went through the Asian financial crisis.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What is the point of order?

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

There is no point of order. I remind the member for Wannon that he was heard in silence in the chamber. I ask that he pay the same courtesy to his colleagues.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Indeed. I do thank the former government for trying to tackle the Asian financial crisis. But I would remind those opposite—before the member for Wannon rushes out of the chamber because he does not want to hear the truth—that we went through a financial crisis, we acted and this country stands in a much better position now than just about any other comparable country and economy.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Four people died as a result of that program.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You do not like hearing it. You would rather come out with the exceptions rather than the rule. Okay, there were issues in some of the programs. We understand that, but, I tell you what, many, many thousands of people got home insulation and it is safely installed and they are happy about that. If you want to tell me that all your schools in Wannon do not accept their BER projects as being important and greatly needed, then I will fly—and you know it! Yet they trot this rubbish out each time. I just want to remind them. I would like also to remind those opposite, particularly the member for Wannon, as he is rushing out the door, that this opposition’s record in terms of financial responsibility is appalling. In the last election—quickly forgotten by all those opposite—there was an $11 billion gaping, thumping, monstrous black hole! They don’t want to know about it.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What about your costings on the resource tax?

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Here we go! Of course you can try and talk over the top, friend, but that just exactly indicates that you do not want to hear the truth—as is the case with the member for Tangney most times, because he likes to be a contrarian. We all know what that means.

The so-called cuts, the savings, that you were going to propose in a bipartisan way for the reconstruction levy—blow-out after blow-out and you know it. You are even double-counting half the time. Of course you cannot explain it. You have got Joe Hockey trying to explain one thing and Andrew Robb trying to explain another. Tony Abbott has gone completely silent. I do not know what has happened. It must be the continuation of that interview on the television! Just a nod, nod and a stare. ‘I don’t want to know anymore,’ he says.

Anyway, we know about the mob opposite. I would like to talk about some good news, and that, Madam Deputy Speaker—as no doubt you have given me some leeway there—is in Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011. These appropriation bills will be dealing with $2.3 billion worth of appropriations for a number of fantastic programs, many of which actually affect my electorate. That is what I would like to concentrate on if I may.

First and foremost, part and parcel of the appropriation was $22.4 million to assist Tasmanian forestry contractors and employees respond to the challenges now facing the Tasmanian native forest industry. They are considerable. There is massive restructuring required in Tassie. I do thank all those that have sat down—many of them opponents, traditionally—to try to nut out a statement of principles to take that industry forward into the future. They have shown terrific courage and leadership, all of them, and I do thank them. I really hope that these guiding principles are able to restructure the industry into the future.

This appropriation delivered on our election commitment to respond to these challenges. We committed a $20 million package during the federal election, and last month the government announced that it would increase the size of the package by more than 10 per cent to $22.4 million. We have delivered on that promise and that process is now underway. Hopefully, those people chosen from the application round will benefit from this and we will be able to restructure the industry to have a future.

Another appropriation is $69.8 million brought forward from 2011-12 for DEEWR to meet contractual commitments for projects relating to the non-government schools component of the Building the Education Revolution which have been completed earlier than expected. Only last Friday I was able to open the Peter Chanel Centre at Marist Regional College, which is a new science and language complex. It has a fantastic design and is very student oriented, very community connected. I want to congratulate Sue Chen and the Marist college on a fantastic project. It joins many other projects in my electorate. Indeed, in my 63 schools there have been something like 95 BER projects and nearly $100 million worth of investment. It is fantastic, as it is throughout this country. I know community after community and school after school have benefited greatly from it. It was part and parcel of the jobs stimulus, and so many people were employed and jobs sustained because of the BER. Congratulations to all those involved.

I also notice there is $48.3 million, representing a reappropriation of amounts from the last financial year, for the non-government schools component in this instance, for trades training centres. What a fantastic program that is. In my electorate we have been very fortunate. We have a trades training centre already up and running at St Brendan-Shaw College. The latest one has just been announced at Marist college and I have two trades training centres up in the Circular Head region, in Circular Head Christian School and Smithton High School, which has a year 11 and 12 annexe as well. Congratulations to all those people. Of course, these trades training centres will allow people to start to develop their skills earlier on and it will build up our skills capacity for the future.

I will turn to some of the other appropriations which are so important and which will benefit every electorate. There is an additional $14.6 million to double the capacity of the Connecting People with Jobs relocation assistance pilot program to up to 4,000 places. I notice, Madam Deputy Speaker Livermore, and it is of course relevant to you and your area—and I commiserate with you on the damage that was caused there and I hope things are beginning to get underway and get back to normal again—a primary focus of the program will be to assist eligible unemployed Australians to relocate to Queensland to take up employment opportunities in flood affected areas. That is fantastic. I also note the Attorney-General’s Department will provide $120.8 million to assist people in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia who have been adversely affected by the floods which began in late November 2010 and which have unfortunately been rolling out right through to the present. Tasmania has been included in that and, subsequently, areas affected by Cyclone Yasi.

There are other appropriations, and this one is very dear to my heart, as I am sure it is to many members. The Australian Sports Commission will be provided with $21.6 million to continue the Active After-School Communities program until December 2011. Madam Deputy Speaker, I think you actually spoke in parliament on this program. This is a fantastic program in my local area. Just to remind members, in Tassie they run 90 sites and, in my electorate, 20 sites. They are in places such as Sheffield, Latrobe, Devonport, Spreyton, Ulverstone, Riana, Burnie, Somerset, Wynyard, Smithton, Stanley and Strahan, to name just some of those important sites. Each child participating receives up to 80 free sports sessions, 80 free healthy afternoon snacks—I tried one of those; they were very good—and free access to a qualified coach and sports equipment in a supervised environment. That all adds up to a lot of fun and some healthy living and eating. Over 2,500 children participate state-wide in Tassie in 40 different sports. There is an amazing array of sports.

In term 3 of last year local coach Leanne Bissett was presented with a Tasmanian 5 Star Community Coach Award in recognition for outstanding coaching provided to children in the AASC program on the north-west coast of Tassie. Leanne works as a part-time development officer in north-west Tassie for Hockey Tasmania, so having her involved in the program gives the opportunity to create excellent pathways for children to move from the AASC program at schools into hockey clubs and associations. It is a fantastic program. I thank the Minister for Sport for extending the funding and I, along with no doubt lots of my colleagues, will be advocating that that funding be extended well beyond 2011. I thank all of those who have participated in the program.

Another area of appropriation that is very important—I moved a motion on this in this House, with the support as well of colleagues on the other side—concerns the provision to AusAID of $129.2 million for, amongst other things, contributions to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and to maintain Australia’s share in the International Development Association. Importantly, $20 million will be contributed to the global fund. This is part of a new $210 million commitment to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, between 2011 and 2013, in support of the fund’s critical role in tackling these three deadly diseases. Every one of them is preventable and it is cheap to prevent them. So, with a lot of international goodwill and Australia playing its part in trying to tackle these preventable diseases, we can certainly help the lives of individuals and communities. But most importantly we are tackling poverty, which is at the essence of national and international security. If we can tackle poverty then we can genuinely and practically improve the lifestyle and life prospects of individuals. I know that that view is shared by all members whom I know in this House. I thank the government for the continuation of its support for the program.

I will finish with appropriations in relation to regional Australia, regional development and local government. There is an amount of $5.9 million to strengthen local engagement and improve whole-of-government coordination of policy for regional Australia. That is a really important initiative of this government. I look forward to the Department of Regional Australia, Regional Development and Local Government continuing to evolve its role, particularly working with Regional Development Australia as they continue to roll out their channelling and facilitation role. I look forward particularly to working with the Tasmanian group of Regional Development Australia.

The government will also provide an additional $100 million as part of the government’s partnership with local government. They are very important partnerships. Importantly, the government will also provide $30 million, which is a re-appropriation from 2009-10, to meet project commitments under the Regional and Local Community Infrastructure program, many of which fortunately found their way into my electorate. They have really helped to improve community capacity and the creation of the facilities. It is so important to our local communities. I thank all those involved in local government. They play a terrific role and I look forward to their constitutional recognition in the future.

Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Science, Technology and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It has been a long time since poor Kevin was knifed, when the government had lost its way but, as we look at Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011, building on appropriation bills Nos 1 and 2 coming from supply for the budget, ‘lost its way’ continues to be a mantra shouted strongly and loudly. The budget and indeed the appropriations continue to have lost their way.

There is no finer example of this than looking at the continual disaster that is Labor’s border protection policies and suite of policies that, in August 2008, wound back some of the most effective protections to ward off the scourge of people smugglers, to the point where over 200 boats and over 9,000 irregular maritime arrivals have come to our shores.

What is most vexing is not that people are paying people smugglers so that they can come here to seek a better freedom but that those who sit behind razor wire right now in some of the most desperate conditions in the world are being locked out of Australia because of the current IMAs. It has been said in the parliament in recent days that if you are in an Afghani refugee camp on the border with one of its neighbours you have a one in 10 chance of your asylum application being picked up through the normal channels. If you jump on a boat and pay a people smuggler, that figure rises to 97 per cent. How the government continues its hollow rhetoric that there are no pull factors is beyond me.

I see in Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 that there is $290 million extra for the running costs in the blow-out this year for offshore asylum seeker management. In Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011 there is $152.8 million in additional capital expenditure for the establishment of the Northam detention centre and the Inverbrackie detention centre previously announced by the government. History is always an interesting witness. On 8 February 2008, Senator Evans said:

The Pacific solution was a cynical, costly and ultimately unsuccessful exercise introduced on the eve of a Federal election by the Howard Government.

Is this senator kidding me? He then said that the entire project cost a staggering $289 million. That $289 million was from the period September 2001 to June 2007 for the Nauru and Manus OPCs whereby the number of boats dropped from an extraordinary number to three a year. There are something like three a week at present. That was $289 million over seven years. Here we are looking at a $290 million in blow-out costs for six months, not seven years. Indeed the total, as a statement of fact, for this financial year alone for the asylum seeker debacle is a $750 million blow-out, and the total blow-out in the budgets since Labor watered down the effective border security measures has been $1.4 billion—fact. At the current rate, by the end of the 2011-12 financial year, the amount of money by which the budget will have blown out because of Labor’s failures in this space will be a staggering $1.9 billion. That is almost getting up to the amount of the failed pink batts policy, Green Loans, solar and other programs, where the waste and mismanagement have been staggering. We are heading towards $1.9 billion; $1.4 billion is where we are at.

Surprisingly, those figures are quite close to the amount that will be raised by the new tax the government is seeking to put on Australians. When we speak about the flood levy, which I and my colleagues will certainly vote against, I am reminded that communities around the country continue with great spirit and great goodwill to do whatever they can. Last Saturday night I was at a community concert in Paradise Point where the council to their credit had put on Popera in the Park. Thousands and thousands of people attended. The goal was to raise $15,000. The major sponsor was the local Bendigo Bank. The chairman, Ann Glenister, did a wonderful job, with the bank coming there and joining the community. The community raised $33,000, with all the money bypassing the state Labor government and going directly to the Mayor of Lockyer Valley. That is the spirit of a generous Australian community. However, the more I hear about the flood levy and the tax, the more I see people disappointed that that spirit has not been fostered but has indeed been dampened.

As we look at these appropriation bills, especially in the area of asylum seeker failures, we need look no further than Defence, with a strategic reform program building on the last Hawke-Keating Labor governments where they had a Defence reform program building on the last disaster under Gough Whitlam, who despised Defence in the extreme. The SRP was saving $20 billion over 10 years. It is now simply about cuts. And the cuts are damaging operational capability. In typical spin style, Labor said that the strategic reform program was not about cutting and it would not impact operational capability, and that it is about streamlining, efficiency and effectiveness.

In the last financial year, Navy handed back $200 million in maintenance funds. Yet now we cannot put an amphibious ship in the water, with Tobruk, Kanimbla and Manoora completely out of action. Could you imagine if Cyclone Yasi had hit Cairns? We would have had tens of thousands of refugees. Where is the offshore medical facility, where is the offshore helicopter-carrying facility, where is the capacity for stores and food and water offshore? They are not there.

The minister should be sacked for negligence in not allowing a full naval amphibious capability to be available when we knew we were entering the cyclone season and we knew that weather patterns were changing from El Nino. When the full horror of the lack of amphibious capability was produced to the Australian people, the minister had the hide, the audacity and the temerity to blame the department—‘The department did not keep me informed. The department has pulled the wool over my eyes.’ I thought that under the Westminster system the minister is accountable, but not this minister. The department is at fault. He even went so far as to release some of the advice he had received to show how much the department was at fault. This minister is not responsible; he is just the minister.

Now we have no amphibious capability, no ability to respond to disasters overseas, no capacity in countries in our immediate area where Australian citizens may need assistance, no offshore helicopter capability, no stores, no ability to carry a battalion group, nothing. The two previous Labor ministers over the last 3½ years failed to ensure that the SRP was not a series of cuts. They failed to ensure that it was simply about efficiency. They have failed and capability is being impacted. As I look at the budget I am deeply concerned as to where this is going in terms of the waste and the management and where it will end. In terms of my brief comments, I will simply leave it there and call on the government to address these failures, especially the failure in border protection. The amount of money needed to deal with their continual failures keeps racking up.

Kelvin Thomson (Wills, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We have certainly had a wild couple of months in Australia and right around the world, from the climate disasters—the floods, the cyclones and the bushfires—to the natural disasters, such as earthquakes, and the riots and protests in Africa and the Middle East. I want to extend the sympathy of the electorate of Wills to all of the victims of these events and to their families: to the victims of the floods in Queensland, Victoria and Brazil; to the victims of Cyclone Yasi; to the victims of the Western Australian bushfires; to the victims of the terrible Christchurch earthquake; and to the killed and injured in the political protests in Egypt, Libya, Iran, Tunisia, Bahrain and elsewhere in Africa and the Middle East. Our hearts go out to so many innocent people—men, women and children whose lives have been cruelly cut short or changed and blighted forever by events over which they had no or little control.

As well as responding with compassion and generosity to those who have suffered and who are still suffering, as we must, we also need to think hard about the causes of these events. Surely we do not want them to become commonplace, part of the everyday experience of our children and our grandchildren. This would be a terrible legacy for which our children and grandchildren would rightly hold us in contempt. There are some disasters—and the earthquake in Christchurch is a classic example—which we simply cannot prevent. I accept that. But much of our pain and suffering is avoidable. First, if we think about the riots, protests and revolts in the Middle East and Africa, of course they are motivated by a hunger for democracy and it is our obligation to help ordinary people achieve that, not to support undemocratic regimes simply because they support us. They are also motivated by hunger pure and simple, by the failure of governments in these countries to provide the basics of adequate, affordable food and clean drinking water. This failure breeds desperation and this desperation leads to revolt.

Why is there not enough food or clean water? With food, on the demand side we see population growth, rising affluence and the use of grain to fuel cars. On the supply side we see soil erosion, aquifer depletion, the loss of crop land to non-farm uses, the diversion of irrigation water to cities, the plateauing of crop yields in agriculturally advanced countries and, due to climate change, crop-withering heatwaves and melting mountain glaciers and ice sheets.

The impact of population growth on food resources is clear and dramatic. The world’s population has nearly doubled since 1970. We are adding 80 million people each year. Tonight there will be another 200,000 mouths to feed at the world’s dinner table, and many of those mouths will have empty plates. This growth is taxing the limits of the earth’s land and water resources. Lester Brown’s article ‘The great food crisis of 2011’ points out that, as well as this global population growth, there are now some three billion people moving up the food chain, eating greater quantities of grain-intensive livestock and poultry products. This rise in meat, milk and egg consumption has no precedent. Total meat consumption in China today is already nearly double that of the United States.

The third major source of demand growth is the use of crops to produce fuel for cars. In 2009 the United States sent 119 million tonnes of grain to ethanol distilleries to produce fuel for cars. That is enough to feed 350 million people for a year. European diesel cars are causing a growing demand for plant based diesel oil such as palm oil. This is not only reducing land available to produce food crops in Europe; it is also driving the clearing of rainforests in Indonesia and Malaysia for palm oil plantations.

Then there is the problem of water. The Arab Middle East is the first geographic region where spreading water shortages are shrinking the grain harvest. The irrigated area is shrinking in the Middle East—in Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iraq and possibly Yemen. In Saudi Arabia, which was totally dependent on a now depleted fossil aquifer for its wheat self-sufficiency, Lester Brown says production is now in ‘freefall’. Between 2007 and 2010, Saudi wheat production fell by more than two-thirds. By 2012, wheat production will likely end entirely, leaving the country totally dependent on imported grain.

But the food and water problems are not confined to the Middle East. The large-scale use of mechanical pumps to exploit underground water is depleting aquifers, fast shrinking the amount of irrigated area in many parts of the world. Today, half of the world’s people live in countries where watertables are falling as a result of overpumping depleted aquifers. In France, Germany and the United Kingdom, which together account for one-eighth of the world’s wheat harvest, wheat yields are no longer rising at all. Another trend slowing the growth in the world grain harvest is the conversion of crop land to non-farm uses. Suburban sprawl, industrial construction and the paving of land for roads, highways and parking lots are all claiming crop land in California, in the Nile River basin in Egypt, in China, in India and, of course, here in Australia. Diverting water to cities means less irrigation water available for food production. Lester Brown says:

California has lost perhaps a million acres of irrigated land in recent years as farmers have sold huge amounts of water to the thirsty millions in Los Angeles and San Diego.

Another emerging threat to food security is the melting of mountain glaciers. This is a particular issue in the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau, where ice melt from glaciers helps sustain the major rivers of Asia such as the Indus, Ganges, Mekong, Yangtze and Yellow rivers during the dry season and, of course, sustains the food produced in these mighty river valleys.

There are a number of things the world needs to do to alter this stark, grim picture, but chief among them—principal among them—is to halt our rapid population growth. In this task every country has a responsibility to halt its own population growth and to get its own house in order. If we do not—if we fail in this task—we will see a future of food and water shortages, rising prices, declining availability and affordability and the grim consequences of this: violent disputes over access to scarce resources. We will see more war, more terrorism, more refugees and more boat people. To pull our weight—to stabilise Australia’s population—is, frankly, not that hard. All it requires is for us to return our net overseas migration to around 70,000, the kind of level we regularly had during the 1970s and 1980s.

It is claimed, particularly by big business and property developers, that we should not do this and that we should maintain our current net overseas migration rate, which is over 200,000. But I urge anyone who believes that there is substance in the argument that it is a good idea to keep on going down the high-migration road to look at a report prepared by the National Institute of Labour Studies for the Department of Immigration and Citizenship. This 335-page report, Long-term physical implications of net overseas migration: Australia in 2050, was put on the department’s website before Christmas. It did not receive much publicity or public attention, which is regrettable. The institute found that the magnitude of the impacts, at all net overall migration levels, suggests that—unless substantial and timely actions are taken to address these impacts—some impacts have the potential to disrupt Australia’s economy and society. It found that if we were to maintain the level of net overseas migration we have had for the last couple of years, Sydney and Melbourne would require more than 430,000 hectares of new land for housing. Farms and public land would be consumed, as bulging cities expanded. Sydney would lose about half its land used for fresh fruit and vegetable production, as Sydney and Melbourne rose to seven million people. The loss of productive land would slash agricultural output under the higher immigration scenarios, forcing the import of key staples, including fruit, nuts, oil and pig meat. Even for the dairy, lamb and vegetable categories, net imports would be required by 2050 for the 260,000 net overseas migration level.

The advocates of population growth ignore this dreadful, terrible legacy that we are leaving for future generations: a world with not enough food or clean water; a world in which more people, not fewer, will starve. They claim continuing population growth is necessary for ongoing economic prosperity. But is it? There was another report released in December 2010, this one in America, carried out by Fodor & Associates, titled Relationship Between Growth and Prosperity in 100 Largest US Metropolitan Areas. As the title suggests, this study examines the relationship between population growth and economic prosperity in the 100 largest US metropolitan areas, looking at economic wellbeing using well-known indicators such as per capita income, unemployment rates and poverty rates.

The study found that faster population growth rates are associated with lower incomes, greater income declines and higher poverty rates. Unemployment rates tend to be higher in the areas with faster population growth. The 25 slowest-growing metropolitan areas outperformed the 25 fastest-growing in every category. In 2009, they averaged US$8,455 more in per capita personal income. The findings show that the common refrain from local officials and others that, ‘We have to grow to provide jobs,’ or even, ‘We have to grow or die,’ are just mindless slogans—there is no scientific or economic evidence to substantiate them.

This is not only true within America; it is also true around the world. Charles Berger from the Australian Conservation Foundation reports that between 1997 and 2007 no fewer than 11 OECD nations achieved faster per capita economic growth than Australia, despite slower population growth—or even, in some cases, no population growth or even a slight decline. Norway has a thriving economy, notwithstanding much lower population growth than Australia. Slovakia has a stable and ageing population and a booming economy. The Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary and Finland all have stable or low-growth populations and yet they have vibrant economies.

We need to understand that our population growth rate is not giving us economies of scale; it is giving us diseconomies of scale, such as traffic congestion. The cost of electricity, gas and water infrastructure is rising, fuelled by these diseconomies of scale, leading to rising prices and real hardship for pensioners and ordinary families. The rapid migration rate also makes it harder for our unemployed and people on disability support pensions to find a job. Leaving these people behind is bad for them and bad for the economy. The Norwegians, the Dutch and the Swiss do not do it, and they prosper as a result.

I want to turn, in the time remaining to me, to the role of carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions in the weather instability we have been experiencing, both in Australia and around the world. This century, we have had the worst droughts ever in the country’s history. The sceptics said that was not climate change. Two years ago we had the worst bushfires ever in the country’s history. The sceptics said that was not climate change. This year we have seen the worst floods in the country’s history, and the biggest cyclone in the country’s history. And the sceptics are still out there, clutching at straws, saying: ‘Prove it. Prove it. Prove it.’

Climate scientists have been telling us for years that increasing carbon emissions would increase the earth’s temperature and give us bigger and more frequent droughts, bushfires, floods and cyclones. This is exactly what is happening. We need to cut our carbon emissions. Our children will not thank us if we leave them a world of CycloneYasis, Lockyer Valley floods and Black Saturdays.

Every year shows that the climate is less stable than the year before. We saw droughts from 2002 to 2009 devastating the Murray-Darling Basin and Australian agriculture. The Black Saturday Victorian bushfires of 2009 cost 173 lives and $4.4 billion dollars. The 2011 Queensland and Victorian floods cost 36 lives and the federal government is now finding $5.6 billion for reconstruction. We ignore the lessons of this weather instability, this weather of mass destruction, at our peril. The cost of the droughts, bushfires, floods and cyclones is massive. It is clear that the costs of inaction on weather instability will exceed the costs of action and we need to stop the rise in carbon emissions in Australia and globally and reduce Australia’s emissions and global emissions as fast as we possibly can.

Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are here today to discuss a variety of appropriations put forward by the government in Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011. I would like to take this opportunity to speak on an area where the government continues to lose its way, and that is the issue of aged care. Whilst there is, I note, $24 million for the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, there is still a lot more that needs to be done. Aged care in Australia is a topic that is close to my heart. When I first arrived here I spoke about the importance of social connectedness and active ageing in my maiden speech. I said:

Just to put the potential impact—

of an ageing population—

into perspective, it is worth noting the statistics: by 2050, one in two voters will be aged over 50 and, by 2055, 78,000 Australians will be aged over 100. We need to acknowledge not only the cost but also the potential benefits of age. Australians aged 55 and over contribute an estimated $74.5 billion per annum through voluntary, unpaid and caring work. We must not dismiss their enormous contribution and potential. That is our challenge.

The ageing of our population is the biggest social issue facing Australia, and potentially one of our biggest fiscal issues. Our population is ageing rapidly, living longer and experiencing more complex health conditions. This is resulting in increasing and changing aged-care needs. Society itself is changing. We are experiencing a shift in the size and composition of households. As Bernard Salt points out, the time we spend in each phase of our lives has shifted inexorably. Whereas life used to consist of birth, childhood, adulthood, retirement and then death, technology and modern society now see us experiencing birth, childhood, teenage years, young adulthood, middle age, retirement and beyond. More and more, life after retiring from work is long, vibrant and full. It is no longer a matter of simply having a few years to put your affairs in order.

Whilst this, of course, can be a huge benefit to our society, it unquestionably affects the aged-care industry. There are more and more people needing these services and this demand will only continue to increase. And, unlike our parents, you can be sure that the soon-to-retire baby boomers will be very demanding and not accepting of basic care. There will also be fewer taxpayers to support this increased burden. The dependency ratio in 2007 was six working people to support every person aged 67 years and over, but by 2047 this will have almost halved to 3.2 people of working age. With fewer people generating taxation revenue, care options of concessional and assisted aged-care residents—those with the least resources—will be jeopardised.

The implications of an ageing population and the need to increase aged-care services are challenging. It is vitally important that we formulate policies that can actually be delivered. There is growing and alarming evidence that the aged-care sector cannot provide the care that Australians expect. Until there is structural reform of the sector, the care and wellbeing of senior Australians is at risk. The industry is already close to crisis, with 40 per cent of aged-care providers operating in the red as at June 2010. Senior Australians are increasingly finding they are unable to access the services and care they need, when and where they want. Two thousand aged-care beds and 786 bed licences have been lost since 2007. It is a concern that, at a time when there is an increasing demand for services, some providers are walking away from the sector due to the lack of viability of providing high-care beds and the increasing compliance demands of government. The outlook is bleak in terms of growing the capacity of aged care in Australia.

Within this industry there are many dedicated and committed individuals doing an inspiring job under difficult circumstances. My local aged-care providers do a tremendous job with limited funding and resources, and I am committed to giving them a voice. I have seen firsthand the frustration of the sector with the approach of this government to aged care and its failure to deliver on promises and take hard decisions. I am concerned about the current government’s lack of attention to the aged. I am concerned about the expectations that the Rudd and Gillard governments have raised and their subsequent failures in not meeting those expectations.

I am also quite disappointed that, both in Mr Rudd’s first round of health reforms and in Prime Minister Gillard’s recent rebadging of the program, aged care and mental health missed out. It is no longer good enough for this Labor government to continually point the finger at the Howard government. The ALP has had a full term of government and has been in power for four years now, and it is simply no longer acceptable to blame their own failings on the previous government. Kevin Rudd went to the 2007 election with his own agenda for aged care. There is no-one else to blame for the expectations and standards he set for his government, just as there is no-one else to blame for failing to achieve these standards, failing to achieve any reform and failing to make any improvements.

The costs the ageing population will cause the economy is a major issue facing Australia. This of course raises further concerns given the absolute waste and irresponsibility with which this government treats public funds. A mainstay of the Howard government’s policy agenda was to start preparing today for the financial demands of tomorrow. A spendthrift government today puts us all at risk tomorrow. This is not an area that can be funded tomorrow by yet another great big new tax or levy. How responsibly we manage and spend today has an enormous impact on our capacity to properly fund aged care in the future.

Currently the budget simply cannot sustain Australia’s demographic changes. The declining workforce will generate insufficient tax revenue to meet the healthcare and aged-care demands of our ageing population, yet the need for reform has never been greater. Any reforms must be fiscally responsible—although I have little faith that this Labor government can achieve that. We need to make improvements without being financially irresponsible. To quote Mike Woods:

… the system is expected to provide care to over 3.6 million older Australians by 2050. It is inevitable that government expenditure will rise. The challenge is to reform the system, while keeping that expenditure within sustainable limits.

This is obviously of huge concern, given the current debt and spending levels of the government.

The federal government has said that it would manage its fiscal exposure by setting the criteria for needs assessments, the resource levels for approved services, the co-contribution schedules and the standard for basic accommodation. Yet again, the coalition has some concerns about the government’s ability in this area given their track record. Reforming the system raises challenging implementation issues. We have seen the government fail with the implementation of their home insulation scheme, with BER and with the Green Loans Program—and I note in this appropriations bill there is a re-appropriation of $25 million, and that is due to unspent amounts from last financial year in this program—and we have seen countless other broken promises. The aged-care industry is vitally important to our nation and as a society. There is a better way to deliver for this industry than what the Rudd and Gillard governments have shown.

We all acknowledge that there is a need for reform for the aged-care industry. We should never walk away from a challenge or bury our heads in the sand when things get tough. This is particularly apparent when it concerns elderly Australians who have contributed so much to our society. We can and must meet this challenge to ensure that we as a society live up to our duty to protect the elderly. That is a self-evident truth but it needs to be said again and again, because we must prepare today for those significantly increasing demands of tomorrow. We cannot afford the Gillard government’s continuing poor and reckless financial management.

Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011, which cover the $22.4 million that will assist Tasmanian forestry contractors and employees to respond to the challenges facing the Tasmanian native forestry industry.

This is an issue I have had strong connections with, because most of the forestry falls in the areas I cover in Tasmania and the people who work in the industry are located in my area, predominantly. There has been enormous turmoil in the forest industry going back many decades. There seems to be no accommodation for both the industry and the Greens’ objections to the industry. We were at an impasse. Business confidence and the industry were suffering. Something had to be done. The industry is a good one but, by undermining the market and preventing change through education, science and technology, the industry has been brought to its knees.

I still believe that we have a sustainable and viable industry for general woods grown in plantations, but for high-value timbers we have a huge dilemma because these just do not grow in plantations. They have a natural range and a natural environmental climax which, if not looked after, becomes what I would call a jungle. They can suffer the ravages of climate, fire and weeds without any means of being managed or locked away. This could be okay for a few years but, with climate changing in cycles, species could very easily disappear overnight and there will be few plans to help save them.

There were eight principles laid down by the group that was tasked to come up with a solution to the conflict and to develop a new and innovative direction for the forest industries that did not compromise certain environmental goals. From that, both state and federal governments decided they wanted an independent group to take the principles and come up with a new direction.

Former ACTU secretary Bill Kelty was handed the job of finding a final peace for the forests of Tasmania because of his past record of successful negotiations. As a facilitator, it is his job to try to turn a landmark statement of principles agreed by conservationists, forest companies and workers into a lasting deal. Federal Sustainability and Environment Minister Tony Burke believed that Mr Kelty was the perfect person to pull off the difficult task aimed at ending three decades of conflict over native forest logging in Tasmania. It is a unique undertaking because of the unprecedented level of agreement and goodwill between industry and green groups in Tasmania, and it did not create a precedent for reform of the forest industry, nationally.

I have been fighting for the industry for many years—about 40, I would think. It has been a gruelling path inching towards change in the industry. I know we need a solution but I believe Tasmanians will not accept state forestry being closed to wood production. We have had forestry since white settlement and native peoples have used the forest for thousands of years. The state government has made some guarantees to the sawmilling industry to continue supply into 2027. We may face job losses from Gunns closing its hardwood sawmills and leaving the harvesting of native forests. The company’s decision was to try to gain a social licence for a pulp mill, but it has hit many of its workers very hard. It has been a tough time for them.

This means the industry, which was based on 300 cubic metres of high-quality sawlogs a year, has now gone. The pulp wood that came from native forests is now available for other uses, like woodchips. The argument was that it was seen that the pulp industry was driving the sawlog industry, but the economics of this was actually the other way round: we needed the pulp industry to keep the sawlog industry economically viable.

Locking up traditional forest did not and does not make any economic sense. Who is going to pay for it? Who is going to manage it? Taking out the forest workers means that we have lost firefighters and machine operators who help with land management, along with emergency service workers. Being able to source wood for the hardwood saw industry is important for the future. Being able to source specialty woods for the craft industry is important also. All of this wood is from native forests.

The road system in the native forests of Tasmania will deteriorate, which will destroy any hope of selective logging for sawmills to be economical. The questions have to be asked: can a sawmilling or craft industry survive; who will pay for the management of the Tasmanian native forests if forestry does not?

I understand that New Zealand sold its forest assets to American pension funds and now foreign capital ships those logs to America for processing. Do we really want Tasmania to follow that option? We need some options and we need to assist the people whose businesses have been ravaged by this forest debate. We need a pulp mill for Bell Bay, with some very high-conservation-value forestry areas like the Styx Valley going into reserves for the government to manage.

When the industry and the green movement got together in Tasmania to try and solve some of their difficulties, it was a chance to try and move the industry and the argument into this century, to try and negotiate change without closing the industry. The federal government has come up with a $22.4 million package which is to provide exit assistance and ongoing business support for Tasmanian forest contractors who wish to retire or turn their businesses into another line. This was an election promise that the Gillard government has delivered on, a promise to provide much-needed help for contractors and their employees because of the heat these people had to endure as a result of Green action.

The program aims to reduce business ‘overcapacity’ in the native forest harvest and haulage contracting sector by reducing the number of businesses that operate in that sector. The program provides up to $17 million for exit assistance to harvest and/or haulage contracting businesses. The government also agreed to provide $5.4 million in financial support for those who will remain in the industry so that we do not lose the skills or the machinery as new avenues in the industry are opened up as a result of the Kelty inquiry.

Contractors wishing to leave the industry could apply for funding immediately. Applications for exit assistance closed on 13 December. Details of business assistance funding are still in the process of being rolled out. Applications for the government’s Tasmanian Forest Contractors Exit Assistance Program have now closed. Eighty-three applications were received, demonstrating a strong interest in the program. All of this information is available on the department’s website.

In the past, contracts have also been a problem. They allowed contractors to undercut each other, and this encouraged some unsafe practices to occur. The Gillard government welcomes the Tasmanian government’s commitment to put in place a system of fair contracts in the forest industry. This will be vital for securing the viability of the industry.

The assessment committee met in late December 2010 to assess these applications against the selection criteria in the program’s guidelines. The guidelines stated:

Exit grant recipients will need to demonstrate that they have left the forest contracting industry by disposing of equipment and agreeing not to return to the contracting sector for a period of five years.

The guidelines also stated:

To be eligible to apply for exit assistance a business must:

(a)

have an Australian Business Number (ABN); and

(b)

conduct its activities predominantly in the Tasmanian native forest harvest and/or Tasmanian native forest haulage contracting sector; and

(c)

have been operating as a harvest and/or haulage business for the period 1 January 2009 to 30 June 2010 and had a contract (operative or inoperative), quota or delivery arrangement; and

(d)

be able to show business related debt.

As the media release said:

Eligible contracting activities are the harvest of wood from Tasmanian native forests and the haulage of wood from Tasmanian native forests. Applications will not be accepted for contracting activities other than for harvesting and/or haulage of wood from native forests in Tasmania.

According to the grant assessment plan:

On receipt, applications will be handled in accordance with the DAFF grants management manual. The secretariat will assess all applications against the eligibility criteria stipulated in the program guidelines. Applications that meet the eligibility criteria will progress for further assessment.

Where there is insufficient information to support the claims being made in the application, the secretariat will request further information from the applicant. This information must be provided by the applicant within five working days of the request. If this proof is received within the five day period, the department will forward the application to the Advisory Panel. If the proof is not received within the five-day period, the department may not forward the application and the application may lapse.

So there is a rigorous process for each step of the application. Furthermore, the plan stated:

The department may seek clarification from an applicant at any stage of the assessment process.

Applications not meeting the eligibility criteria will be recorded as ineligible.

Copies of all eligible applications will be provided to the Advisory Panel.

Rather than provide payments to each and every contractor in Tasmania, it has always been the government’s intention to conduct a competitive grants process. Suitability of the applicants will be determined by ranking them according to merit criteria, as was mentioned earlier. Under ‘Roles and responsibilities’, the assessment plan states:

The Tasmanian Forest Contractors Exit Assistance Program secretariat will receive, store, open, register, handle and file applications in an accountable manner.

The Advisory Panel will assess applications against the program’s objectives, eligibility criteria and merit criteria.

The Advisory Panel may draw upon material and information other than an applicant’s written submission in the assessment process. For example, advice from a financial expert may be considered by the Advisory Panel.

The plan continues:

The Advisory Panel will be prepare an Assessment Report, including recommendations on which applicants should receive funding and the level of funding to be offered, to be presented to the Tasmanian Forest Contractors Exit Assistance Program in the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry for submission to the decision-maker for decision.

I believe the Greens have made an allegation of fraud. I hope they have their facts straight and that they have reported that to the relevant people. If they have raised an issue that does not directly relate to someone taking fraudulent advantage of the government’s proposal to assist people from the industry then I would say, ‘Shame on you,’ and ask them to desist. These forest contractors have taken a lot over the last few years, and they deserve some assistance to help them move out of the industry and find other forms of employment. I believe the guidelines in place are stringent and the decision-making was done, independent of politics, after assessing the needs of applicants. There is also some assistance for those who were unsuccessful but who could be eligible for financial support under the revised guidelines for the measure by the Tasmanian government. If anyone has reason to believe that the department has been provided with false or misleading information in relation to an application for a grant from this or any other program, it should be referred to the fraud investigations and security team that operates independently of the advisory panel.

Grant recipients have legally enforceable obligations to exit the Tasmanian forest contractors sector. The government takes allegations of fraud seriously, and if any person has information that indicates that a grant recipient has provided the Commonwealth with false or misleading information they should contact the department’s fraud investigation unit. Allegations will be investigated, should credible evidence be presented to the department that warrants further investigation, and information will be referred to the appropriate authorities. However, if these allegations are deemed to be false or frivolous then I would be very concerned that there is some vindictiveness going on between the forest workers and the greens again. This was supposed to be helping those two groups come together, and work together for a mutually useful future in the industry. By the same token, if there have been some people taking dishonest advantage, and it is proven, this government will ensure that they will be taken to task, and there will be a transparent process in dealing with that.

All this is part of a task to redevelop an important rural industry. We need the assistance of government to make this monumental change, and we need the goodwill of all to make it work. The funding is part of the big picture, and I for one am thankful that something can be returned to those people who have contributed to the forest and timber industry for so long and who have put up with so much. I support the appropriation bills.

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

The Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011are more proof of everything that is wrong with the Labor government’s ability to manage the economy. They include wasteful spending and poor management leading to structural deficits which will result in families being unfairly hit by higher costs of living. This Labor government stress that they are helping workers and assisting families and—wait for it—regional Australians. Nothing could be further from the truth. They do nothing of the sort.

Since coming to power in 2007 Labor has been a government of waste, a government of spending—so much so that it has forfeited the $20 billion surplus it inherited from the fiscally responsible Howard-Vaile coalition as well as two funds that were established for the nation’s future. We have another coalition on the Treasury benches now. We have Labor in government, but the Greens are in power. Make no mistake about it: come 1 July, just 126 days away, when the Greens take control of the Senate, every piece of legislation will have a Greens tinge to it. This is why Labor, and particularly the Prime Minister, is pushing so hard for a carbon tax, a carbon tax in relation to which the same Prime Minister said pre-election—the day before, in fact—‘I rule out a carbon tax.’ Now, according to the Prime Minister, Australia cannot do without a carbon tax. It is good for business, she says. It is only going to hurt businesses, because every one of their inputs will have its price pushed up by having this carbon tax in place. It is going to push up petrol prices. In fact, the carbon tax—

Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What about climate change? We don’t have to worry about it?

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

I can hear the member opposite deride me for saying this, but a carbon tax should really be renamed an ‘electricity tax’, because that is what it is. It is just going to push the price of electricity up. I was most interested at the luncheon yesterday for the Mongolian Prime Minister, Sukhbaatar Batbold, who mentioned in his speech that he had visited the Hunter Valley coalmines, the same coalmines that this Labor government with the Greens tinge so desperately want to stop operating. They do not want coalmines; it is not in their interests. All they want to do is have a carbon tax foisted upon the families, the businesses and the people of Australia.

This government always say and maintain that they are there for a fair go for the battlers, but they are proving anything of the sort. How can they say that they are there to give everyone a fair go when all they are doing is increasing debt? They are borrowing $100 million every day, and we are going to be left saddled with that debt—our grandchildren are going to be left saddled with that debt, particularly with the rollout of the NBN. A National Broadband Network, I might add, is not going to be available for towns with fewer than 1,000 premises—and there are many of those in my electorate of Riverina; there are many of those right across regional Australia.

Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They’ll get wireless!

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

He says, ‘Get wireless.’ Indeed, America is rolling out a wonderful wireless network. Ninety-eight per cent of Americans are going to have access to that high-speed internet wireless network. If it is good enough for 98 per cent of Americans to have it—I think at a cost of $17 billion—then surely it would be good enough for Australia, which is roughly the same size as mainland USA. As I said, 98 per cent of Americans are going to have access to it, but here in Australia not quite that many—in fact, far fewer—are going to have access to Australia’s expensive NBN. All it is going to do is saddle our grandchildren with a huge cost that they will be struggling to meet. Hopefully, future coalition governments—and, hopefully, that will not be too far away—because we are fiscally responsible, will be able to service that debt, because we will have to.

Another classic example of Labor’s waste is the Building the Education Revolution, which has brought about so much heartache and so much debt for the Treasury.

Michelle Rowland (Greenway, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Rowland interjecting

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

It is a great idea in principle, and your electorate may well have benefited from it. There certainly have been places in my electorate—and Ungarie is a great example—that got basically a tin shack and it cost thousands upon thousands of dollars. The acronym BER means Building the Education Revolution, but in some parts of my electorate it stood for ‘builder’s early retirement’ fund because that is what it was. There was so much waste and mismanagement. A classic case was at Hillston, where they already had the steel girders up and it cost $1 million to put the bricks up. Quite frankly, it was a complete waste of money. As I said, it is a good idea in principle. There have been so many fanciful projects that are thought up in some prime ministerial thought bubble or some Labor caucus focus group. They have good ideas but they are not actually able to roll them out in an economic, sensible and practical way, which is what most everyday Australians have to do.

I have to reiterate that not many of those on the Labor side have run businesses—a few, but not many, and certainly not as many as on our side of the chamber. If you run a business you cannot spend more money than you bring in. If you do, you are going to have to pay it back. The trouble with Labor is that someone will have to pay it back but it is going to be the Australian public who have to pay it back. It is going to be a fiscally responsible Liberal-National government which will end up paying it back. With power bills set to rise, petrol going up and everyday costs of living, the pressures are just enormous.

Yesterday we heard that this Labor government cannot even find $5 million—it cannot even write a cheque for $5 million—to provide the Australian War Memorial with the additional funding it requires to keep its doors open. I think that this might be some way of forcing people to pay admission. I think that is the modus operandi here. That is the ulterior motive. But to not be able to find $5 million in a budget of $350 billion to me is quite extraordinary. The War Memorial stands as a shrine to our fallen, our heroes, our bravest of the brave. If the War Memorial needs $5 million the War Memorial should receive $5 million. Just write the cheque, put it in the post or, better still, go down and present it to General Cosgrove, the Chairman of the Council of the Australian War Memorial. There should be no question about this. The Prime Minister says this is the year of decision and delivery. She has got the Ds right, but it should really be ‘debt and delay’. Just think about that. Everything with this government is about debt. Everything is about delay—putting it off to a review committee or putting it off to a focus group. It is unbelievable. If the War Memorial requires $5 million in additional funding, I say, ‘Write the cheque.’ This is a no-brainer. It should not even be questioned.

We also see that we have another rollout of tenders for buybacks in the Murray-Darling Basin. That was announced by the water minister after the interim findings from the inquiry by the Standing Committee on Regional Australia into the impact—how this is going to hurt the social and economic welfare of the people who live in the basin.

The chair, the Independent member for New England, Tony Windsor, announced three interim findings. The very first one was about putting more strategic buybacks in place and reducing that Swiss cheese effect. The second one was about putting in place measures to help the taxation needs of the irrigation corporations, because if they were to put some of the infrastructure in place they would be slugged with a huge tax bill, which of course nobody wants. The third finding was to focus on not wasting water in overbank flooding of wetlands and icon sites which require environmental watering.

I go back to the first finding, relating to the Swiss cheese effect of the small strategic buybacks. The finding came about because we were discovering that too many farmers were being forced to sell their water because of debt pressures, and here we had stranded assets—you would see a patch of green and then three patches of brown. A lot of the irrigation companies were worried that they would not be able to service their customers because they had a bare paddock here and a ride paddy there. Mr Deputy Speaker, I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.