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

I rise tonight to talk on these appropriation bills and, more specifically, talk about Labor's budget that was delivered—and what a budget we saw. Let us start with the Treasurer's speech on that Tuesday night. He started by introducing his budget as a budget for growth and a budget for jobs, yet ultimately in the end what did the detail of the budget show? It showed quite clearly that this budget for growth and this budget for jobs actually did the opposite. It showed that growth was going to diminish. It showed that unemployment was going to increase. So our growth and jobs budget turned out to be completely the opposite.

As we continued to go into the budget we started to see that the Treasurer had been laid bare, that his rhetoric over 5½ years had come to nothing. This idea of being an economic conservative, this idea of being able to deliver proper financial reform for this country, was laid bare as being absolutely hollow. This idea that the budget would be returned to surplus over a period of time was seen to be absolutely flawed, absolutely fundamentally wrong. Being kind, I would say that the Australian people have been misled and misled and misled by the Treasurer ever since the Labor government came to office. What we saw with that budget was that all the chickens had come home to roost. All of a sudden we had a Treasurer having to be honest. The facts had caught up with him. There was no surplus to be seen. As a matter of fact, what we have seen both from the Parliamentary Budget Office and then from the Treasury is this. Since 2007 Australia's finance have deteriorated to the extent that we now have a fiscal imbalance, a structural deficit to the tune of around $16 billion.

So in 2016-17 our budget, if it continues on this trajectory, will hit a deficit of $16 billion to $17 billion if all other things stay consistent. As we know with this government, sadly, that is not the case. What this government has shown beyond any other thing is that it is addicted to spending. It cannot help but spend, spend, spend. That is its answer to everything. At some stage the spending has to stop. I think the truth of the matter is that the Australian people will get the chance to make the decision come election time. If Labor is re-elected history tells us that the spending will not stop.

What did the budget also show us? It showed us that gross debt, which is at $250 billion, will hit $300 billion. Yet the Treasurer will not have the honesty to go to the Australian people and say, 'Through my forward policies, through my spending addiction, I will lift the gross debt ceiling.' They are going to leave it to a future government. Once again, we are seeing budget dishonesty. Why not admit to the fact it is a mess? Why not say: we realise we have got a mess, now we are going to have the honesty to say okay, although it is too late, we are going to admit that we got it so wrong.

What happens to the budget in this financial year? Sadly, we are going to see a budget deficit in the vicinity of roughly $19 billion. And if history over the last few years shows us anything it shows us that that will be a conservative estimate. It is likely that $19 billion potentially could hit $30 billion if not $40 billion. It also adds to the fact that we have had the five largest budget deficits in a row in Australia's history. What a record this Treasurer will take when he leaves this parliament. He has never delivered a surplus although he promised to deliver one well over 100 times. He will leave gross debt over $300 billion. He will have delivered the five largest budget deficits in Australia's history—what a record.

It is going to be interesting to see how this record is tried to be buried, how this record is tried to be changed. It is practically indefensible. The sad thing is where is this going to leave the nation? We are currently seeing a lot of problems within the Australian economy. We are seeing them in our manufacturing sector, we are seeing them in our agricultural sector, we are seeing them in retail and there are no solution to these problems in the economic plan which was set out by the Treasurer in the budget.

It is very interesting to contrast that with what the Leader of the Opposition had to say on the Thursday night because he did set out an economic plan, a clear economic plan of what a coalition government if elected would do for the Australian economy. Business confidence, consumer confidence would be restored. We would get rid of the carbon tax but keep the tax cuts. I will repeat that because it was a very important message from that Thursday night. Get rid of the carbon tax but keep the tax cuts. I think you are going to hear that said long and loud between now and election day because it is a key component that really goes to the heart of our ability to manage the economy. Cut the taxes, cut the carbon tax and deliver tax cuts. You will hear it between now and election day. Prepare as you can to try and combat it because it is a powerful message.

To back it up, we have our record in government of reducing debt, cutting taxes and making sure the budget surpluses are delivered. Boy oh boy, do we need to make sure that we get the finances of the nation back in order, because the spending addiction we have seen has been like no other spending addiction any government has overseen. This one has the five largest budget deficits in Australia's history—the $300 billion debt ceiling having to be lifted again, but the political courage is not there for this government to do it themselves. They are going to leave it as a legacy to the next parliament. The Treasurer will have delivered more than $25 billion in higher taxes over the next four years. Chaos, debt and spin.

Fortunately, there is an alternative plan. It will see the Australian economy set a trajectory of growth, will see unemployment decline and will see our key industries—agriculture, manufacturing, retail and services—have the confidence to grow. This is because we will reduce taxes and make sure that those taxes that are hurting our economy, most particularly the carbon tax, will go. It was an outstanding speech by the Leader of the Opposition because it was honest and frank with the Australian people. It was a speech that called the Labor government to account. It revealed all the warts that were presented by Wayne Swan on the previous Tuesday night and started the process of saying, 'There is a better way that we can manage this economy.' It was backed by the shadow Treasurer at the National Press Club the following week, laying out detailed plans of how we will find the savings within the budget to make sure that we live within our means.

Done properly, it will not be that difficult. It will be about having a serious economic discussion with the Australian people, laying out the plans, showing where the Commonwealth spends its funds and saying, 'Okay, if we're to tighten our belts, this is how we will have to do it.' We cannot say to the Australian people: 'We want you to tighten your belts during these times' and not have the government do the same itself. That is the clear message we will be delivering. If we are to get rid of this structural deficit—which will hit $16 billion if nothing is done about it—we have to take action. That action was laid out there for everyone to see.

We will not make shock decisions. We will not make radical changes of policy. We will have a consistent approach to running the nation's finances. That is all the Australian people are asking for, at this stage. They just want a government that will deliver them some certainty, a government that has a philosophy about the way it will run the nation, a government that will not focus on the opposition and the opposition leader, and a government that will focus on running the economy and running the country—and doing so in the interests of all Australians. That is what you will get from us, if we are elected at the next election. We will forget the spin. We will start to address the debt. We will start to address the deficit. We will give business confidence, we will give consumers confidence and we will get the economy tracking where it should be.

We need to do it if we are to have an economy which can live and operate in a globalised world. We have to make sure that production costs come down and that businesses can compete globally, because whether you operate in the domestic environment or whether you export and operate in the global environment, you do so in a globalised world. You have to be able to compete. One of the fundamental things that the Treasurer and the current Prime Minister have never, ever understood is that we are not isolated; we do not live in an incubator. We actually have to operate now in a globalised world, and this presents real challenges. It means that we have to keep our costs down if we are to compete with what is occurring in the US, where we are seeing a new energy source providing a cheap form of input to their industries. If we are to compete with that, we have to make sure that our input costs are kept down. That is why the carbon tax, when it comes to electricity prices, has hurt so much. I give one example: Murray Goulburn, the dairy processor. Their carbon tax bill is $14 million annually. That makes it a lot harder for them to compete internationally. You can run through industry after industry after industry and the same thing is happening.

We have to keep our costs down so that we can compete. It is no longer okay to say that we are going to put up some sort of protective blanket around our economy and that we will be able to survive. In a globalised world that will get us nowhere. We have to be able to compete. We have to make sure that our industries are able to compete. That is the key to our retail sector, to our services sector, to our manufacturing sector and, most importantly, to our agricultural sector. The opportunities are there with the growing middle classes in Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East. There are opportunities there for the Australian economy, for Australian businesses, but we have to be able to compete to make the most of those opportunities. Sadly—and I wish I could say otherwise—the budget that was delivered does not do that. But there was a budget reply on the Thursday night which showed a clear direction on how it can be done, and I commend that budget reply to the House. (Time expired)

Craig Thomson (Dobell, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It always amazes me when someone gets up and says, 'Let's cut the spin,' and then spends 15 minutes spinning around like a top. It is almost unbelievable that you could give a speech about the economy and history of the Rudd and Gillard governments and not actually mention that a global financial crisis happened somewhere in there. We just heard a contribution that went for 15 minutes and did not mention that there had been a global financial crisis. Come on! You want to talk about spin, you want to talk about economic credibility, let us get a little bit real. The previous member tried to talk about global comparisons. Give us one where Australia does not look far superior to every other country in the world in terms of economic growth, unemployment, inflation, productivity, debt and deficit. What measure are you on? You want to have an argument on spin and you want to have an argument on economics—well, argue the economics. Do not argue the spin. Really, what a pathetic contribution we have just heard.

In my contribution on these appropriation bills, I am going to be critical of the government in relation to some of their management over the past six years, but they are going to be real criticisms; they are not going to made-up ones. I am not going to be in fairy land. I am not going to pretend things did not happen. I am not going to not talk about what happened around the world in terms of the global financial crisis. If you want to have some credibility in economics, you have to talk about what occurred and what the situation was in Australia. I think this most recent budget was perhaps the Treasurer's most honest budget and, taken in isolation, a very good budget. The problem for the government in terms of where they are with their messaging is not that they have not responded to the global financial crisis but that they have tried to do too much.

If we could just imagine for a second—and I know this might cause shivers for the Deputy Speaker—that it had been John Howard who was the Prime Minister for the last term, what we probably would have seen would have been no spending on any social and important issues such as education, the NDIS, health and those sorts of things. That is an approach that he could have taken and it might well have seen us get closer to a budget surplus. Alternatively, you could set out a program of social reform, a program of trying to address issues that are important to Australians. Either of those approaches is possible and you could debate their merits.

My criticism of the government was that they tried to do both, and clearly that has not worked. That is where I do agree with the previous speaker about the issues in relation to going on about a surplus for year after year when clearly the program that this government was on was about improving people's lives through a range of social measures. They should have said for the last number of years: 'Look, these are the things that we want to do and it is going to take us longer to get back to a surplus. But, compared to the rest of the world, look how well we're going.' I think if they had taken that approach they would have taken the Australian community with them. That is my major criticism of the government in terms of the way in which they have dealt with these issues. Yes, there has been spin from the government, but not nearly as much spin as we saw from the previous speaker in his contribution, because you have to look at what the issues are. There were two alternative approaches, but you could not do them both—and this government tried.

I want to talk about some of the local initiatives that were in this budget and in previous budgets, since the previous speaker has set the scene of putting this budget, quite rightly, in the context of previous budgets. Most importantly for the people of the Central Coast, where I live, and the seat that I represent was the commitment to fixing the missing road link between the F3 and the M2, where 21 sets of traffic lights create a logjam as more than 45,000 commuters from the Central Coast travel down to Sydney and back every day. This is called the missing link because it is something that governments should have done years and years ago. This budget has finally got there, and the government should be commended for that, as should the state government for agreeing to pay its share for this vital piece of road infrastructure. But the budget went further in terms of roads for my electorate: to widening the F3 pretty much from Tuggerah right up to Doyalson. We have three lanes for most of it, but the significant part of the F3 that goes through my electorate is two lanes each way, again causing the very difficult commute that 45,000 people from the Central Coast do every day to be that much more difficult. So these are really important, real commitments that happened in this budget, because spending time at home with your family is what it is about for most people, not sitting in traffic jams on freeways because the infrastructure money has not been spent. Those are concerns for everyone.

Can I say with some pride that that is the second missing link that I have been responsible for in terms of fixing things in my electorate. The first, and I think the most significant, was a missing pipeline link in our water system. The Central Coast almost ran out of water just a few years ago—we had less than 10 per cent water. We were able to secure over $80 million to build a pipeline to help harvest the water from the catchment area and take it up to the storage dam. We have just celebrated our dam having more than 50 per cent water for the first time in 30 years. This would not have occurred without vital infrastructure being paid for and delivered on the Central Coast for the first time, and I will come back to the importance of water in my contribution.

In looking at the budget over a period of time I did a comparison between the previous six years in my electorate and the six years that will be up later this year. You can characterise it in a number of ways. We have gone from flagpoles to libraries. We have gone from cutting health budgets to super GP clinics and our own area health service for the Central Coast, something we have been after for years. We have gone from drought to drought-proofing. We have gone from the infamous rort of money for Tumby Creek to significant millions of dollars in terms of an environmental program to help fix up Tuggerah Lakes. We are in the process of going from copper wire to fibre with the NBN. These are stark differences between what happened when there was a coalition member in the seat that I occupy and what we have been able to achieve in the last six years. These are things that make a difference to people's lives, and that is what budgets are primarily about—they are about making sure there are resources going to the right places.

I want to briefly go back to the issue of our water supply because it is being threatened at the moment by mining interests. We have a catchment area in the Wyong valleys through which this pipeline goes and we have a proposal for a mine. For the last two or three state and federal elections, the major parties have come along and said, 'There will be no mine; we are going to stop the mine,' and then, as soon as the election has ended, the mine has been back on the table. The reason that we have a real issue with this is that even the miners themselves are estimating that there will be more water lost in a day through this mine than the average rainfall for the area. The experts have said that it will take 200 years, if it will happen at all, for the aquifers to be refilled to supply the water for the Central Coast if this mine goes ahead. Significantly, in relation to government investment, we have a pipeline that has drought-proofed the Central Coast that could drop by over a metre with subsidence and crack, meaning all that important drought-proofing that has taken place in relation to infrastructure investment in the Central Coast would be for nought. It is an issue. It is the No. 1 issue on the Central Coast and it is something that we need to continue to fight for.

I also wanted to say a few things about the coalition's candidate in the next election. The Liberal Party have made an interesting choice of candidate. The Central Coast candidate's husband ran in the last election, and, like her husband, this candidate was also not preselected by the Liberal Party rank and file—someone else won the preselection. Apparently, on the Central Coast, if anyone other than a McNamara wins the preselection you have to kick them out and put a McNamara in. So for two elections in a row we are going to have a McNamara.

One of the really interesting things about the current candidate is that two years ago she wanted to join the Labor Party, surprisingly. So we have a candidate who actually did not want to be in the Liberal Party--she wanted to be in the Labor Party—and whose husband ran as the Liberal Party candidate last time. She has decided that she will have a shot at it anyway. You look at what she stands for, and she does not really stand for terribly much, so probably the label did not mean that much to her.

Her main supporter on the Central Coast is the current mayor, Mayor Eaton. It is very interesting to look at his policies because the current candidate has wrapped herself around this mayor. This is the mayor who came up with a terrific idea—they should get rid of green bins! Who really wants to recycle? It is bit of a cost for council so we should get rid of green bins! He opposed the super GP clinic that I was able to secure for the electorate. He opposed it vehemently, as did the last Liberal candidate for Dobell—'Oops! that is the present candidate's husband. Again, those are the sorts of policies they are looking at. He actually supports a mine under the catchment area even though the council does not support it. The Liberal Party candidate cannot bring herself to say, 'The issues for the community are more important than what my mayor instructs me to say as a Liberal Party candidate.' He wants to transform the Central Coast into a Chinese theme park. That will be a great success—we can see Chinese tourists flooding over to look at imitations of what they have in their own country. We are sure that will be a remarkable success.

The crowning moment for the mayor and now his Liberal Party partner was a much more novel idea than mine—I was able to secure $20 million to help fix up Tuggerah Lakes. Their idea was to drain the lakes, cement them up and have them catch water to help us with our drought problems. Some of the policies this mayor has and this Liberal candidate has tied herself to are quite crazy.

The government has, in the last six years, really got its messages wrong about what it wants to do. But it cannot say it is going to deliver surpluses when it embarks on a different social program. It can say: 'We're going to have a social program and we're not going back into surplus,' but they cannot say both. That is the great shame and the great story that the Treasurer is going to have to live with. In relation to my electorate, The choice and the difference for infrastructure, investment and quality of life that investment has made over the last six years compared to the previous six years—when the coalition was in government and had a coalition member in the seat of Dobell—is so stark that no one on the Central Coast wants to go back to those days, when we missed out on vital infrastructure that changes people's lives.

People on the Central Coast appreciate that we have been able to secure more money and investment in infrastructure in six years than the previous years that this seat has been in existence. That is something that everyone on the Central Coast can be proud of. As the member for Dobell, I am certainly very proud of that record over the last six years. (Time expired)

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

The 2013-14 budget is the one that broke a nation's faith. This is the budget that was framed against the background of the Treasurer's opening statement a year ago. That opening statement was to the effect of 'Tonight I deliver a budget which will deliver four successive surpluses.' A year later, there are no four surpluses in evidence. The year that was to have been the first of those years had a $19 billion deficit. The second of those years had an $18 billion deficit, and then an over-$10 billion deficit. Then, in the final year, we have an $800 million notional surplus—which is an entirely fictional figure.

Why does all of this matter? It matters for two reasons, because somebody has to pay back the debt. Somebody always has to pay back the debt. Every family knows this. Every small-business owner knows this. Every farmer knows this. And every responsible government knows that somebody always has to pay back the debt. Since the election of the ALP in 2007 the actual budget that they have delivered—not what they promised; not what they pledged—has been a $27 billion deficit, a $54 billion deficit, a $47 billion deficit, a $43 billion deficit and a $19 billion deficit. And now we have projections of an $18 billion deficit, for the sixth budget, and a $10 billion deficit for the seventh budget.

That is a history of failure. That is not about returning the budget to surplus on average over the cycle; that is a cycle of deficit. And it comes after a similar period of deficit under the previous ALP government. So what we see here are 12 major successive deficits on either side of a coalition which, through 12 budgets, delivered 10 surpluses.

So, at its heart—at its core—this shows that there is a fundamental difference between two sides. The ALP answer is that the Liberals are just terribly lucky and the ALP are terribly unlucky. The say, 'For some reason they always govern in good times and we always govern in bad times.' The Labor Party inherited a more than $20 billion surplus. They inherited a more than $50 billion bank account in the black and they have sent our deficit to the bottom. They have created a national debt which will now head towards $190 billion in net terms alone. Gross debt is inevitably likely to exceed the $300 billion figure.

These figures have consequences, because there is interest and repayment, and there is opportunity foregone. And who can say that there have been fabulous infrastructure programs which have delivered long-term permanent reductions in national bottlenecks? The money has just gone. I lived through the pink batts program and the green loans program. I saw the cash for clunkers announced and abolished. I saw the citizens' assembly announced and abolished. I saw nine consecutive changes in the carbon tax in its structural performance in just under a year.

All of this money that has gone has not produced anything of great national significant. If it had been spent with a purpose—if it had achieved an outcome—it would have been irresponsible to have done this to the national balance sheet but at least we would have had something. Sadly, we have an absence of infrastructure and an absence of outcomes for this massive process of consecutive budget deficits on a grand scale, the likes of which we have never seen in Australia.

These dollar deficits are the five highest deficits in Australian history. So, against that background we have this fiction of a surplus in 2015-16 at $0.8 billion—or $800 million—and then roughly $6 billion in 2016-17. Both of those figures are also deeply susceptible to any analysis. On the first grounds we have seen that the mining tax revenue is projected to soar one thousand per cent. Those figures cannot be trusted. Secondly, the arrival of boats are benchmarked against the Howard era rather than against the Rudd and Gillard era. We have gone from barely a couple of boats a year to 40,000 arrivals in four years.

Those are two fundamental flaws, where the figures cannot be believed. But in my particular area we have seen a $6 billion black hole on the basis of a $2 billion revenue gap against projections in 2015-16, which would wipe away the surplus, and a $4 billion gap in 2016-17 which, on its own, would almost wipe away the surplus.

What is the basis of this? The basis is very simple. The carbon tax revenue projections cannot be believed. The government knows it. The bureaucracy knows it. In the bureaucracy's defence, they have actually made it clear that these are not their real projections; these are what they were required, as policy statements, to put into budget paper no. 1. And the public knows that the government's carbon tax revenue projections cannot be believed.

How can this be?

Already in this year's budget for the year just passing, 2012-13, we have a $5 billion write-down. That is because the budget had relied on a $29 price for carbon in 2015-16. It now turns out that the European price for that period is just under $6 rather than the $29 that was projected. The EUAs, European Union forward allowances for 2015-16 for tendering on 30 June 2016, are currently trading at a figure well under A$6, in the mid-$5.50. That means that we have already seen a write-down in revenue of $5 million. But the government has only written it down to a projected price of $12.10 in 2015-16 and $18.60 in 2016-17. Then you ask how could they have a figure which is more than double what the market is projecting as the basis for the revenue they have calculated in the budget? How can you have a figure which is more than triple what the market is projecting for the second of those years, 2016-17? The answer is very simple. It is helpfully set out at page 2-48 of Budget Paper No. 1. In terms of the explanation under box 9 of updated carbon price estimates, what we see is that the bureaucracy has made it absolutely clear that these are not their figures; these are not their projections; these are what they were required to put in place.

These advance auctions in the Budget forecast years are based upon average EU-ETS market futures prices for 2013-14 and 2014-15. However, carbon prices in the Budget projection years are not forecasts of carbon prices.

It goes on to say:

Projections for carbon prices for emissions liabilities for 2015-16 and 2016-17 incorporate the straightforward approach of a linear transition from market prices in 2014-15 to the modelled price of $38 in 2019-20 …

It goes on:

The longer-term modelled carbon prices from SGLP reflect the price levels required to meet long-term global environmental goals as well as the international commitment pledges for 2020 …

In other words, these are not market projections of what the market price will be. These are working back from what the government requires in order to meet its emissions targets using the carbon tax.

My point and our point is very clear: the budget is fundamentally broken. We said this last year and we were right. The revenue forecasts were wildly over inflated for the budget. There was not a collapse in revenue. Revenue came in at what people would reasonably have expected. The only failing was that the government, the ALP, predicted that they would win TattsLotto. They spent as if they would win TattsLotto and when they did not win TattsLotto they suddenly claimed that revenue had collapsed. It did not. They had six per cent growth in government receipts last year. They are projecting seven per cent growth in government receipts this year. Any business which had six and seven per cent growth year-on-year in gross revenue would see itself in a very good position.

That then leads me to the final conclusion that not only have they failed in past projections but this year the government has failed to learn from their past failures. So the fact that we see a carbon price estimate in revenue, which is twice what the market had projects in 20 2015-16 and triple what the market projects in 2016-17, shows that there is no connection to reality. That means a $2-billion black hole in 2015-16 and $4-billion black hole in 2016-17. The figures cannot be believed. They were wrong last year. They are wrong this year. In the meantime, we have the highest electricity taxes in the world. The Australian government is driving up electricity prices with enormous damage to abattoirs. I met with the meat and livestock council today. These taxes are driving up the cost to aluminium smelters. They are driving up the cost to manufacturers and to car makers—to everybody involved in fabrication and manufacturing in this country. There is a massively high impact on them because of the electricity price rises—14½ per cent on average, according to the Australian Industry Group.

After 1 July 2015, if you believe this government, one of two things will happen: either electricity prices will continue to skyrocket or there will be a massive budget black hole. This all comes about from the folly of tying our national revenue and our national electricity prices to decisions taken in Brussels. I have no issue with the European Union, but I do have an issue with abandoning our sovereignty over our electricity prices and our national budget. For those reasons, whilst we will not stand in the way of supply because we do not wish the country to suffer from instability, we think this budget should be condemned on the basis that it is established and founded on forecasts which cannot be believed. We will repeal the carbon tax beginning on day one because, above all else, not only is it poor economics and poor for our competitiveness but it fails utterly to achieve the task of reducing emissions. It does not do the job economically; it does not do the job environmentally. Ultimately, we can reduce our emissions, achieve our outcomes, without a carbon tax by doing direct things which actually clean up the environment on a lowest cost basis rather than having the highest carbon tax in the world today and a collapse in budget revenue in 2015-16.

Patrick Secker (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I was saying in the previous sitting of this chamber, we have experienced three large areas of debt—firstly under the Whitlam government, then under the Hawke-Keating government and now under this government. They tried to come up with all sorts of excuses that really resembled things like 'the dog ate my homework'. There is the excuse that the government has a revenue problem. In fact, revenue in 2013-14 is over $80 billion higher than it was in the last year of the coalition government, just six years ago; but spending is $120 billion higher. So revenue is $80 billion higher but spending is $120 billion higher. The government really has a spending problem, not a revenue problem, and so it cannot use that lame excuse with any credibility.

The Australian people deserve better than the empty 'surplus' promise and spin. They work hard for their money and deserve a credible economic strategy. Australia cannot afford to keep running up record debts and deficits, and only a coalition government has the right people and experience to get this country back on track. To pay off the debt that we have already accumulated under this government, we, the taxpayers, are paying $35 million a day to pay the interest charges on that debt. In my electorate, I have 35 communities that would love to have $1 million to spend in their community, but we are using it to pay off our debt—well, it does not actually pay off the debt; it only pays the interest on the debt bill.

When we look at this budget, we see that it does nothing to help Australian families with the rise in the cost of living. The budget will deliver more than $25 billion in higher taxes over the next four years, and 99 per cent of that will hit Australians after the next election. The coalition does have a plan to take the pressure off families, and it starts with abolishing the carbon tax. Abolishing the carbon tax will take pressure off electricity and gas prices, and that will provide much needed relief to household budgets. Families and pensioners will also benefit by fully retaining the income tax cuts and fortnightly pension and benefit increases associated with that carbon tax. This is a commitment that is fully funded and accounted for by equivalent reductions in government spending—something that this government does not seem to understand.

The Productivity Commission will also be tasked with examining ways to make child care more flexible for people like shift workers, who cannot access the mainstream childcare system. The coalition do get it when it comes to family living costs and they understand how important it is to take the pressure off family living costs. But we know that it can only be done with the right economic plan.

Only this Labor government could invent a mining tax that hardly raises any revenue but destroys confidence. The forecast revenues from the mining tax have collapsed from $22.5 billion to $3.3 billion over the first four years. Despite the failure of the mining tax to raise any meaningful revenue so far, Wayne Swan's 2016-17 surplus promise relies on mining tax revenue increasing by more than 10 times its level this year. That is a big call. We will abolish the mining tax, and abolishing the mining tax means supporting investment and jobs.

We will also help small businesses grow and create more jobs by cutting red- and green-tape costs by $1 billion every year. Under a carbon tax, small businesses are paying at least 10 per cent more for their electricity and nine per cent more for their gas. The coalition will abolish this carbon tax. The blow-out in the management of Australian borders is at least $4.7 billion since the last budget and is just getting worse. Overall, it has cost taxpayers more than $10 billion over budget, when in the last years of the Howard government it was costing virtually nothing.

This budget also assumes that boat arrivals will phase down—that is the term used—over the next four years, despite arrivals now at a record and increasing level. We need to stop the boats. The coalition has the experience and the right plan to stop the boats—after all, we have done it before. We can do it again. Remember, John Howard inherited a problem and crafted a solution. The current government inherited a solution and created a problem. To stop the boats, we need rigorous offshore processing for illegal arrivals. We need to reintroduce temporary protection visas and we need to give the Navy the option of turning back the boats where it is safe to do so.

Labor, unfortunately, has no interest in Australia's primary sector or in the regional communities dependent on agriculture. Labor has cut millions from the department's already strained resources and has cut millions from cooperative research centres, which means fewer CRCs are funded each year and, as most of the CRCs are agriculturally based, there will be less funding for agriculture. Labor has also reduced the exceptional circumstances budget by hundreds of millions of dollars and has refused to acknowledge the exceptional circumstances of the floods in many states.

Labor has cut cargo-screening resources at ports and airports, resulting in 4.7 fewer air-cargo consignments being inspected each year and 2,150 fewer vessels being boarded on arrival. That puts our security at risk. Labor has also cut $63 million from agriculture research within the CSIRO and closed CSIRO agricultural research sites in Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia. We all know that Labor's kneejerk reaction to suspend live exports to Indonesian abattoirs severely damaged our $1 million industry, weakened industry confidence and threatened jobs.

The coalition will stop farmers, regional communities and the agricultural sector paying more for electricity and gas, by abolishing the carbon tax. It will also support the live export industry, as it has in the past. We believe that maintaining the live export trade will be the best way to improve animal welfare and to reward those abattoirs who do the right thing. The coalition in government will be able to restore confidence by reversing the damage that Labor has done—and they have done a lot of damage.

The Labor Party are very good at announcing big-ticket items but hopeless at paying for them. Debt continues to rise. The gross debt is most likely to exceed the $300 billion limit within the forward estimates, and this government is wasting $7.8 billion a year on interest payments alone. The spending spree has to end, and the coalition has identified savings that will be implemented if the coalition is elected to government in September. We will rescind the increase in the humanitarian intake. We will reduce through natural attrition by at least 12,000 the size of the Commonwealth public sector, which is now 20,000 bureaucrats bigger than it was in 2007. We will scrap Labor's green loans scheme for a project that banks will not touch. (Time expired)

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Boy we regret letting Patrick get in there, don't we! I rise to talk about the bill before the chamber tonight—Appropriation Bill (No. B) 2013-2014—because it is part of probably one of the most important budgets that we are going to see in a long time. We have known for a while about the revenue write-downs. We have known about the GFC, which has had a very long tail and which affects a lot of people in a lot of ways. The Treasurer delivered a budget which seems foreign to those opposite because it is not full of election bribes and handouts. It is a sensible budget which puts us on track to make sure that this country continues in the position that it is in now.

Those on the other side are running a scare campaign—the fairy tales about the economy being dead, the world going to pieces and the Australian economy going to pieces—but the facts on the table prove that the reality is completely otherwise. They prove that the only failure is the failure of the opposition to put forward a plan. They have come up with a magic pudding—'we're going to give everyone tax cuts; we're going to give everyone the world and not collect any money for it'—and then they have the audacity to come into this place and the other place and complain about what the Labor government is doing. They did have budget surpluses when they were in government, but they also cut the guts out of spending. They did not cut it to the bone; they cut right through it. That is why our hospitals are in such trouble. There was as much money spent on golf balls by former health minister Abbott as there was money spent on patient care.

Compare this to what this government have done and to what we have had to do in such tough economic circumstances. We have invested money in health. We have delivered cancer centres right across the nation. Those opposite did not do that. We have delivered superclinics, which means that families do not have to drive for many miles, particularly in my electorate, to see a doctor or specialist when they need to. We have delivered right across the education portfolio with the Gonski reforms. The report by David Gonski looked at a better and fairer way to get education funding for our kids which would be based on their needs, not their postcodes. But the silver-spooners over there would like to see something different, and that is why they never invested money in schools.

You only have to look at what is going on with state governments to see exactly what will happen if those opposite get their claws into the Australian economy. In Victoria, before the Liberal government was elected, every school was to be rebuilt over the period from 2012 to 2016. But that has been totally scrapped by the state Liberal government to the point where there are kids in learning facilities where you cannot even open a window or where you have to nail the windows shut because otherwise they would fall out. What has happened to Woodend Primary School in my electorate is an example of what will happen if the coalition is elected to federal government. The coalition in Victoria have totally stopped every bit of maintenance on Woodend Primary School. There is an example of what we will see if those opposite are elected.

Let us look at the very fundamentals of our budget and Australia's position in the global economy. We have extremely low unemployment. We have low interest rates—a lot lower than what they were when those opposite were in government. We have contained inflation. These are pretty big fundamentals to have right and for the Australian people to look at on 14 September.

The average person in McEwen has a home with a mortgage of about $300,000, and that is rising. Because of this government they are now more than $100 a week better off than they would have been, in exactly the same place, had we unfortunately kept a Howard or Costello, or whoever had the guts to stand up and do it, government under the coalition. That is direct money into people's pockets that they are using to spend and keep the economy going along.

We hear those opposite constantly carp and whinge and complain about debt in this country. There are any number of studies and reports around the world showing just how strong our economy is. We are one of only eight countries that still hold a AAA credit rating by all three rating agencies. That is something those opposite can only aspire to, because they could never achieve it. Even through the glorious days of the Howard era, as they call it, they could not achieve a AAA credit rating from all three agencies. It has only been done by our government, by a Labor government, and we have done that because we stick to the fundamentals of what is right for the economy. We stick to what needs to be done to ensure that Australian families are better off. When we look back to the GFC we see the 200,000 jobs that would have been lost had they had their way and not supported the stimulus package that was put through by the Labor government.

We did that because it needed to be done to keep the economy afloat. We are getting the benefits of that now, because we are not in double-digit unemployment, we are not in recession, we are actually going along quite strongly. Yes, it is a patchwork, it is up and down—that is a reality of the Australian economy. You only have to look to that great conservative icon Mr Howard, a man who it is fair to say none of us on this side admire too much but who put it well when he told a Sydney conference:

When the current Prime Minister and the Treasurer and others tell you that the Australian economy is doing better than most—they are right.

Those are pretty powerful words coming from the great leader of the conservatives; when he comes out and says our government, this Labor government, has got it right and that 'we are fortunate that we have an unemployment rate with five in front of it'. Even he did not think that was possible, and it is something that would not be possible if those opposite get their hands on the economy.

We have also invested in DisabilityCare. This is something that strikes, I think, to the morals of your heart. This is about protecting and supporting people who are the most vulnerable, who are not able to actively participate in the workforce because of a range of issues, usually because they are not getting the support that they need. We have brought that in to ensure that people with disabilities can have a fair start to life and a fair opportunity to become participants in the workforce and do what they want to do, which is to be contributors to our society.

The fundamentals of our budget are being stronger by supporting jobs and supporting growth. We have seen nearly a million jobs created under this government—something those opposite only wish they could do. We have seen investing in our classrooms to give kids the best possible opportunities, to skill them up for the future to make sure they can get job opportunities in the future. Again I look to those opposite and say: let's look at your track record. The track record of the conservatives is to cut skills education, to cut TAFE, to cut the VET and VCAL programs in Victoria. We inherited a massive skill shortage when we came to government in 2007 because of the direct actions of those opposite in cutting the funding for training and support and for further education. We took the cap of university places. We have actually invested all this money for our future.

If you look at the Victorian government, the Queensland government and the New South Wales government, there is a window to what will happen if those opposite win the 14 September election. We will see exactly the same thing: everything is cut to the bone. That is a term we do not use lightly, a term we do not like to use, but it is a clear fact that that will happen if they get in. You only have to look at what they have done in Victoria and New South Wales, where everywhere you go, right across those states, unemployment is going through the roof. It is going through the roof because they are doing what they do best, and that is sack people and take away wages and conditions. We have already seen the Leader of the Opposition talk about a tax review and about increasing the GST, and that is exactly what they will do.

They will increase the GST. It is the first thing that came out on their Thursday night speech. Look at Tony Abbott, the Leader of the Opposition's, carefully scripted and crafted words. He talked about how people's personal income tax will not be affected. But what it means over here is that they will be pushing to support a rise in the GST by at least 2.5 per cent. They have never been able to come out and deny it and they will not stand up and say absolutely categorically it will not happen—and I will resign if it does. They will not say that because they know they cannot.

They have already had discussions with their state colleagues about the redistribution of GST. They have already gone through that. We have already seen that they are going to put in an impost on Australian families with a 1.6 per cent tax increase to businesses to pay for the paid parental leave scheme that is going to help people who are earning $150,000 a year more than it is going to help those that need the money the most, those on the lower end of the scale. We already know now that because of what they are doing, the banks are saying, 'We will just pass that onto people; we will pass that on to interest rates, credit card rates et cetera.' No one is going to wear what they have said, what they have done and what they are threatening to do without passing it on so it is going to be a cost to every single one of us.

When I look at the budget and to some of the direct things that have been an absolute improvement to my community, I look at the Vietnam Veterans Commemorative Walk. What is really important to notice about this is there are two levels of government in Victoria that have funded this as well as the shire that gifted the land and did the work. The Victorian government funded it. The federal Labor government funded it. When I say the Victorian government, I mean both state governments, Labor and Liberal. The only people who have never ever committed one cent to supporting these veterans through this commemorative work is the federal Liberal Party. They have gone to two elections and have not committed a cent. In fact, one of the candidates actually said, 'Not a chance. We are not going to build something like that in Seymour,' which just goes to show how much contempt they show for regional areas. We are putting in a Huey helicopter and a Howitzer gun as well as lighting and pathways for the Vietnam Veterans Commemorative Walk. Out of the two parties, at state level both supported it but at the federal level only Labor supported it. I think it is a real blight on those opposite that they are not prepared to support our veterans.

The commemorative walk is delivering many benefits. It not only recognises the people who worked on the volunteer committee but also what it is doing for local businesses and tourism, which is amazing. It is actually delivering people. Every single day or night when you get there people are going for this walk. They go back to look at their own names on the wall, their father's, their grandfather's, their mother's and their grandmother's. It is an exciting thing that is being done and an absolute credit to a bunch of blokes who sat round the table over a cup of coffee and said we should do this because it has never been done before. They should be absolutely congratulated for the work that they have done and for their dedication.

The other thing I want to talk about is our NBN policy, which is being supported by my community. The opportunity to be part of the digital future is astronomical. You only have to look at things like business productivity, health and education. There are many things that can be done with NBN today and in the future that are actually going to save money for our health budgets, for education and it will also take cars off the congested roads that we have leading into the city. The things we talk about cannot be done with copper and that is why the opposition refused to say what their upload speed will be. They refuse because they know that what you have got today is what you will get for the future. You would have thought that those opposite would be supporting a national broadband network that actually meant that country areas can have the same access to medical treatment.

Dr Stone interjecting—

You might sit there and laugh. Let us note that the member for Murray sits there and laughs.

Dr Stone interjecting—

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

Order! Member for Murray.

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Doing live breast-screen examinations in country towns hooked to the NBN can be done straight away, and you think that is funny.

Dr Stone interjecting--

You were laughing. You are being untruthful saying that you are not laughing. You even admitted you were laughing through interjection. I am glad you think that is funny, because it shows the calibre of person you are.

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

Members!

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And your friend laughs too, but that is because she is not real bright. The fact of the matter is—

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

Member for McEwan, members will be called by their correct titles.

Teresa Gambaro (Brisbane, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship and Settlement) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on a point of order. I ask the member to withdraw the insulting comment that he made.

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What insulting comment?

Teresa Gambaro (Brisbane, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship and Settlement) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You made an insulting comment and I ask you to withdraw. You know what you said.

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am happy to withdraw. This is the person who actually reckons our migrants stink. She cannot deny that.

Teresa Gambaro (Brisbane, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship and Settlement) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was misrepresented in the press. I made an explanatory statement. I ask the member to withdraw that untrue statement.

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

Members, there is another place for this to be done. Please withdraw unconditionally and finish.

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw.

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

Your time has now expired.

Teresa Gambaro (Brisbane, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship and Settlement) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on these appropriation bills. It can only be hoped that it is the last act of chaotic, divided, dysfunctional government that has no plans for Australia's future. But we are not without hope. As my parliamentary colleague and leader of the coalition, Tony Abbott, said in his budget reply speech:

While it is easy, and understandable, that you should be pessimistic about this government, everyone should be optimistic about our country.

There is an end in sight to this very bad government. This is a government that gave us pink batts, overpriced school halls and cash for clunkers—all failed programs. As of tonight there are 109 days until a federal election, when the people of my electorate in Brisbane and the people of Australia have the opportunity of bringing this bad government to an end.

There is no better way of highlighting the contrast between where we are now under Labor and where the coalition was when it delivered government and what we saw in the federal budget just a few weeks ago. What we saw was a clear contrast between Labor with its debt, deficit, broken promises, new taxes and no plan for Australia's future, and the coalition with its plan to build a strong, prosperous country, more jobs, higher wages and better services for all Australians.

The budget papers reveal that Australia's gross debt will breach Labor's $300 billion debt ceiling within the forward estimates. In a space of less than two weeks, that $300 million ceiling is already forecast to beyond $400 billion. Since coming to office in 2007, the first five Labor budgets have resulted in $192 billion in deficits. There is one thing we can be certain of: Labor will never deliver a surplus. The Treasurer has now delivered Labor's 12th deficit from the last 12 budgets. Disturbingly, the last surplus delivered by a Labor government was in 1989—almost 2½ decades ago.

Last year Treasurer Wayne Swan promised a surplus of $1.5 billion but instead he delivered a deficit more than 12 times as big at $19.4 billion. He did not just miss the target by a little tiny bit—this is really taking the adage 'If you miss by an inch you might as well miss by a mile' to a whole new depth. It must be remembered that this towering achievement of budgetary incompetence came after the government promised on more than 500 occasions that they were delivering a surplus for 2012-13, with the Prime Minister even boasting that the surplus had already been achieved. All of this from a bunch that have the audacity to call themselves fiscal conservatives. The delusion is truly spectacular.

Fiscal conservative was one of the many meaningless Kevin Rudd slogans adopted by the Treasurer and then recycled by the Prime Minister. It must go down as one of the most cynical, political cons of all time—right up there with: 'There will not be a carbon tax under a government I lead.' Both unbelievable; both false.

The electorate of Brisbane has to deal with significant cost-of-living pressures, and under Labor the price of essentials such as electricity, education, child care and health services continues to go up and up. Labor's reckless policy making plays a significant part in these price rises. Labor cannot claim to care about the cost of living while imposing policies that add to those pressures. For example, increases in electricity prices are Labor's carbon tax at work and increases in medical and hospital services are in part because of Labor's chopping and changing of the private health insurance rebate. With child care, for example, on 1 July 2012 the government cut and capped the childcare rebate to a maximum of $7,500. If the childcare rebate was still being indexed parents in my electorate would be receiving $700 a year more in assistance. Since Julia Gillard became Prime Minister, childcare costs have increased by 26 per cent. In the 2013-14 budget, the government extended its freeze on the childcare rebate for another three years. The rebate was capped at $7,500 two years ago and will now remain capped until 30 June 2017. While the government has capped the rebate, it is also spending $8 million advertising what government assistance is available to families to help meet childcare costs, confirming that Labor is more about spin than they are about substance.

With private health insurance the government imposed a means test on 1 July 2012. It placed a 30 per cent rebate on private health insurance. This will mean that some families in my electorate will be paying up to 43 per cent more for their insurance while everyone else will pay an additional 10 per cent on top of the existing cost of their policy. This measure will impact very hard on the electorate of Brisbane: 79 per cent of people in my electorate have private health insurance. In the 2012-13 MYEFO the government announced that from 1 July 2013 it would no longer provide a rebate for the lifetime health cover component of one's private health insurance premium. The lifetime health cover component is an additional two per cent charge on a person's premium for every year that they have not taken out private health insurance after turning 31 years of age. This represents a $386 million cut to private health insurance. In the 2012-13 MYEFO the government announced that from1 April 2014 funding for private health insurance rebate would be linked to the CPI rather than keeping it linked to the average industry premium increase that is set each year at around four per cent. This represents a $700 million cut to the rebate over four years.

In the 2013-14 budget the government has cut more $1.8 billion from Medicare rebates, the extended Medicare Safety Net and the Net Medical Expenses Tax Offset, while incredibly still managing to deliver more debt, more deficits and taxes. These cuts from the health budget, which follow years of waste and mismanagement across all areas of government, will hit the sickest and the most vulnerable the hardest. There will be no increase to the Medicare rebates between November 2012 and July 2014, despite continued growth in the cost of delivering health care. This means the costs are likely to be passed on to patients directly, particularly in general practice where there is a high volume of pensioners and concession cared holders.

Deputy Speaker, as you can see, Labor cuts will force up out-of-pocket costs for families in my electorate as they are already struggling with the cost-of-living pressures and all of this on top of the increased costs that came in on 1 July 2012, when the dreaded carbon tax started. On the government's own figures, under a carbon tax there will be an immediate 10 per cent in electricity prices, a nine per cent increase in gas bills. The increase in electricity in the September quarter of 2012 was 15.3 per cent—the largest quarterly increase since ABS electronic records began. The rise since Labor came to power has been 94 per cent.

In education, the Gonski numbers change from day-to-day. When the Prime Minister announced her school funding a few weeks ago she said it would result in an extra $14.5 billion over six years, with her government contributing $9.4 billion. This week the Prime Minister said it would be $16.2 billion and the Commonwealth would contribute $9.8 billion over six years, but the actual budget papers show that the Commonwealth has only put aside $2.8 billion over the next four years for school funding, leaving a shortfall of $7 billion to be delivered in just two years—that is, two elections from now. Labor is cutting more than $300 million out of school funding over the next four years.

The forward estimates show that under this government funding for schools is going down, not up, and that is very bad news for schools, for parents and for students in my electorate. This government is not giving schools more money; it is giving schools less money and that is on top of cuts to university to pay for the so-called Gonski changes. Labor's funding continues with them ripping funds out of education and cutting the indexation at three per cent. Labor is fiddling the figures yet again. Thankfully, the coalition offers a clear choice which guarantees that no school will be worse off because we will keep the existing system at least until such time as we have a consensus on the need for change.

One of the precious few pieces of good news in this budget relates to the announcement of a new headspace in Brisbane. As the federal member for Brisbane, for some time I have been calling for a headspace facility to be based in central Brisbane. I am advised that one of the 15 centres being funded in 2013-14 will be based in Brisbane and headspace advise that the new facility will be up and running by January 2014. That is great news for Brisbane residents. My only reservation regarding this announcement relates to the need for the government to resist any temptation to hijack the original headspace charter set up under the Howard government, which ensured the locations of these facilities were determined on a needs basis and not as part of some desperate political pork barrelling campaign to try to save failed Labor MPs.

I wish to turn to DisabilityCare and the funding in the budget for disability. In a parliament under this government which has been rife with incompetence, mismanagement, dysfunction and scandal, the NDIS maybe the best thing to come out of the 43rd parliament. As we know, both sides of politics support the NDIS. The Labor Party desperately wanted to use it as a political football. Labor's rhetoric was always designed to wedge the coalition on the NDIS. Then came the classic move, after sending the budget further into the red, with Labor's proposal to have an increase to the Medicare levy of 0.5 per cent to partially fund the NDIS. However the coalition will be supporting this increase, even though this government has completely and irresponsibly managed the budget. The increase in the Medicare levy should not have been necessary, had the budget been balanced.

As elected representatives, we are always reluctant to increase taxes imposed on those we represent. However, as a Liberal I believe one of the core roles of government is to help those who cannot help themselves. There is no one in this House who would argue that those who suffer from a disability and their families have the same opportunity and freedom in life as those without a disability. We obviously still have a lot of detail to work through regarding DisabilityCare and how it will work but on behalf of those in my electorate with a disability, their friends and their families, I welcome the commitment by state and federal governments to a national disability insurance scheme. As federal members, on a daily basis we hear the heartbreaking stories of those with disabilities. Hopefully, this will be one decision which we have made together as a parliament to provide them with some help and relief.

When you look at the gross failures of this government to provide basic services, you have to ask yourself: Where has all the money gone? What did they spend it on?

In consideration of these questions, a sobering and disturbing fact is that the cost to Australians of Labor's waste and budgetary mismanagement is a net interest bill of $7.8 billion a year. Add to that annual interest bill the cost of some items from the greatest hit list of Labor's waste such as the $10 billion blow-out in the immigration portfolio—thanks to Labor's failed border protection policies—and the $3.2 billion blow-out in the NBN rollout, and you get the picture. These policy failures alone add up to more than $13 billion and when you add that to the annual interest rate bill, you are looking at nearly $21 billion. This could have provided a lot of infrastructure.

This is the cost of Labor's abysmal fiscal management—and an appalling waste on things that we did not need to have, like pink batts, and it has ensured that there is no money for things that we do need. We need 21st century infrastructure. Let us consider the amount of money that could have been spent on this wonderful infrastructure had this government not misspent. It could have been spent on projects that are sorely needed in the electorate of Brisbane and in the state of Queensland. It could have been spent on things like the Cross River Rail project and the upgrade of the Kingsford Smith Drive—all very worthwhile projects.

Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the appropriation bills—bills that have been framed in an challenging economic environment. This budget seeks to chart the most appropriate course of action for the long-term prosperity of our nation. It is a budget aimed squarely at making Australia stronger, smarter and fairer through investment in infrastructure, schools and social reform. Having all but come through the biggest downturn our economy has confronted since the forties, this is the time for us to ease back on stimulus and to position the economy for the future.

It is worth noting at the outset the impact that the current economic climate has had on revenue—$170 billion has been wiped off the revenue since the GFC. Global economic conditions now mean that companies cannot sustain their profits in the way that they once did, and this is having an impact on tax receipts. It is presenting a massive challenge for governments. It is why we had to find savings to the tune of $43 billion but to do so in a way that does not tear at the fabric of the community.

As an MP heading into an election later this year, I know that all of us in this chamber would loved to be able to spruik for tax cuts or find other ways to inject government spending, but our balance sheet simply does not permit that and, frankly, it would represent the height of irresponsibility to do so. Instead, the government is showing fiscal restraint while keeping an eye on the things that will make Australia more productive and will grow our economy into the future.

On both sides of this chamber, in a place where we focus on division, we should find areas that unite us. On both sides of the chamber, we can all be rightly proud that the budget has provided nearly $20 billion over the next seven years to fund DisabilityCare. In my electorate of Chifley, it could benefit as a many as 3,800 people. Delivering DisabilityCare is without doubt the most fundamental social policy reform this government has seen since we introduced Medicare. For far too long, it has been reflected elsewhere that this sort of reform was considered too difficult, too hard. Now we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet the lifelong needs of people with a disability, their families and their carers. People with a disability have much to contribute to society, and with the choice and support that DisabilityCare will provide we can remove from many of them the barriers to their productive involvement and engagement in our society and in our workforce.

I have had many opportunities to visit disability enterprises operating in the Chifley electorate and have seen for myself the effect that gainful employment has on the people who can work. There are great organisations like the Endeavour Foundation, Mount Druitt and AFFORD in Minchinbury. In reflecting on the proposal to increase the Medicare levy, I think most people will see that increasing the Medicare levy to help fund DisabilityCare is something that they believe is worthy of support. In fact, it was something that I spoke on in February this year. I outlined the challenges for both sides of politics in finding revenue in this climate to fund disability care, and I recognised that it simply was not there. Medicare has always provided a healthcare safety net for Australians. We are now stretching it a little bit further to provide support for the disabled, their families and their carers. It is a worthy way in which to fund DisabilityCare.

Another initiative that I am very happy to see funded in this budget is our support of nearly $10 billion to fund schools over the next six years, to deliver our National Plan for School Improvement. It is an important delivery of the work by David Gonski. It is very much a plan to better resource every school on the base of need, improving teacher quality and supporting students to achieve their best. Our plan not only makes the distribution of funding fairer but also targets those schools facing the greatest disadvantage, some of which are located in the Chifley electorate. Schools in the Chifley electorate have all welcomed the commitment.

I was delighted last week to join Cathy Anderson, the principal of Chifley College at Mount Druitt, and her staff in celebrating our deal with the New South Wales government, where both federal Labor and state Liberals joined as one to advance education in the state of New South Wales. This month's budget will also make a tangible difference to the lives of residents in Chifley and in the neighbouring seats of my colleagues the members for Greenway, Lindsay, McMahon and Parramatta, particularly through the funding of the WestConnex motorway.

The Australian government has made an offer of $1.8 billion to the New South Wales government to extend the M4 motorway to the Sydney CBD and Port Botany. Improving traffic flow will mean shorter travel times to and from work, more time at home with family and reduced running costs for the daily commute. One of the biggest challenges facing Western Sydney for all levels of government is finding ways to free-up the movement of people in an area of the country where congestion is causing massive problems. Smart investment in infrastructure is important if we are to keep our economy amongst the strongest in the world and, importantly, our government has sought to put forward certain conditions on the funding.

The first is that there are to be no new tolls on sections of the motorway already paid for. It makes no sense, if we have paid for the road, that we pay again through a new toll. The second condition is that the extension has to go all the way to the CBD and Port Botany so that motorists are able to travel to their desired destinations without unnecessarily clogging up roads around the motorway. This is something the New South Wales state government did not indicate previously, which is a shortcoming of its plan. We are seeking to fix it and work with them on it.

Other measures in the budget to provide for the infrastructural needs of our community include nearly a quarter-of-a-million dollars to fix two identified traffic black spots in the electorate. This is to install, for instance, a partial median-enclosure at the intersection of the Great Western Highway and Mount Druitt Road and to install a single-lane roundabout at the intersection of Wolseley and Derby streets in Rooty Hill.

On building and investment in the National Broadband Network in Western Sydney, the budget provided extra funding for each of the six Broadband for Seniors kiosks in Chifley, so they can purchase touch-screen monitors for teaching seniors about the next generation of computer interfaces. I was particularly delighted to see an additional $39.4 million provided on a separate initiative through the end of 2014 to extend the Active After-school Communities program. It currently has just over 1,200 children from Chifley participating in it. I got to see first-hand some of the activities of the AASC in our area, in conjunction with the Western Sydney Wanderers.

With the delivery of any budget, it is important to contrast it with plans being offered by the other side. I note today the opposition's joint party room is committed to supporting and keeping all of Labor's promised budget savings. That is one of the best endorsements a budget can get. What else does the opposition intend to do that requires scrutiny? For instance, the Leader of the Opposition has recommitted to scrapping the price on carbon but intends to keep in place all of the household compensation associated with this pricing mechanism, without indicating how it will be funded. At the same time, he will commit to paying polluters to the tune of $5 billion under his so-called Direct Action Plan. This does not identify how that will be funded.

The Leader of the Opposition is digging an even bigger budget blackhole for himself, and Australians should rightly know what cuts he will make to fill it. He has also recommitted to his overly generous paid parental leave scheme, which will hit the nation's top 3,000 companies with a tax in order to pay—as one pensioner in the Chifley electorate identified to me, three times the rate of that person's pension—up to $75,000 to the wealthiest of families. People in our area cannot understand how you would fund a scheme in that way. Inside his own party room, rightly so, there is a degree of disquiet about the affordability of such payments. I notice tonight there has been some reference to GST reform. It is interesting to see that the GST reform is being touted as responsible national economic reform, but when we attempt to do likewise that is the most heinous of all initiatives that could be taken. They characterise something, for instance, as a great big new tax, but when it comes to the GST then that is moderate economic reform. The way it is being characterised is interesting. The way the GST could be broadened to cover, for instance, food and other essentials will impact particularly on communities in my area. We are being softened up for a change—an increase in the GST—and ostensibly it is being driven by the states, but with the imprimatur of the federal level.

Members would also have seen at another level the spat between the member for Sturt and the New South Wales education minister over our national school improvement plan. The member for Sturt has made it quite clear that this government's record investment in schools will be cut if they win the upcoming election. What I find interesting is the strident defence of state rights provided by the coalition when it comes, for instance, to the ownership of resources, but when it comes to deals done to provide greater support for the education of our next generation the coalition will tear up deals with the states and ram states' rights into a pulp for their own political imperative. What I find concerning about the caveat that the opposition leader has placed on future cuts to spending is that he needs to wait until the pre-election fiscal outlook before making any predictions about what will come down the track.

Come 14 September Australians will have a choice between two discrete pathways to the future. They should have the opportunity to weigh up the merits of each pathway before casting a vote and should look in close detail at not only what the opposition says it will do but the track record of incoming Liberal governments in recent times. For instance, in Queensland the LNP government set about a slash and burn process with 14,000 public sector job cuts—not just high-level bureaucrats but front-line health workers, police and ambulance officers. They are investigating selling off community parks and sports grounds and working out which schools they can close—depriving communities of important local infrastructure.

In my home state of New South Wales, the O'Farrell government implemented budget savings they conveniently overlooked reference to prior to the election. Did Mr O'Farrell, for example, tell voters that he intended to cut almost $2 billion from education? No. When he toured suburbs of Western Sydney and assured voters he would look after them, did he tell them he would cut funding to install lifts at Doonside, Rooty Hill or Toongabbie, as the member for Greenway has pointed out? No. He did say he would tackle the cost-of-living pressures on families, but he did not tell pensioners in public housing that he intended to take away their household compensation by jacking up housing commission rents. Did he tell us that he would close the cardiac unit at Mount Druitt hospital? No. He argued that he needed to rein in spending because of the state of the budget, but the Auditor-General in New South Wales found there was an extra $1 billion that the New South Wales Liberal treasurer had not accounted for and then refused to recommit it to support education.

I would hope electors in Chifley and Greenway pay close attention to the record of the Liberal-independent council that came to office last year in Blacktown. Again, there was no warning whatsoever of the political agenda of the Liberal council—after an extraordinary record in which successive Labor-controlled councils were debt free and delivered some of the best community and recreational facilities in the state. The Liberals have begun undoing this legacy. They have indicated that they will close essential community services and facilities or at least privatise in some cases—for example, child care—to cut spending. The Liberals on council appear to have an ideology demanding that community facilities be profitable rather than be paid for at ratepayer expense. They have flagged the closing of childcare centres, reserves and they even announced the closure of the Mount Druitt swimming pool. The president of the Rooty Hill RSL youth swimming club believes they would be in dire straits when this pool closes and that schools would be left with few options for swimming carnivals. There is a great deal of anger amongst residents about the pool's closure. For many years it has provided the community with a venue for recreation, training and competition. Residents, particularly in the part of Blacktown I represent, rely enormously on the services and facilities council provides and if Blacktown Council were to continue with this agenda I can only see people being further disadvantaged and marginalised. Probably the biggest threat to local residents is the draft local environment plan, which will see council acquire homes to make way for recreational space. This has caused great concern in our area.

None of these things were mentioned prior to the election. They tear at the fabric of our local community and undermine the investment in infrastructure. The federal government can point to investments of $140 million in 67 schools in Chifley. Trade training centres are opening. The NBN is being rolled out. Primary care infrastructure grants are changing the way that local GP clinics are operating. The opening of a clinician's school at Blacktown Hospital will ensure that we can train more GPs and that they will stay in Western Sydney. Contrast all this with the cuts to education by the state government—either to the cardiac ward at Mt Druitt Hospital and overtime in the Western Sydney health district—as well as the failure to provide for infrastructure at railway stations and council closures of community facilities such as swimming pools. All this has been done without providing support to our area. The contrast between the actions of the two governments should be concentrated upon in the lead up to 14 September. I thank the House.

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is no wonder that the previous speaker representing the Labor government focused on state government issues, because it is just too painful to look at what the federal budget speech from the Treasurer, Mr Swan, delivered to us. We, of course, are aware of the parlous state of the economy in Australia. No-one who is living in this country thinks of the era that we are now in as anything but a budget emergency. Let us look at some of the incredible statistics.

Total gross debt will breach the $300 billion debt ceiling within the forward estimates. We are now living with Labor's fifth record deficit in five years and at least two more deficits to come. We have record net debt of $192 billion, and there is no credible path back to surplus—except, I suggest, having a change of government on 14 September. There have been so many broken promises, such as scrapped tax cuts and family payments. Most recently, we have been told that the baby bonus is gone. Very sadly, people who know how important it is to have private health insurance are finding it more and more unaffordable. There have been nonsense programs such as set-top boxes, pink batts, cash-for-clunkers and grocery watch—they go on and on. Some day someone is going to write a book about all of this and no one will believe it; they will think it is a comedy. But it is not a comedy. It is not funny when you look at what is happening on the ground and what is behind the statistics.

I will give just one example of the impacts of the carbon tax, which this government imposed in a flight of fancy while imagining that somehow enough new tax can be put into the system to make the climate magically cease its evolution. For example, those doing the heavy lifting in the economy by employing people and trying to generate production for export and for the domestic market are faced with incredible increases in electricity and gas bills.

I have in front of me a bill of 31 August 2012 for a two-month period from Mulcahy Pastoral, one of the biggest dairy producers in the northern Victorian region. This is just one of their electricity bills; they have a number of them depending on which part of their enterprise is being billed. Their electricity charge for two months was $7,069.97. On top of that came a carbon charge, which is itemised on their bill, of $1,142.48. So that is $7,000 plus another $1,000 for the carbon charge. Then, tragically, GST is levied on top of the combined charges. GST amounted to $821.24. Mulcahy Pastoral's bill therefore went from $7,000 to $9,000. There is no productivity advantage when the additional nearly $2,000, which went straight to the government as a carbon charge, is taken into account. Electricity bills such as this bring Mulcahy Pastoral ever closer to not being sustainable despite the incredible heavy lifting they do in employing scores of workers generating an excellent product benchmarked as world's best practice.

Think if you were a contractor to SPC Ardmona and you had just been told that, due to the costs which are now imposed on food manufacture—in this case, preserved fruits and vegetables—the costs, combined with the high Australian dollar, renders them unable to compete with imported rubbish, often product which has not been properly scrutinised at the border because this government has slashed and burned quarantine checking. Biosecurity is now on its knees as an agency. We know that every day we are facing real threats with food safety, as Coles and Woolworths delightedly import some of the biggest volumes ever seen of imported preserved fruit and things like tomatoes. They fill their generic labels with these products. The labelling laws in Australia are such that the discerning shopper has great difficulty working out exactly the source of the product in cans or in plastic squeezy tubes, in glass jars or in plastic packs.

Put all of that together and what did SPC Ardmona recently have to do? They had to tell the 114 orchardist suppliers that about half of them would have no contracts next year for supplying fruit and the other half would be able to supply only 50 per cent or less of the fruit they had previously been under contract to provide. This is stunning fruit—pears, apricots, peaches, all beautiful product. Some of the pear trees have been bearing for more than 70 years in the Goulburn Valley. In fact, the Goulburn Valley produces more than 85 per cent of Australia's pears.

While SPC Ardmona in the Goulburn Valley said no to its fruit suppliers, there has also been a rebounding impact on the packers, pickers and pruners of that product, on the transport operators who once took all that product to market and on the workers in their factory. SPC Ardmona in the Goulburn Valley had 870 full-time equivalent staff. Their salaries and wages in one year alone were $63 million alone, which went into the local economy. They provided apprenticeships and training programs year after year, giving experience to young people, and they had graduate student programs. The multiplier effect is that more than 2,700 jobs in the Goulburn Valley region alone will be affected. More than 150,000 tonnes of fruit and vegetables worth more than $32 million each year was taken from local contracted growers. All of that now is history because this government has basically turned its back on the manufacturing sector in Australia and in particular on food manufacturing.

Imagine what the SPC Ardmona and fruit-growing sector thought as they saw the federal government scrambling to put millions of dollars into the very tragic announcement that the Ford Motor Company would basically be shutting up shop in a couple of years time. We have not yet heard a squeak of support for the Goulburn Valley or the Murray Valley for this magnificent food industry, which is now on its knees.

On 30 April, an application was made to this federal government for emergency safeguard action, which is completely lawful under the World Trade Organisation rules. This measure would have put a temporary, 200-day set of duties on the imported product—on tomatoes from Italy, on peaches from China and South Africa—and would have given this company and its growers and the growers' workers a 200-day, emergency breathing space, so that Coles and Woolworths were made to wake up, to look again at the prospects of having to buy local produce instead of cheap, junk imports. We suspect many of those imports are dumped.

What has happened to that application for emergency WTO safeguard action in the 28 days since it was launched with this federal government? You tell me. We do not know what has happened to that action. It was moved on fairly promptly from Senator Ludwig, the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. We understand he gave it his support, his prima facie approval, saying that it looks like a reasonable application. It is now sitting with the Minister for Trade. It has been sitting for 28 days going on 29 days tomorrow. I have to ask: is it because they are not an automotive industry based in Geelong and Broadmeadows? Is that the problem? Is it because this government just does not understand agriculture and food processing in particular and the enormous multiplier impact that food processing has on other jobs generated and on other value generated in both the domestic and export market?

SPC Ardmona used to export 30 per cent of its product. Unfortunately, that is down to zero next year. Those export dollars used to circulate around the Australian economy and leaven so many other associated industries like packaging, marketing and promotional industries. Now they are simply staring down the barrel of being wiped out by cheap imports, and this government is sitting on its hands.

There is also a biosecurity problem looming with the lack of action from the federal government, and, I have to say, also from the state government of Victoria at this time. There are 700 hectares of beautiful orchards that have to either be pushed over in the next few months or they need to be actively sprayed to make sure that they do not develop fruit fly, codling moth, a whole range of pest species and diseases, which the vigilance of local orchardists keep at bay. But if these trees no longer have any commercial fruit and the fruit they produce will be left on the ground then these orchardists do not have the resources to keep the trees sprayed. The cost of pushing those trees over is not insignificant—some $3,000 to $5,000 per hectare depending on the age and size of the trees. So we are begging the state and federal governments to support these orchardists in keeping the disease-free state of these orchards intact so that pest species do not spread to the fresh fruit market orchards, which of course are in the same region. It seems a very reasonable and sensible thing to do but, again, we are waiting for some response. There is just deafening silence on this critical matter.

As we speak, SPC Ardmona is in the process of preparing an anti-dumping action in the first instance against the Italian tomato imports and then against South African peaches and preserved fruit and then against the Chinese preserved fruit. New Zealand has recently very successfully yet again rolled over its anti-dumping action against Chinese preserved peaches. It is the same product that is destroying the Australian market. So we should expect, if given a fair hearing, that those anti-dumping actions would be successful. The trouble is they need to happen quickly. They need to be brought into place before too many of these orchards are already bulldozed.

I was so saddened as I drove around the Murray Valley a weekend ago and saw the huge mounds of pushed over what were magnificent fruit trees mounded up ready for burning. Those trees could have fed the world. They could have been used for some of our food aid. Our Australian food aid now is purchased from the cheapest supplier anyone can find anywhere. Speaking to representatives of some of the ethnic groups from the Myanmar or Burma just last night, I was deeply concerned to hear that they continue to be malnourished and in great need of food aid themselves. Yet Australia very proudly bought broken rice from Myanmar for its food aid to be sent somewhere else in the very recent past. I have been given the rice sacks with the big Australian kangaroo and with 'Gift from Australian AusAID' printed on them and then in slightly smaller print, not much smaller, 'This is broken rice from Myanmar.' How disgraceful, how shocking. Meanwhile there were hundreds in fact thousands of tonnes of fruit lying in the on the ground in the Goulburn Valley going to waste.

I beg this government to look harder at how it supports the manufacturing industries that have been destroyed by its policies. Let me talk about the Labor failures in relation to agriculture. There has been $32.8 million taken from agriculture in recent times. They are under extremely strained resource deficits.

Labor have reduced the funding for the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, from $3.8 billion to $1.7 billion, driven, of course, by the Greens, who do not see any value in Australian agriculture. They see farmers as the enemy of the people, it would seem. Then we have $33.4 million taken and cut from the cooperative research centres, which means fewer CRCs are funded each year. As most of them are agriculturally based, there is less funding for agricultural research just at the time we have to look at alternative crops and we have to look at how to grow agricultural crops in places where climates are changing. We have cuts in cargo-screening resources at ports and airports by $58.1 million, resulting in 4.7 million fewer air cargo consignments being inspected each year and 2,150 fewer vessels being boarded on arrival. That is the food security and food safety concerns that I was expressing before. We have cuts of $63 million from agriculture research within the CSIRO. They have closed CSIRO agricultural research sites in Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia. Some of those sites had been in action for more than three or four decades. All that research is now lost. No other country in the world that pretends to be a food-producing nation would do this sort of thing. We just cannot wait until 14 September but let us hope that is not too late for some of our great agricultural industries. (Time expired)

Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to begin tonight by congratulating the Treasurer on this, is sixth budget, because in this budget the Treasurer has successfully balanced the often competing priorities of fiscal responsibility at the same time as nation-building reform. We have put the focus on jobs, we have put the focus on growth and we have put the focus on fiscal responsibility at the same time as on education, disability reform and also major infrastructure reform to improve productivity.

There are many aspects of the 2013 federal budget that are close to my heart and I am particularly proud of. Tonight I am pleased to be able to talk about some of these as well as some particular aspects of this budget that will benefit by electorate of Canberra. Members would be aware of my great passion for education. In my maiden speech I said that my life had been transformed by education, that education was the great transformer and that I was living proof of that because through education I escaped the cycle of disadvantage and there are millions more like me. So I am really proud of our Labor government's education reforms and the $9.8 billion commitment to increase school funding over six years under the National Plan for School Improvement. I do believe that these reforms will give more Australians, more Canberrans, the chance to have their lives transformed by education, like I had.

At the same time I also want to dwell a bit on the investment that we as a government have made in education, because we are the government committed to education. I would say the majority of us in caucus are living proof of the transformative qualities of education and have greatly benefited from it. So, as a result of that, it is a driving issue for us. It is very front and centre for us.

In my electorate alone we have invested in the past $54 million to deliver more maths and science teachers. We have also delivered $131 million for 136 BER projects in Canberra benefiting 67 schools. That resulted in 17 new libraries, 23 multipurpose halls and 29 covered outdoor learning areas. We have also invested in 8½ thousand computers in 23 schools, which means that our children are now linked into modern technology and they can learn through education. I see schools like Narrabundah College, where they are doing a lot of remote learning as a result of having these fantastic computer labs. I was at St Bede's Primary School on Friday. They were celebrating their 50th anniversary. I was reminded again by the chair of the P&C—who made a really powerful speech when I actually opened their BER building, this beautiful multipurpose hall—of the fact that this would not have been possible if it had been left to the P&C to do their sausage sizzles, to do their lamington drives, to do their chocolate runs and to do their working bees to raise money. It would have never been possible to be able to come up with that significant sum of money to build the multipurpose hall. It was the stuff of dreams. And I get this from other P&Cs and other parents and teachers I meet throughout the schools. I spend a lot of time in schools because I love schools. I love seeing what is going on in the Canberra education system, speaking to the children and how they are benefiting from the significant investment we have made in Canberra, as well as speaking to the teachers about the benefits of the significant investments we have made in their professionalisation, autonomy and empowerment.

There is no doubt that one of the other cornerstones of this budget is our long-term commitment to DisabilityCare Australia, or the National Disability Insurance Scheme. For too long successive governments have shunned the opportunity to reform services for the profoundly disabled, neglecting the needs of people with significant and permanent disability, their carers and families. We have invested $14.3 billion over seven years to give people with disability, their families and carers the care and support they need over their lifetimes, and choice and control over the services they need. Most importantly, it focuses on the individual and defines the support that is needed for an individual over the course of their lifetime. Their needs can vary: during primary school they have specific needs, when they are teenagers they have different needs, when they are entering the workforce they have different needs and then as they age they have different needs.

Mr Deputy Speaker you, like me and everyone in this House, have spoken to carers. I have this enduring image of being at Koomarri—I see this family every time I go out to Koomarri to do a different event. The parents are a hard-working migrants and they have one daughter who is quite profoundly intellectually disabled. The parents are quite a bit older and every time I saw them prior to this DisabilityCare being introduced they were in tears—both of them, mother and father—absolutely scared witless about what was going to happen to their daughter when they passed on. You, Mr Deputy Speaker, like so many in this chamber would have had similar experiences: petrified parents, living with fear night and day as a result of them having an intellectually or physically disabled child that they are absolutely worried about should they pass on.

Tragically, I saw this family just recently at another event at Koomarri and they told me that the father has just been diagnosed with a brain tumour. So not only are they battling this issue of dealing with this profoundly intellectually disabled daughter but he also has his own health challenges. That is why DisabilityCare could not have come at a better time. It sends a very strong message to this family that their daughter will be looked after over the course of her lifetime.

It will end the cruel lottery that currently exists where the care and support a person receives depends on where they live and how they acquired their disability. In the ACT around $175 million in funding will be provided for the full rollout of our DisabilityCare by 2019-30. This will provide life-changing support to more than 5,000 Canberrans, one of them being that family I have just mentioned.

In the lead-up to this budget I spent a lot of time also talking to my constituents in Canberra and listening to their concerns—I am always talking to them and listening to their concerns. One area that was of particular concern was the issue of single parents. I am a child of a single mother: my father walked out on us when I was 11, and he walked out on us with $30 in the bank, so my early teen years were particularly hard. We were dining out every second night at family and friends because, basically, mum did not have any money. So I am acutely aware of the challenges that single mothers face. I grew up with one who did not have much money. We did not go on school camps, because mum did not have any money, so I am acutely aware of the disappointment that some single parents have in the fact that they cannot actually give their children what their peers are getting. And so I am acutely aware of the potential impact of some of the policies that we were looking at in terms of single parents was having on the single mothers in my electorate. I spent a lot of time talking to them, and I spent a lot of time actually sitting down with them and going through their budgets. These women are extraordinary budgeters. Everything is budgeted to within an inch of its life. They have Excel spreadsheets. You name it. They really do have tight budgets, so they really need to keep an eye on their finances. At the same time, these women were also working part time, training part time and trying to look after their child on their own as well.

Some of those conversations brought back a lot of really sad memories of what I went through as an early teen, which is why I had a lot of discussions with some of my colleagues and a number of ministers on what we could do on the single parents front. That is why I was particularly pleased with the income support that we outlined in the budget, where we are increasing the amount of income that Australians receiving income support can earn before their payments are affected. This will affect Australians and Canberrans receiving the parenting payment, Newstart allowance and widow, sickness or partner allowance. The income-free area will increase from $62 to $100 per fortnight. In practical terms, this means that people can take home $494 extra per year. In addition to this, the budget also outlines that from 1 July 2015, for the first time in Australia's history, the income-free area for Australians on income support will be indexed by the CPI. These reforms demonstrate that this Labor government is committed to supporting single parents and committed to upholding the principles of income support.

We also introduced a scheme where people who are on a pension supplement get the pensioner education supplement, which I think is a significant reform—$32 a fortnight, from memory. It allows those women who are in my electorate to get some assistance with the training they are undertaking. These reforms will immediately benefit 458 people on income support currently earning over $62 a fortnight in my electorate, and they have the potential to benefit more than 2,000 more people should they move into work.

The initiative in this budget that I was least heartened by was the introduction of paid parking in the Parliamentary Triangle next year. Members will have noticed that this issue dominated much of the local media in the days after the announcement. I am very proud of the Parliamentary Triangle. I know that there are a number of issues that confront the Parliamentary Triangle, particularly the fact that there are workers. It is a business district. It is a commercial district. We now have private enterprise there. We have public sector agencies there. We also have national institutions. So we are balancing a number of things. The Parliamentary Triangle is balancing a number of objectives and a number of missions. The challenge that we are currently faced with is the fact that workers are parking there—it is all free—and, as a result of that, a number of tourists particularly are not able to get to the national institutions. They are having to drive around and around and around because there is no car-parking space, which is not thrilling our fabulous national institutions—namely, the Library, Questacon, the Portrait Gallery, the National Gallery and the gorgeous old wedding cake of Old Parliament House—much. So it was decided to introduce paid parking to manage the parking in the Parliamentary Triangle.

The thing is—and I have been clear on this since my preselection—that I only support paid parking if there is an amenity. That is something I have been very clear on for many, many years, because I have worked in the Parliamentary Triangle and I know the challenges that people face. There is nothing there apart from those fantastic national institutions and a few wonderful cafes. There is no post office there. There used to be a post office; it has gone. There are a few banks there but not many. There are no shops. There is no mini-mart. There are no convenience stores. There is no amenity for people working there like there is in any business district throughout the rest of Canberra and any business district throughout the rest of Australia. If people are to pay for parking, I believe that they should be provided with the facility, the amenity—shops, convenience stores and mini-marts—similar to what has happened over at Brindabella Business Park, where there are a range of services. That is an industrial park, a business district, a commercial precinct.

I have initiated an inquiry into the level of amenity that is available in the Parliamentary Triangle. That inquiry will be conducted over the coming months through the Joint Standing Committee on the National Capital and External Territories. I am particularly looking forward to getting in and seeing what amenity is required in that area, what amenity can be provided in that area and what we can do about improving the services to the people in the Parliamentary Triangle.

Finally, my electorate also benefited from the budget's health and infrastructure investments, with $300,000 for the Cotter Road and Tuggeranong Parkway intersection and $5 million in funding for a dedicated emergency paediatric department at the Canberra Hospital.

This is a fiscally responsible budget but it is also a budget that contains nation-building reforms and it is a budget that the people of Canberra can be assured will benefit them into the future. It is a budget that puts jobs first, growth first, education first, fairness first and productivity first. The budget provides a very clear choice for Canberrans. I commend the bills to the House.

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

I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2013-2014 and the other appropriation bills. I want to confirm that this budget—another budget in deficit and in crisis—is really another Labor budget of more debt, more chaos and more spin. Nothing has been more pertinent in that regard than witnessing the Labor Party's backbench on the delivery of the budget. I have seen budgets over the five years since I was first elected to this parliament, and I have watched budgets over many more years. The complete and utter lack of enthusiasm for the budget from the individual Labor members is quite telling about what you find with this budget, and that is: it does not have a sense of life. When the former Treasurer Peter Costello delivered a budget, you got a sense of what he was on about. You got a strong message. You got a set of policies. You got a coherent narrative. And you got enthusiasm that flowed from the delivery of that budget. Since Treasurer Swan has been in place, we really have no coherent narrative. We do not have a set of policies that people can believe in and we have a very confused mix of settings. That confusion and chaos are adding to uncertainty in the economy.

I want to speak about some of the sectors that are experiencing that confusion and chaos and the consequences that it is having. It is evident that the Labor Party had to dragoon a whole series of backbenchers into speaking on the budget. That is quite telling about how the lack of belief in what the Treasurer is doing has really come to a head. Perhaps the best feature of this budget that I have found is the fact that the government is saving $4.5 million by not proceeding with plans to filter the internet of objectionable material. As a long-term opponent of the government's mandatory internet-filtering proposal, I was very happy to see that the government was forced into a humiliating backdown on this proposal. That saving is entirely appropriate, considering that that overblown government policy would not have delivered any benefit to the Australian society and would have burdened us with overregulation in the internet space, one of the least regulated spaces that we have left. That is probably the best thing that I will mention about this budget. It does not really get much better from there.

The Leader of the Opposition, in his budget in-reply speech, stated very clearly that, if the coalition is fortunate enough to be elected in September, he will ensure that there are days of deregulation in our parliament and days where legislation will simply be repealed, consolidated or redressed. The reaction of the Labor Party and the Labor Party's backbench was again very telling. They looked at each other in stunned awe, saying, 'Is such a thing possible?' or 'That's outrageous!' 'What a fool!' 'What an idiot!' 'How could you do that?' But, when I speak to the business sector—the small business sector in particular but also medium and large enterprises—in my electorate and all around Australia, business and industry are crying out for less regulation, for less interference from government, for a removal of the tens of thousands of regulations that are burdening them and stopping them from making investment decisions, from adding additional employees and from doing their job on a day-to-day basis. For the Labor Party to react in such an incredulous way to such a simple proposal highlights everything that is wrong with government today. What we did not see from the government was a program of delegislation or deregulation, of consolidating bad laws, of fixing things, of removing unnecessary law—a deregulation program that could kick-start our economy.

Nowhere is this felt more than in the small business sector. It is telling to note that, according to questions on notice returned recently, the number of small enterprises structured as companies has dropped by 23,100 since 2006-07, the number of small enterprises that paid company tax has dropped by 19,400 since 2006-07 and the number of small enterprises with a turnover of under $2 million has dropped by 2,400 since 2006-07. Those statistics are important because they represent a diminishment of the small and medium enterprise sector because of the increase in red tape we have seen under the Labor Party, the increase in regulation and the increase in taxes and charges. Indeed, over the last four years we have seen 29 new and increased taxes, 21,000 new regulations and record government borrowing and deficits, which I will turn to in a moment.

These new regulations and taxes hit hardest on the small business sector, on those businesses which have to generate the wealth and work so hard to risk their own capital and enterprise, to employ a few people and to add capacity to their business. This is where regulation and government intervention hurt the most. The big corporations have armies of lawyers and accountants and the ability to deal with change from government. Uncertainty and constant regulation by government hit the small and medium business sector hardest. Those statistics I have just read out for the benefit of the House are indeed very telling and troubling, given that we have around two million small businesses and that there has been such a reduction, and that they do most of the employing in Australia today.

A government that ignores the small business sector, that does not have a program to provide relief and lift the burden on hardworking family businesses and small and medium businesses in our nation, does not have a plan for the revival of our economy. So when we see a budget delivered that simply takes us further into debt and deficit and that does attempt to correct some of the errors of the past by cutting some expenditure but fails to do so adequately, that does not assist the small and medium business sector by deregulating or doing anything to relieve the burden they are facing—and that burden has become intolerable.

In particular, I think all Australians will be most concerned about the issue of gross debt breaching the $300 billion ceiling for the first time. We have seen this Labor government increase the debt ceiling on two occasions now. When asked about this issue the Treasurer, instead of providing honesty and transparency for Australians in the House at question time, has failed to answer whether he will lift the debt cap above $300 billion, given that in all of the projections it is extremely likely that in the next few years that Australia will need to borrow more than $300 billion of gross debt. The dishonesty is amazing when you consider that it is there for everybody to see.

We have also seen that the fifth record deficit in five years and two more deficits issued in this budget have led to a record net debt of about $192 billion. There is no credible path back to surplus in this budget. Indeed, we have seen the emergence of structural deficit, and structural deficits require structural solutions. Yet no structural solution has been found to the structural deficit crisis in the budget. If you do not address the structural deficit problem then you cannot hope to return to surplus. The claims that the government will bring the budget back to surplus in a reasonable time frame are completely unrealistic without the structural issues being addressed. It is simply not enough to cut some expenditure and say, 'Look, we're cutting expenditure.' You must address the structural settings when you have a structural deficit. The government has failed in that regard. At the same time they are raising more than $25 billion in higher taxes over the next five years and they are breaking their election commitments—although that is a regular, commonplace feature of this Labor government; it is hardly remarkable anymore when they break a promise—such as the scrapped family tax cuts and family payments and the other measures in the private health area. I think when you put all that into the blender you find a country that cannot get a sense of where this government is going.

There is no doubt that economic confidence is the other missing feature in our economy at the moment. Not only are business conditions difficult; not only is the global financial crisis continuing to impact upon the operation of our economy and the confidence of businesses to invest; but the ongoing chaos and confusion from the federal government level is producing sovereign risk in relation to doing business in Australia and causing a crisis of confidence. There is no doubt that Australians are waiting for 14 September with bated breath so we can have a renewal of confidence in government in Australia, refresh the settings of confidence in our economy and renew people's willingness to spend, people's willingness to invest and people's willingness to employ. I do not think that should be underestimated when you consider the record of the government—and it does not matter what sector you go to.

I cannot let an appropriation bill speech go by without mentioning that defence expenditure as a percentage of GDP is now at levels not seen since 1938. Not since 1938 have we seen defence expenditure so low. On the Labor Party's own website, it says that the first priority of government must be defence, protecting Australia. If that is the first priority of national government, and it is, why has $25 million been cut from the defence budget? The coalition believes that the purpose of a national government, the first priority of a national government, is defence of the nation. Under the Howard government, defence expenditure was cauterised from cuts. It was protected from savage cuts. Yet this government has sent our nation, with our proud Australian military tradition, to defence expenditure levels not seen since 1938. It raises serious sustainability questions for the operation of the Australian Defence Force, its ability to engage in overseas operations in the region and its ability to deploy when necessary to protect Australia's regional and national interests.

Again, it does not matter what sector you go to; the low revenue and the problems that we have seen from the budgetary mismanagement over the last five years are having an impact on confidence. Certainly, it is the case that Labor has a spending problem, not a revenue problem. We have seen a lot made of the fact that revenues have fallen. From the overblown projections that we have seen, revenue has fallen. But revenue in 2013-14 from this budget is projected to be $80 billion higher than at the end of the Howard government. That sounds like a lot of money, but it is not as much money as the $120 billion more in expenditure than at the end of the Howard government, which highlights why we are in such deficit. It is not that we do not have more money than we did in 2007—we do have more revenue and more income—but that we have expenditure on a scale that has seen six budget deficits and debt continuing to balloon out.

Budgetary mismanagement has consequences for all Australians. It has consequences not just for small businesses and medium-sized enterprises but also for individual families. For households, 29 increased or new taxes and charges mean increased cost-of-living pressures. There is no greater issue in any metropolitan city—I come from an outer-metropolitan electorate myself—than cost-of-living pressures. We have heard today that evidence has been produced that electricity prices will soon be double what they were when this federal Labor government was elected. They will have doubled for households and doubled for businesses.

Ms Rishworth interjecting—

In Sydney, that has had a huge impact. Not only do electricity prices have an impact on households; they have an impact on businesses and on the cost of doing business in Australia. Access to cheap electricity is of course providing a resurgence in the American economy: cheap energy. Cheap energy is critical, which is why you would not introduce the world's biggest carbon tax at a time when electricity prices are already rising.

Apart from the revenue implications, the other issue is that these are 'Treasury's figures'. The government have no responsibility for their own budget, according to the Treasurer—and according to the members opposite, including the member for Kingston. They have no responsibility for their own budget. But somebody is getting these figures wrong. And somebody is getting these figures wrong in terms of the carbon price, because I can tell the member for Kingston and other members present that the carbon price will not sit at $12 per tonne when the European carbon price is now collapsing—

Ms Rishworth interjecting—

The member for Kingston does not understand the market, because the price would not be set by Treasury and it would not be set by the government. The market must flow, and the market in Europe says that the price per tonne is very low. The market price is at rock bottom. So having an Australian carbon price of $12, or having an Australian carbon price which could reach up to $30, is not a market mechanism; it is an arbitrary mechanism. It is a failure of government to be imposing the price well above what you can get in all the other markets in the world today. It will not be good for Australia because you can buy emissions at $4 or $5 a tonne in Europe, whereas here we are mandating $12 in the budget. Of course, that is not the government's figure—the member for Kingston did not come up with that—that is some Treasury bureaucrat!

Surely, it is the role of government to question the bureaucracy and ask, 'Where did that figure come from and why is it not in line with world expectations on carbon pricing?' It is yet another example of the dishonesty and deceit that is in this budget. If the government bases its budget on projections that are wrong, on forecasts which are unreasonable and on figures which will never come to fruition it is setting our nation up for failure. Australians, and all members of this House, are looking for a new start in a new parliament with a government that has a consistent and firm approach to budgetary matters. The coalition has a real solutions plan to restore hope, reward and opportunity for Australians.

Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was great to hear the member for Mitchell leave with the key lines that I am sure he gets sent home with every night to rehearse and practice. It is great that he has been able to get it delivered.

I am pleased to speak on the Appropriations Bill (No. 1) 2013-2014 and cognate bills, and in particular the budget that was delivered by the Treasurer a couple of weeks ago. This is an important budget. It is a budget that sets this nation up for the future. What you see in this budget is an important focus on jobs and on making sure that we have an investment in the long term that will promote jobs. Our investment in infrastructure—

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 20 : 02 to 20 : 16

As I was saying before the division, this is an incredibly important budget because it sets Australia up for the future. It makes the strong investment in infrastructure that we need and also puts jobs at the heart of the economy. I am very proud to be part of a government which, over nearly six years, has created in excess of 900,000 jobs—a significant and important thing for the economy. In addition, this is making the smart investments. I will talk about how many schools are going to benefit in the investment we are making in education and on a whole range of investments which will ensure we take up the opportunities of the 21st century and of the Asian century. Also, this is about a fairer Australia, in particular with DisabilityCare.

As Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers, I know there are many people with disabilities and their families and carers who are now celebrating the 2013-14 budget. Despite some mislaid comments in the media, this budget is about hope, especially the part that deals with DisabilityCare Australia. The budget has made the responsible decision to fully fund DisabilityCare Australia, the national disability insurance scheme, into the long term. This funding security will provide people with a significant and permanent disability, their families and carers, the certainty they deserve. As I have gone around previously in my electorate of Kingston but also in my role as parliamentary secretary, the one thing so many people are calling out for is certainty and long-term security. Indeed, in the Page electorate when I was talking with carers and their families, one of the questions which came up—and it has come up around the country—was: how are we to know that this funding is going to continue? Where is the security? This budget provides the long-term security which people have been waiting for. No longer will the carpet be pulled out from under people's feet when funding is cut or service organisations run out of places and can no longer accept people. This funding is a certainty.

I am pleased that we are investing $14.3 billion over seven years to roll out DisabilityCare Australia across the country. It will give families, carers and people with a disability the support they need over a lifetime but also, importantly, the choice and control over the services they receive. We cannot underestimate the impact that this choice and control means to people. Importantly, it will also ensure that in the long term people's goals and aspirations are recognised and the care and support they need to achieve those goals will be met. This is critical.

As I travel around, there is a lot of excitement about DisabilityCare Australia now that we have a secured agreement for the full rollout of the scheme with New South Wales, South Australia and the ACT—with agreements also being reached with Victoria, Queensland, Tasmania and the Northern Territory—with the full scheme in all these states and territories to be rolled out between July 2018 and July 2019. These agreements mean that 90 per cent of Australians will be covered by DisablityCare Australia, in the event that they are born with or acquire a disability.

The government will continue to seek agreement with Western Australia for the full national rollout of DisabilityCare Australia. But it is important to recognise that through the modest increase in the Medicare levy—and through our savings measures—we provide that certainty in the long term, in the budget, for DisabilityCare Australia. It is the responsible thing to do. It is the fair thing to do. This does deliver and build on the government's $1 billion investment in the 2012-13 budget for the launch of DisabilityCare Australia, now in six locations across the country and in four of those locations launching from 1 July this year. This will see real action on the ground, with the beginning of the rollout.

The 2013-14 federal budget also demonstrates the longstanding and ongoing commitment by the Gillard government to improve the capacity of people with a disability to participate fully in the economic and social life of our nation. It continues a number of critically important payments, concessions, and support and care services. I will touch on a few of these payments and services that will continue to be provided by the federal Labor government because we truly understand how critical it is that people with a disability—as well as their families and carers—are well supported.

We will continue to provide income support for those with a disability who are unable to support themselves financially through employment. We will continue to make regular payments and allowances to financially assist eligible carers and people with a disability. We will continue to provide supported employment and improve access to information and advocacy services, so Australians with a disability are able to reach their potential. We will continue to provide critical peer support, respite and information services for carers to help them effectively manage their carer responsibilities. And we will continue to provide access to early-intervention services through the popular Helping Children with Autism and the Better Start for Children with Disability initiatives.

I said earlier and I will say again, I am truly proud to be part of a government that recognises the importance of supporting Australians with a disability, their families and carers. The 2013-14 federal budget reflects the Labor government's strong belief that a historic reform like DisabilityCare Australia needs a solid funding base well into the future, and the security and certainty that this provides. I believe this is fundamentally important.

Not only is this an important thing for the nation but also it is a very important thing for my local electorate of Kingston. It is estimated that in my electorate 2,978 local people could be eligible for support under disability care. I know, from talking with many of these people in my local electorate and around the country, that this is something that would be very welcome. I am also proud to be part of a government that is working to improve the quality of environment and reduce pollution.

As the Parliamentary Secretary for Sustainability and Urban Water, I am pleased to say that in this budget we have seen the introduction of significant new incentives for the destruction of synthetic greenhouse gases and ozone-depleting substances. In the 2013-14 budget, the government has allocated $12 million over the forward estimates to directly encourage greater destruction of waste SGGs. The government has also provided $42 million over the forward estimates for a number of other measures to increase emission abatements for SGGs. These incentives deliver on the Gillard government's commitment to introduce a destruction program for waste synthetic greenhouse gases and ozone-depleting substances as part of the clean energy future plan.

It is important that when synthetic greenhouse gases reach the end of their life they are destroyed rather than emitted into the atmosphere, where they can cause harm to our environment. Any reduction of emissions achieved through the destruction incentives will contribute to Australia's emissions abatement commitment under the Kyoto protocol. To achieve this, the government will increase the amount paid to refrigeration contractors by 50 per cent for waste gas reclaimed and provided to Refrigerant Reclaim Australia for destruction. We will also be introducing a further destruction incentive which will increase the amount paid for the destruction of synthetic greenhouse gases to 70 per cent of the equivalent carbon price where the gas species and quantity can be independently verified. By increasing incentives for the industry, we will encourage additional recovery of synthetic greenhouse gases where the gas is subject to the equivalent carbon price but not suitable for recycling or reuse. In a further step in reducing emissions from synthetic greenhouse gases, the government will examine the potential for the introduction of a complementary product stewardship scheme for domestic refrigeration and air-conditioning equipment with small gas charges, usually less than two kilograms, to reclaim waste gas, metals, plastic and hazardous materials for reuse or appropriate disposal.

As part of this program, additional funding has also been provided through the budget to the Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities to increase compliance with and enforcement of domestic licensing requirements to prevent illegal emissions of gas.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 20:27 to 20:36

As I was saying, as Parliamentary Secretary for Sustainability and Urban Water and as a South Australian, I am proud that the Gillard government has locked in its commitment to the historic Murray-Darling Basin reform through this budget. I have spoken many times in this place on the importance of the Murray-Darling Basin reform process and the critical role that the basin plays in the lives of many Australians. Late last year, this Labor government ended a century-long argument about how best to manage our rivers and deliver a Murray-Darling Basin Plan that restores our rivers to health, supports strong regional communities and ensures sustainable food production.

But we are determined to achieve greater environmental outcomes than could be achieved just through this plan. That is why we are providing $1.8 billion over 10 years from 2014-15 to relax key flow constraints and recover an additional 450 gigalitres of water for the environment. This budget maximises the environmental outcomes under the Basin Plan, and the plan will be achieved while avoiding adverse social and economic impacts on basin communities. As a South Australian, I am proud to support our government providing an enhanced Basin Plan with better environmental and social outcomes. This year, the Gillard government has made smart investments for Australia's future like improving the Murray-Darling.

In the few minutes I have left, I would like to touch on my electorate of Kingston. For Kingston, this is a very important budget, especially in the area of education. In this budget, we have ensured that there is better resourcing for our schools, our classrooms and our teachers. The National Plan for School Improvement is critical to ensuring that every student—and the Prime Minister has said this many times before—gets a great education. On average, the plan will deliver an extra $14.5 billion for Australian schools over the next six years, which is an average of an additional $4,000 for every student and $1.5 million for every school. It is incredibly important for my electorate of Kingston, where schools have often told me they need better resources to use for specialist teachers, more SSOs, more support in the classroom and more professional development. So it is very important that this money is part of the budget.

As I said at the beginning, infrastructure is very important in this budget and I am very pleased that there have been a number of infrastructure investments. I would like to highlight the black spot funding. The black spot funding will include improvements to the intersections of Dyson Road and O'Sullivan Beach Road; Dyson Road and Sherriffs Road; Bains Road and Piggott Range Road; South Road and Flaxmill Road; Old South Road and Reynell Road; and Grant Road at Old Reynella. Fixing these black spots it is really important. It is important infrastructure investment so that we can ensure safety on the roads in my electorate of Kingston.

There have been other investments, but I will not be able to talk about all of them. I commend the appropriations and the budget to the House. (Time expired)

Natasha Griggs (Solomon, Country Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

More debt, more chaos, more spin is the way to describe the Gillard Labor government's budget, a budget that delivers more debt, more deficits, more taxes, more broken promises and more uncertainty from an incompetent government that just cannot be trusted. After six years of chaos, debt and spin, Australians are desperately seeking stable and competent economic management, but the Labor budget has once again failed to deliver.

I would like to use the appropriations bill to talk a little bit about some budget items but will start with the Palmerston hospital. As I said in this place many times, I have always been committed to the Palmerston hospital. Palmerston is where I live. It was the previous Northern Territory Labor government that failed Territorians. They were the ones that put a fence around a block of land with no building and called it a hospital. There are no plans to relocate or downgrade services being offered at RDH at this time.

I would like to share a transcript from the Northern Territory Minister for Health, Robyn Lambley, who said on Territory Talk:

We've always been committed to a Palmerston hospital. We've never suggested in any way shape or form that there wouldn't be a Palmerston hospital but I guess coming into government we've realised that what Labor was putting forward was would be inadequate over the coming decades. That was fairly short sighted so we've committed to spending $5 million or less hopefully on the scoping study just to make sure we get it right. We think that it's absolutely essential that we do get it right not just that the people of Palmerston and the rural area but the whole of the greater Darwin area.

She also said:

We've committed to a two-hospital system in the greater Darwin area. There will always be a Royal Darwin Hospital and there will always be a hospital placed within that Palmerston area to service the future growth of the greater Darwin area but yes, the scoping study will be available for public scrutiny and inspection. We think that really the plans that Labor put forward really don't take into account the demographic forecast for the area satisfactorily.

Does that sound like a government that is not committed to the Palmerston hospital? I do not think so. But as we know, Labor never fully explored the range of options available to ensure that the health needs of Darwin, Palmerston and the rural area were properly serviced into the future. That is why it is really important that the Giles government undertakes this scoping study, which the health minister said they are going to do.

There is a lot of scaremongering that is going on in Palmerston from the Labor candidate saying that we are not committed to the Palmerston hospital. Well I put on the record that the Territory government is committed to the hospital. I am a member of the coalition and I have always been committed to the hospital. What we have got to remember is that the $70 million that was promised by the Gillard Labor government for a hospital is actually not enough money. You cannot build a hospital for $70 million and that is why the scoping study is absolutely important. As I said, I have always been committed to the Palmerston hospital because I live in Palmerston. I was at the very first community meeting when the idea of the hospital was first conceived. So I want to assure people of Darwin and Palmerston that the hospital is not at risk despite the scaremongering that the Labor candidate is putting out into people's letterboxes. Please, do not be deceived by Labor's scaremongering. The Palmerston hospital is not at risk.

I would like to move now to something that is at risk. My colleagues and the chief minister asked me to raise the road funding that the Northern Territory received from this Gillard Labor government's budget because the 2013 federal budget, particularly the Nation Building Program 2, was terrible for the Northern Territory in a number of ways. Firstly, the overall allocation was down by almost 50 per cent. This was evidenced by the NBP 2 being cut by almost 50 per cent from the Nation Building Program 1. Nation Building Program 1 totalled $474 million for the period 2008-09 to 2012-13. The NBP 2 totalled $244 million, which equates to a cut of $230 million. This, as anyone would expect, is a massive blow to the Northern Territory's road infrastructure budget for civil construction and for the transport industry. This could also potentially lead to job losses because the Northern Territory simply cannot afford to carry the burden. The Australian government should carry its share of commitments.

The second point I would like to make is that the NBP2 spend is pushed out into the later years of the program. The government are making out that they are spending all this money now, but $183.6 million, which is about 75 per cent of the spend, is not available until the 2016-17 financial year. This makes some of the key projects difficult, and one of them is in my electorate—the duplication of the Tiger Brennan Drive from Woolner to Berrimah Road. The regional roads productivity program is potentially impacted. But, despite that, the minister for infrastructure flew into Darwin with the Labor candidates—and it was like: 'We're spending all this money', as if it was going to happen tomorrow. But Territorians are smarter than that. They know that this government is leading them up the garden path and that this money is not going to be available until 2016-17. Unfortunately, the Giles government have to stump up their part of this expenditure now. They are suffering because the former Territory Labor government left them with $5.5 billion worth of debt. So, financially, it is quite difficult for the Territory government to stump up the money straightaway.

I am surprised that Minister Snowdon was not able to get Minister Albanese to fund some of these projects, because some of the projects that I want to talk about are in his electorate of Lingiari. There is no new capital expenditure for the Australian government road network, and this is despite the Northern Territory government submitting an infrastructure program worth around $522 million. These projects are largely in Minister Snowdon's electorate. There is $40 million for flood immunity for the Saddle, Mathieson and Sandy creeks on the Victoria Highway; $70 million for safety and fatigue management, including truck parking bays; intersections and safety treatment to the Katherine River bridge; upgrading of the Stuart Highway from Dixon to the MVR in Alice Springs, which is actually in Minister Snowdon's electorate; $125 million for strengthening and widening the National Highway for the Stuart, Barkly and Victoria highways; and $180 million for ongoing repairs and maintenance for the national network. So what did the Northern Territory get? Zip. Nothing. There was no money whatsoever for a capital expenditure upgrade.

I am disappointed. I would have thought that Minister Snowdon would have been able to do something, but obviously he did not. But I can assure you that our candidate, Tina MacFarlane, will fight for Territorians. She knows what these roads are like. She is up and down and driving around on them. She is a pastoralist from Mataranka. She knows that these roads need work, and she will stand there and fight for Territorians. As I said, the NT did get some funding, but it will not be available until 2016-17. Also, as I said, we have had Minister Albanese and all the other ministers visit my electorate. You would be surprised, member for Durack, that they do not let us know that they are coming, yet they spruik all this money that they are going to spend.

We have some other projects which the Northern Territory missed out on. They include: $40 million for the sealing of the Tanami Road; $80 million for local roads; $20 million for Gapuwiyak; $25 million for Ramingining; $10 million to seal the road from Ali Curung to the Stuart Highway; $25 million to seal the Kintore Road from Papunya to the Derwent river crossing; $20 million for upgrading the Galiwinku Highway from a Galiwinku to Gawa; $40 million to extend the seal on the Outback Way towards Harts Range and some other roads; and $10 million to commence sealing the Buntine Highway to Lajamanu. These are decent projects, and they are all in Minister Snowdon's electorate. I am not sure what has happened. It is also important to point out that there is no money to repair and maintain the Australian government highway network. The NT government asked for $128 million and received with $52.8 million. As I said, our candidate, Tina MacFarland, would put up a fight. I think Minister Snowdon has just let it go down. I know Senator Crossin would have been in there fighting. She is a good representative of the Territory, but unfortunately Labor are not listening to her and will let her go, which is very is disappointing.

The Chief Minister also wanted me to point out that the $128 million is desperately needed to repair and maintain our road pavements due to growth, to adverse weather and to ageing. The concern is that less funding will lead to rapid deterioration in some sections of the national network and dollars will have to be diverted to high-priority areas to ensure accessibility and stability. That is the Northern Territory government's prerogative but it is disappointing that the Northern Territory government sought $128 million after good, well-costed funding, but basically they have been ignored.

This is not the first time this issue has been raised. I know my colleague Senator Scullion had similar concerns last budget, and now we are doing this again. This reduction in funding comes despite sections of the Stuart Highway from Darwin to Katherine being labelled 'high risk' and some of the worst road conditions in Australia by the AANT. It is alarming that the need for upgrading is being ignored. As I said, they are all in Minister Snowdon's electorate. Maybe they are going to use some of the money already put away, member for Durack, the $430-odd million that was stashed away in the budget on announcements that have not been made.

Barry Haase (Durack, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Secret announcements.

Natasha Griggs (Solomon, Country Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, secret announcements. It is concerning that the most recent AusRAP risk mapping report indicates that the Darwin to Pine Creek section of the Sturt Highway is the highest risk section of the national highway on which to travel in Australia. That is nothing for the Gillard Labor government to be proud of. In addition, the AusRAP star ratings report also shows that over 50 per cent of the Northern Territory section of the Stuart Highway rates at only one and two stars. The Darwin to Pine Creek section of the Stuart Highway is a significant part of the substandard section. Urgent investment is needed to improve the Darwin to Pine Creek section of the Stuart Highway. This was submitted with submissions from the Northern Territory government, but the Gillard Labor government and Minister Snowdon have obviously ignored this information. As I said, I know that our candidate, Tina MacFarland, would fight for funding to ensure that roads in Lingiari are well serviced.

Having substandard roads is not good, so I am appalled that the Gillard Labor government has chosen to ignore Territorians. They need to focus more attention on our roads. As I said, this is not the first time that expenditure for Northern Territory roads has been raised in this place. My colleague senator Scullion has raised many times in the other place, during his tenure as a senator, expenditure on road funding and how important it is to ensure that the national highway framework is maintained for safety. The Stuart Highway is the only way into the Northern Territory by road. If that highway is not maintained, it will be detrimental for Territorians.

Stephen Jones (Throsby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This has been a difficult budget to frame with uncertainty in the world economy, where Eurozone countries have significant debt and double digit unemployment in some countries, with unemployment in some countries well above 15 per cent, with youth unemployment close to a quarter of some youth populations and the unemployment and uncertain outlook in the United States. When we look to some of our major trading partners where we have traditionally looked for growth opportunities, certainly there is significant uncertainty there as well. So there is a difficult global environment and a difficult domestic environment in which to frame a budget, with a drop-off in projected revenues of over $16 billion over the budget period.

Within this very difficult environment to frame a budget and to ensure that we keep the Australian economy moving forward, I think the Treasurer has to be commended for the job that he has done. Australia stands alone in the developed world, with record low unemployment with a five in front of it, interest rates at a historic low and low inflation. The economy still continues to grow, but we know that the growth is both fragile and uneven. There are many areas throughout the nation that are not enjoying the benefits of the boom in the resources sector, particularly in areas that have a higher than average exposure to trade and to the impacts of the record high Australian dollar.

Within this context, the priority of this budget has been jobs, ensuring that Australians are kept in jobs and that businesses are keeping the doors open. If we had to make a choice between bringing the budget into surplus and ensuring that we had people in work and businesses open, we chose the latter, and we did that unashamedly. They are our priorities. They are Labor priorities.

Our national outlook is positive and bright, but it does not mean that we can lose our focus on measures to ensure that economic participation is maximised and that those who need it are supported by a strong safety net of government services and social support. We are well situated to build on our record of resilience over the past five years. Over 950,000 jobs have been created under Labor. There are more people in work today than at any other time in our nation's history. We have a triple-A credit rating by all three major global agencies. We are one of only eight countries to achieve that with a stable outlook. Our economy is more than 13 per cent bigger than it was when we came into government. As I said, we have contained inflation. We have record low interest rates and strong public finances.

With the 2013-14 budget, the government made a choice to keep our economy strong and to invest in the future. It is a budget that responds to the current economic circumstances and continues to support jobs and growth. For members like me, for Labor members, supporting the growth of employment is one of the principal reasons for being in this place and for advocating the policies of the government in my electorate. Jobs give our lives dignity and a way forward. A job gives us the ability to imagine a future with a family and a home of our own.

Budgets are about choices. They involve choices about priorities and about what to spend and where to save, but they are much more than an aggregate of those decisions. At the core of this budget is a choice about our future. It brings together Labor values with the circumstances that we find ourselves in. So, while the economic circumstances before us are unlike any that any government before has faced, our approach to the budget remains embedded in those core principles. No government, as the Treasurer says, gets to choose the global economic circumstances in which the budget is framed, but we do get to choose our priorities as a nation.

We have prioritised two Labor initiatives in this budget: firstly, the Gonski school education reforms, which are about ensuring that every child at every school has a quality education and every school has the resources to deliver that education; and, secondly, ensuring that the National Disability Insurance Scheme disability care is funded so that the lottery of life and how you acquire a disability do not determine whether you have the appropriate medical and other care to meet your needs throughout the course of your life. Those two priorities are very well supported in the community, prioritised in this budget and funded and accounted for in this budget. They are something that people will look upon in decades to come and say, 'Thank God that a government'—this Labor government—'had the courage and the foresight to instigate those reforms.'

The challenge for government is to manage the process of economic transformation. These transitions are never seamless. Our economy does not exist in a vacuum. They are taking place against a backdrop of a global economy undergoing profound change. Nominal GDP growth has fallen below real GDP growth in through-the-year terms over the past three quarters. This is unprecedented in the 50-year history of our national accounts. It is largely due to the combination of the sustained high dollar in the face of lower terms of trade. This scenario makes it tougher for exporters, who receive less for what they sell and, in an attempt to keep their profits up, push back on suppliers, often paying less than they would in better times. Everyone is seeking to cut their costs. This has an impact on margins and on jobs. It is also hard on those domestic firms that compete with imports that have become cheaper, in some instances over 40 per cent cheaper, over the last two years.

Nationally the task of Labor in government is to build a strong yet fair economy. Good economic management just does not grow the economy; it ensures the growth is enjoyed by the maximum number of people. In my electorate, in the Illawarra in the Southern Highlands, just like in other areas of Australia like Geelong and Broadmeadows, our economy is dealing with the impact of the high Australian dollar on manufacturing. In the Illawarra we feel the brunt of these economic circumstances. While our local economy is undergoing its own transformation from traditional manufacturing to a growth in service sector employment, manufacturing still strongly underpins our economy. One in 10 jobs remain within this sector. It is good news that the Australian government is strongly backing the Illawarra and highlands economy through this economic transformation. First and foremost, the Labor government is investigating $1 billion to support and grow jobs. This billion-dollar investment will significantly boost Australian manufacturing, including in the greater Illawarra and beyond.

Our plan for Australian jobs has three core strategies: backing Australian firms to win more work at home, supporting Australian industry to increase exports and win business abroad, and helping Australian small and medium sized businesses to create and grow new jobs. In addition, the $30 million Illawarra Region Innovation and Investment Fund is helping to attract new industries to the region. This fund has leveraged $62 million in project investment, and there are some truly great success stories coming out of this investment. There is new investment in communication manufacturing equipment that is being used on the rollout of the National Broadband Network, and new investment in computer system and design.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Proceedings suspended from 21 : 02 to 21:17

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The question is that this bill be now read a second time. I call the honourable member for Throsby in continuation.

Stephen Jones (Throsby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I was saying, the Illawarra Region Innovation and Investment Fund has led to significant new investment and investment in the pipeline, including new food manufacturing, innovative printing facilities and a new mental health facility, just to name a few. These are important investments to help an economy transition. Of course, it is added to by the fact that the National Broadband Network is being rolled out quicker and in greater density in the Illawarra and Southern Highlands region than in any other area in the country. This will be the game changer for the Illawarra.

The Illawarra and Southern Highlands is laying the foundations we need to build a stronger economy now and for the future. And it will be based on six key assets. First is our skilled and talented local workforce, with expertise gained from over 100 years of experience in engineering manufacturing and mining. Second is the rollout of the National Broadband Network, as I have mentioned, which will connect our region to the markets of the world and enhance the development of new industries, and transform the way we live, work and play.

Third is the University of Wollongong, which serves the region and the country by producing world-class professionals in medicine, law, education, engineering and information technology. In fact, one quarter of all information and communication technology graduates in Australia come from the University of Wollongong. The government has put over $100 million investment into capital works at the university and there is more investment in the pipeline. Fourth, there is the Port Kembla harbour, which gives the potential to develop a freight transport and logistics hub for the region. The Australian government's $25.5 million investment in preconstruction work and engineering work on the Maldon-Dumbarton rail link is helping to make this potential a future reality. The Maldon-Dumbarton rail link would connect Port Kembla to the major mines and freight corridors of the Central-West and Western Sydney. It can also take pressure off the Sydney-Wollongong passenger line by removing some of the freight off that line.

Fifth, we are blessed with a wonderful natural environment: our stunning beaches, rolling green hills and magnificent escarpments all provide an impressive backdrop to our daily lives in the Illawarra region. Not only that, but our cultural diversity and strong arts and sporting culture is a part of the foundation for future opportunities in tourism, sports and other economic development.

Finally our services sector: the health and aged-care services are rapidly expanding. Indeed, the largest employer in the region is now community services and health. The Illawarra is an attractive and affordable destination for retirees and our potential to develop a seniors economy is significant.

I have spoken before in this place about the need to ensure that our local manufacturers and local workers get a fair share of the enormous opportunities that are being generated by Australia's mining and resources boom. I welcome the fact that earlier today we had the opportunity to debate our plan for Australian jobs—and that passed through the House of Representatives. This is an important piece of legislation which will connect the manufacturers, the fabricators, the industries and workshops within my electorate and right around the country to the benefits of the mining boom, providing work and opportunities now and into the future.

I would like to say something about the debate that is raging at the moment about the use of 457 visas. There has been some speculation about widespread rorts within the scheme. We do not need to do a forensic analysis of this to know that there is something wrong when I have got workers in my electorate who say they have applied for jobs in businesses and have been turned back only to know that overseas workers have been brought in on 457 visas to fill the jobs that they are ready, willing and able to do. I think it is wrong and I do this on the basis of an understanding that well over one quarter of the workforce of my electorate has come to the Illawarra and surrounding regions from another country. At another time they came to work in the steelworks, the mines and the services industry within the Illawarra so there is no objection to workers coming from overseas to work here. In fact, my electorate was founded on that. But you have something that is very wrong when you have workers who are ready, willing and able to stand up and take a job and they are being overlooked by employers, those very same employers who are coming to government and saying, 'We want the right to access to 457 visa workers to do these jobs.' Close to five or six years ago, the Leader of the Opposition referred to workers as job snobs if they would refuse employment with one business because they thought it was not good enough for them. Well, we run the risk of some employers being the new job snobs by the fact that they are overlooking local workers to hire workers from overseas—and that is simply not good enough.

I have been pressing the immigration minister to introduce new measures to ensure a local work test is put in place for these workers. I am particularly concerned about workers who have been thrown out of lifelong employment and they are now in their 50s, seeking work and are willing to travel for work and they feel that they are being discriminated against in their search for work in this regard. I am hopeful that the minister of immigration will respond to this and ensure that a new test is put into place to ensure employers must test the local labour market and must offer available positions to local appropriately skilled workers before they turn to the government and ask the government to approve 457 visas in this regard. It is a good budget and it deserves our support in difficult times. (Time expired)

Ken O'Dowd (Flynn, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to talk about Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2013-2014, Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 2013-2014 and Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2013-2014.

Australia is now at a significant crossroads. Without sounding too pessimistic, I think we must seriously be at a point where we sink or swim. I have previously described the looming federal election as one of the most definitive of our time. I say this in light of the delivery of the Treasurer's sixth deficit budget, one which was promised to be in surplus—and we had heard that more than 600 times. I highlight the importance of this year's election not to be alarmist but to highlight that Australia has choice to make.

The first choice is a Labor government that is obsessed with retaining power at any cost. It has no clear direction or plan to fix its mistakes. It has decimated the northern cattle industry. It is driving industry and jobs offshore. It has been hijacked by the extreme Left and is leading this nation down the path of economic ruin. The other choice is a coalition government, which I will be proud to be a part of, that will stand ready to let business and industry do what they do best and to get out of their way. It will provide a stable environment for investments to create jobs. It will ease the cost of living by getting rid of the confidence-crushing taxes such as the carbon tax. It will end the border protection failures, get better communications to our regions sooner and make Australia strong again.

The Treasurer's presentation of the budget during the last sitting period said it all. His delivery was flat, dejected and unenthusiastic. To me this suggests one thing: the government is out of ideas. The signs are there, and the Gillard government has been repeatedly warned by the people, the businesses and industry. Those signs are evident. Budget deficits are normal since Labor came to power in 2007. In 2008-09 we had a $27 billion deficit; in 2009-10, a $54.5 billion deficit; in 2010-11, a $47.5 billion deficit; in 2011-12, a $43.4 billion deficit; and in 2012-13, a $19.4 billion deficit, which was supposed to be a surplus. And we have projections for 2013-14 of an $18.8 billion deficit and for 2014-15 of an $11 billion deficit. Our gross debt is to sail past $300 billion in the forward estimates. The Treasurer has lost control of his spending and forecasts and now wants to pass the blame on to the Treasury.

Both large and small businesses continue swimming in red and green tape. There are plenty of local examples of small businesses in Flynn that are struggling to survive. There is a two-speed economy in Central Queensland towns. Smaller employers who are not directly involved in the mining or gas industries are losing their workers to the higher paid mining and gas jobs.

Chinese growth continues to plateau, affecting our commodity prices, and we do not know what is around the corner there. However, we hope that commodity prices will bounce back and I hope that we are a part of supplying China and other parts of Asia with these commodities. There has been $100 billion worth of resource projects shelved or scrapped. I refer to the project in your electorate, Deputy Speaker Scott, for Wandoan coal which was proposed by Xstrata. That involved not only the mine at Wandoan but several other coal projects which would have use the railway link line to Banana and then on to the Wiggins Island project at Gladstone. These plans have all been scrapped.

We face fierce competition from countries in Africa, from Indonesia, Mongolia and Kazakhstan, which is a rising commodity supplier, and also from Canada and countries in South America. The high Australian dollar has also affected most of our exports; however, in the last few days we have seen it starting to fall as the United States dollar picks up. The car industry, as we all know, is on the brink.

The steel industry cannot compete with overseas prices; labour costs are too high for the productivity of the workforce. Trade tariffs are now working against us. For example, beef into Japan and Korea and dairy products into China have all been affected by the trade tariffs that are placed upon our products being exported into those Asian countries. This fact needs to be addressed ASAP. Our cement industry is fighting hard against imports. In fact, they cannot produce at the same price at which cement can be brought into Australia. The pig industry struggles to survive without subsidies while the countries from which we import our pig products subsidise their own products. So our pig farmers are behind the eight ball at the very start.

The fishing industry is another industry of concern, since 70 per cent of the fish we eat is from overseas. This is a disgrace considering we are an island nation with water all around us. Coal, coal seam gas and iron ore companies are struggling to keep existing mines and plants open. The setting up of new greenfield sites in any of the industries I have just named is getting harder and less attractive by the day—and, of course, that is why $100 million of projects have been scrapped. Deutsche Bank's analysts of BHP and Rio Tinto coal operations in Australia have highlighted that operating costs have gone up some 320 per cent since 2005. The mining tax and the dreaded carbon tax have stifled existing businesses and households in Australia and sent our cost of living through the roof. By world standards we are a high cost country to live in. The tourism industry is impacted by the inflated cost of living. Industrial relations legislation must become fairer and more flexible to help kick-start the economy.

Those are the problems which, as I see it, we face as Australians. These are suggested solutions. No longer can this country afford a government which lacks direction and commitment to ensuring that we are well placed to deal with the challenges we face in a globalised economy. Everything is global these days. We are in the global export market. We must be competitive with other countries, but this is where we are falling behind. We need to refocus our attention on regional Australia and the valuable contribution which regional Australia makes and will continue to make in the future. We need a speedy resolution to trade agreements with South Korea and others in the Asia-Pacific basin to ensure that the cattle industry has every chance to become competitive in the global market. Our primary producers need their federal representatives to get off their backs and stop pandering to the extreme left. We need to unleash the potential of small, medium and big business by repealing thousands of regulations which have been imposed on them since 2007. This will give them the confidence to reinvest, encourage their children to carry on with the businesses and give them the confidence to employ.

The current NBN, especially in rural areas throughout Flynn, is a rank failure by anyone's standard. At the current rate of the rollout, it will be 100 years before the job is done. If you look on the NBN website, you will see that Gladstone, which is a major industrial town in Queensland, and Emerald to the west are not even on the radar. How will they get NBN services? It is quite strange to realise that an NBN fibre-optic cable goes past the doors of Emerald, Monto and Mundubbera. The NBN fibre-optic cable has been put in by a private company called Leighton yet sits there in the trenches unused. It is a strange one indeed, and I cannot get to the bottom of the intended future of this fibre-optic cable.

By contrast, the coalition NBN will cost far less, provide a benchmark of 25 megabits per second and hit the regions first, which is good for my area. And all this will be done across Australia by 2016. The coalition can get rid of the carbon tax, which will ease the cost of living for families, take pressure off businesses and industry, and generate more confidence in the economy. We will also act responsibly and decisively to pay down the government debt. The $300 billion is costing us $20 million a day every day with interest. Seven days worth of interest would have paid for the Calliope Crossroads. For less than 20 days worth, the Yeppoon flood plain upgrade would have been fully funded. One day's worth of interest would have paid for the high school at Calliope. We have to rein in debt to ensure that the essential overdue schemes like the NDIS are fully funded and achieve exactly what they need to achieve to fulfil our social obligations to people with disability and their carers. This is just the tip of the iceberg. When it comes to a coalition government, we will further the cause of the Australian people, not just in the cities but in the regions, which are the backbone of the country.

I hear it every day back home in Flynn: even those who do not support me believe that we need change and that something has to give. In Central Queensland, people simply want government to govern responsibly, to protect them and, for the most part, to stay out of their lives. Flynn is a diverse electorate, rich with a buffet of industries and environmental assets that are the envy of the rest of the country. The region has so much potential, but it has been overlooked and neglected time and time again. So many budget deficits in a row stand testament to a government that is not capable of handling the change that is taking place in Flynn right now. Most of all, we have a government, a Prime Minister and a Treasurer who will not listen to the people of Australia. They plough on regardless, unaware that our economy is not good and needs urgent, radical change.

I will take the last minute or so to talk about the V457s, as were mentioned by the member for Throsby. It is a difficult situation, and I have this problem in my area, but I can tell the House that without V457s our meatworks in Rockhampton and Biloela would not be able to survive, nor would some of our citrus farms along the Burnett or in the Emerald region. We also make sure that those companies who bring in 457s make sure that Australians are always offered the jobs first. That is what we all stand by: jobs for Australians first. But, if we cannot get those people to come out of the cities, cities like Bundaberg, then we must import labour; otherwise, the fruit will go rotten on the ground, the cattle will not be slaughtered, and the whole economy will grind to a halt.

Sitting suspended from 21:3 9 to 21 : 44

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

The Labor government is making it more difficult for Australian labour to work. Just because the government is not working, either together or at all, should not mean that more ordinary Australians find themselves out of work.

The budget, as handed down by Treasurer Swan, is a fairy tale. It makes assumptions so sanguine as to be wilfully and recklessly optimistic. On every measure of revenue forecasting presented before the House, time and again the Treasurer has been not just wrong but hopelessly wrong.

Our country needs to get back to the sensible position of a Costello discount. Let's take the Treasury forecast and reduce the expected revenue by a certain amount and increase the outlays by a certain percentage, therefore building a more realistic margin for safety. Treasury may be wrong once—but six years in a row? And for Labor to countenance that exuberance is shameful.

Where good governments like those of Howard and Hawke found a way, the Gillard government finds an excuse. It is indicative of the government more generally that today one reads of how 25,000 refugees will be taken in—an overshoot five times that of the initial estimate.

Why budget for the most optimistic in the pricing of carbon, as is the case when pricing carbon at $25 a tonne, and compensate people for that amount? This is when the price for that same carbon in Europe—the only market where carbon is freely traded—is less than a quarter of the price that is banked on by the government. Moreover, it is doubly important to observe the carbon price in this market, because it is this market to which our futures are tied. Today the carbon price in Europe is, as I said, approximately one quarter that of what the government has estimated and has budgeted for—approximately 75 per cent out. That is a long way out!

Revenue inflows to the Labor government in the year to May 2013 have actually increased by 7.6 per cent—twice the rate of CPI, twice the rate that most people would fairly award themselves. Yet in spite of this generous increase Labor cannot balance the books. The notorious MRRT has to date raised $126 million gross—some 90 per cent below projected figures.

That tax is somehow, and quite miraculously, going to realise an 800 per cent increase in inflow in two years time. Perhaps this is overly optimistic, or perhaps the Treasurer knows something the rest of us do not, because for the majority of voters in my electorate the opinion is that these actions remind them of the actions of a troubled gambler—hoping that their luck will turn, and betting all on black.

One of the most significant problems I have with this budget is that it does not make any attempt to rectify the overwhelming time bomb that is rapidly increasing structural deficit. Think of a jug with a hole. Our economy has holes and we are leaking value. It is time—not to create new and bigger holes, but to start to repair those holes. That is what is needed. And the coalition is the only party with the vision and the intestinal fortitude to commission such a systemic structural performance evaluation and, critically, see those findings implemented.

When I speak of structural deficits I mean layers of spending and policy commitments that cannot be rolled back. And if they can be rolled back then they cannot be undone quickly. It is starting with negative numbers before the country even opens for business. I am deeply concerned because I see a once-in-a-generation opportunity to seize on unprecedented and unrepeatable economic advantages to lock in prosperity for our unborn generations. Instead of locking in prosperity on a sensible and sustained basis, this Labor government is spending everything, selling everything and borrowing to do it.

The mantra of the rich, as is decoded from books such as Robert Kiyosaki's Rich Dad Poor Dad, is to buy assets, not liabilities. Yet this Labor government is bent only on buying liabilities and is selling our national strategic assets to do such. That is the case in regard to ports and geographic strategic defence installations. But so too it extends to food production and the sustainability of access to fresh produce. Unfunded commitments are myopic and immoral. They are in essence Labor, pure Labor. That is what will pay for Gillard's gold: your labour.

Our people need and deserve a government that is willing and capable of implementing policy that has been benchmarked against the best in the world. Aspiration and ambition need to return to the heart of government following on such salutary examples as the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund highlight pathways for secure and sustained development in the interests of all citizens. It is time.

It is insulting and wrong that a government of the Australian people at this time in history tear up the rich tapestry of our national character, a fair go. Australia is by definition the place to have a go. This attack can be seen ever so clearly in the affairs of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship under Labor. How can one say it is fair or august or necessary that visa application fees increased by nearly 200 per cent in the space of 15 months? The obvious example being the much maligned 457 visa with the cost of applying having risen from $350 to $450 and now to $900 from 1 July—all in the space of 15 months.

Labor is unwilling to do the heavy lifting for the good of the country. Labor in power is the very worst of politics—that is, serving personal interest over national interest. It is not in Labor's interest to discuss the need to broaden the taxation base vis-a-vis the GST and conduct a review including all aspects of taxation but it is in the national interest. It is not in Labor's interest to discuss the low unit productivity of employed labour in Australia but it is in the national interest. The difference between the coalition and Labor is that Labor seeks to rule and the coalition offers service. It is the difference between self-interest and the national interest.

Labor prefers at all times to opt for good politics over good policy. Good policy and governance are about the right decision at the right time. But so is good governance marked by the ability to recognise better options and change as it is required. This is exactly the case when one thinks about the government's commitment to purchase up to 100 JSFs at a cost of $16 billion in this mega-spending environment where the cost and schedule of the JSF is out of control. All of this at a time when we are living in a budget emergency. Yes, it is an emergency.

When the gross debt that Labor intends to reach means that the credit card for every man, woman and child in Australia is loaded up at over $15,000 each or more than $60,000 for a family of four then we have an emergency. This is when Labor started from a position left to them by the previous coalition government of money in the bank. When the Reserve Bank interest rate years after the GFC are down below levels that the Treasurer himself described as emergency levels then we have a budget emergency. When the Treasurer assured us that the deficit was temporary yet all that we have seen under Labor are deficits and if, God forbid, they won the next election all of their budgets in the next term would be budget deficits by their own reckoning then we have a budget emergency. When the bill for the interest on the national debt is over $8 billion per annum then it is an emergency. There is a bill on each Australian of $350 per year on interest alone. Putting it another way, it would be $1,400 per family of four just on interest. Think how much more productive that money would be to your family. To put this in perspective, $8 billion would pay for four Fiona Stanley hospitals. It would fully fund the entire cost of Gonski school improvements, with over $1.5 billion to spare. It would fund the blow-out in border protection for the last three years, with $2 billion to spare.

In this budget, the Treasurer spoke a lot about jobs and growth, yet there was no real move to create jobs or maintain growth. The coalition is committed to lower taxes, less red tape and getting government out of your business. The world is a competitive place, and no-one owes us a living. Our place in the future is not secure. Labor wants to see Australia trundle along in the median line of the World Bank competitive index. Most shocking is our relative performance in terms of rates of rate of increase in spending, and the debt is astronomical. In fact, it is one of the highest in the world. The only way to describe this, apart from handicapping ourselves, is to describe it as antibusiness and antigrowth.

Dumb policy and practice are hindering the efficacy of our public servants. Efficiency dividends are a good idea in principle, but it is difficult to see how compounding efficiency dividends can be achieved. Indeed, efficiency dividends only make sense if there are indeed improvements in efficiency—in other words, in productivity. Labor simply uses efficiency dividends without the efficiency improvement as a means to try to save some of the money that it has so flagrantly wasted. Having Labor's version of an efficiency dividend will affect the quality or delivery of services. Most importantly, its model is not sustainable or responsible.

In conclusion, perhaps it is correct that the swan song budget from Labor is about jobs and growth. Getting rid of the Gillard government is good for growth and jobs: jobs in real business and the real growth of hope, reward and opportunity.

Debate adjourned.

Federation Chamber adjourned at 21:57 .