Bert Van Manen (Forde, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It gives me great pleasure, in rising to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-2016 and related bills, to take this opportunity to share with the House some of the positive feedback from the Forde community following the 2015 federal budget. Over the course of the week subsequent to the budget we hosted a number of mobile offices and community forums around the electorate. There was a clear sense of understanding and confidence in the Australian government from the residents we spoke to. People understand that we were left with unsustainable debt and deficit from the previous Labor government, and they are looking to us as a coalition to come up with a budget that is measured and responsible to ensure a prosperous economic future for our country. This starts with the $5.5 billion Growing Jobs and Small Business package, which has been very well received by Forde's small business community.

I recently met with local business owner Paula Brand from Living with IT. She not only runs a small business but hosts regular north Gold Coast business meetings as well. She applauded the budget measure to cut the company tax rate by 1½ per cent to 28.5 per cent. She also said that the new accelerated depreciation measures that would allow small businesses to claim an immediate tax deduction for every asset valued up to $20,000 would improve cash flows for small businesses significantly.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 16 : 47 to 17 : 01

I was speaking before about the importance of the budget to small business in the electorate of Forde and I was sharing some of the thoughts of Paula Brand from Living with IT, one of our very good small businesspeople. The instant asset write-off to $20,000 is a substantial increase over the previous $1,000 threshold and is a fantastic opportunity for small business in Forde to have a go and take the opportunity to expand their business. Paula also welcomed the removal of the fringe benefits tax on portable devices as this would encourage business to embrace technology. She said that it would encourage small technology businesses to take on the challenge of competing with bigger technology retailers and would improve spending in the industry.

The Growing Jobs and Small Business package will also encourage young people into work and provide incentives for business to hire older workers. Investing some $6.8 billion to establish Job Active will significantly improve the quality of service for job seekers and employers. In Forde, MAX Employment has been appointed the Work for the Dole coordinator for the Logan region. I look forward to seeing the fruits of our labours as we help job seekers gain valuable skills and search for permanent employment. I know that, in meeting and speaking with representatives from Max Employment, we have already seen some significant successes.

The Forde region has had its concerns with youth unemployment, and we see the new Job Active program helping job seekers not only to learn new skills but also to give something back to the community that supports them. Many young job seekers do not have practical work experience. I have often heard from our young people how difficult it can be to gain employment without experience. Job Active is about helping job seekers who have been out of the workforce for some time to gain valuable employable skills.

There are also incentives for employers. The government has committed a $1.2 billion pool for wage subsidies to support employers to provide job opportunities and assist job seekers into work. We have also committed $18 million over four years for around 6,000 job seekers to annually undertake valuable work experience of up to four weeks while they continue to receive income support. This is a great step forward as we seek to tackle youth unemployment. I encourage Forde's young people to take the initiative to seek the skills they need to find full-time work and positively contribute to their local community and their country. We want to see more people in work and continuing in work. These incentives will encourage local small businesses to take the initiative to expand their number of employees.

There are more than 18,000 families with school-age children in Forde and the $4.4 billion Jobs for Families package has been very well received across the community. The struggle for parents to return to work after having children has been a growing concern for many families. The childcare system has become more and more expensive under Labor, with fees increasing by more than 50 per cent between 2007 and 2013. I am pleased to say we are reforming the childcare assistance package to establish a new and simpler childcare subsidy from July 2017.

With the changes that have taken place in our society and economy over the years, having two parents in paid employment has become an increasingly important necessity for most families. This means we need to do more to help parents who want to work and parents who want to work more. I have spoken with many families over the years who have complained about the increasing cost of child care and the toll it has taken on the family budget. One mother told me how she had returned to work for the sake of an extra $100 a week after childcare expenses—but that they needed that extra hundred dollars just to get by.

The new Jobs for Families package will deliver a simpler, more affordable, more flexible and more accessible childcare system. Parents who are working, training, studying or undertaking other activities such as volunteering will be able to get the assistance they need. The majority of families in Forde accessing child care will be on average $30 a week better off. The Child Care Safety Net will also ensure children from lower income families will not be left behind, with support for the children and families who need it most. This is a tremendous win for families and we look forward to it being implemented over the coming years. As usual, it has taken a coalition government to actually sit down and listen to what Australian families need and to help them to achieve their priorities, goals and objectives.

Forde has more than 25,000 people receiving the age pension and more than 3,600 receiving Veterans' Affairs pension payments and benefits. Budget changes to the assets test for pensions mean the majority of pensioners in Forde, those with modest assets, will be on average $30 a fortnight better off. Following the community forums I held last week, I know that pensioners are pleased with these changes and have also welcomed the government's decision to scrap last year's budget measure to link pension increases to the CPI. Following the assets test changes, the majority of pensioners will either be better off or will have no change. This is a positive step forward in the government's plans for a fair and sustainable pension system.

I am very proud to say that much has already been achieved by this government for the people of Forde. From the 2015 budget, Forde received a portion of the government's 2015-16 budget funding, including $300 million for the preconstruction work for the Melbourne to Brisbane Inland Rail line and a further $10 million for the upgrade of exit 54 at Coomera. Funding for the Coomera Interchange was a major election commitment and I am pleased to see we have achieved this outcome. Construction is scheduled to start in July and I look forward to seeing the project completed and to being part of the celebrations when it officially opens in late 2016.

The government has also recommitted its $3 million in support to the Beenleigh Town Square project. I am happy to report that the community is increasingly looking forward to this project coming to completion. The Beenleigh Town Square is expected to open in September 2015 and will completely change the dynamic of the Beenleigh town centre. There is hope this redevelopment will encourage business investment in the region and give the residents of Beenleigh the pride in their town that it so rightly deserves. Two local councils in Forde will also receive a funding boost from the 2015 budget through Roads to Recovery. Logan City Council will receive some $4.7 million and Gold Coast City Council will receive $8.4 million. The government doubled the Roads to Recovery investment in the 2015-16 financial year. This investment epitomises the importance placed on building the infrastructure Australia needs from the local level up. Funding local councils means local needs will be met and Forde's two local councils will be able to deliver the reliable infrastructure their residents deserve. I have also ticked off on many other election promises. This year's federal budget has been instrumental in this process.

We have an issue in parts of the electorate with crime and antisocial behaviour. This has been a major topic of concern from community surveys. Surveillance plays an integral role in reducing crime and improving the safety of residents. This government has delivered $960,000 for 12 closed circuit CCTV cameras to address this issue. We further committed and funded $20,000 to the Beenleigh and Logan West State Emergency Service groups. This funding helped the SES purchase a number of GPS units and an education trailer. Our local SES branches have performed extraordinary work in the community and have helped so many people in times of crisis. In the past four years we have seen our community hit by floods, devastating storms and cyclonic depressions. Each and every time our SES have answered the call for assistance. It is fantastic to see that we have been able to answer their call for funding by supplying vital equipment so they can continue their work.

I recognise that, while much has already been achieved, there are still many local issues across Forde. I will continue to work hard on behalf of the community to continue to advocate for the funding to address vital projects for our region. I am pleased to commend the budget to the House.

Terri Butler (Griffith, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In speaking in this debate I want to talk about the future of standards of living for individuals and their families because, after all, the purpose of government is to serve its people. Government should do what it can to promote families' and households' living standards, so I want to talk about that. If we want to be a nation that is prosperous and a nation where everyone shares in that prosperity, our country needs to focus on jobs now and in the future. So I also want to talk about jobs and what this budget does or does not do about jobs. If government's purpose is to serve its people then federal budgets should serve the interests of the people. So an important test of a budget is: what does it do for the economy and what does it do to help everyone share in the benefits of the nation's prosperity?

As I said, a federal budget should help to promote families' and households' living standards. What is the point of living in a prosperous nation if people live in poverty? What is the point if even people in middle-class households are finding it hard to make ends meet? Why are we not dealing with these questions as a matter of urgency? What does this budget do in relation to those questions? Unfortunately, what this budget does is continue to take an axe to family tax benefit, particularly family tax benefit part B. As John Howard, the former Prime Minister of this country, said last year, family tax benefits are a form of tax relief for working and middle-class families. They are aimed at helping families with the cost of raising children. Yet the second Abbott government budget maintains last year's cuts to family tax benefits. They want to take away the family tax benefit from a family when the youngest child turns six and there is a long-term freeze on the rates of family tax benefits.

These cuts are going to make it harder for families to bear the costs of living. These are cuts that hit the families on the lowest incomes the hardest. Nine out of 10 families whose income is in the lowest 20 per cent will lose out under the Abbott government's first budget and second budget combined with cuts to family tax benefits. Meanwhile, nine out of 10 of the wealthiest families will actually benefit from the changes that are being made to family tax benefits. A single income family on $65,000 with two children in school will be around $6,000 a year worse off as a consequence of this budget.

We will continue to oppose these cuts, as we have done for the past year. These cuts are not minor; they affect literally thousands of families in each electorate—for example, these cuts to the family tax benefit will affect 7,172 families in my neighbouring electorate of Bonner, 3,408 families in the federal electorate of Brisbane, 8,638 families in Capricornia, 8,690 families in Dawson, 9,629 families in Flynn, 12,867 families in Forde, 11,654 families in Leichhardt and 12,502 families in Petrie. Where are the members for these federal electorates? Why are they not speaking out to oppose the cuts that will affect the families who live in their electorates? If it is not their job to represent those families, then what do they think their job is? Why are they not standing up for the working- and middle-class families in their electorates?

My electorate is one that is younger than average. It is one where there are a lot of young children. It is an electorate where we have a higher-than-the-national-average proportion of dual-income families where both parents work 40 hours a week or more. Those families know as well as anyone how hard it is to balance all of the competing demands that we all have—the demands of care for children, disabled relatives and elderly relatives, the demands of paid work and the demands of being part of a community. People do not just want to live to work and sleep; they want to be part of a rich and vibrant community. My electorate has plenty of those types of communities. Making it harder for people to bear their cost of living by making these cuts to family tax benefits is going to make our society a less cohesive one—a society where people have even less opportunity than they do now to go out and participate in civic life.

Australia needs a big, productive and healthy middle-class. We need economic settings that allow everyone to make a contribution, whether that is through the unpaid labour of love that is care for kids and relatives, volunteering in community organisations, paid employment, running a business, or a combination of all those things. A variety of settings and policies are needed—jobs creation; keeping unemployment low, for example. That is obvious. Importantly, we need settings that help parenting-aged people manage care responsibilities and settings that ensure that people get the best start in life. That is why we need, among many other settings, policy settings that support families. To support families, we need the tax and transfer system to work for them, we need a realistic understanding of the costs of care and we need structures and institutions in place that can serve families' needs. The family tax benefit is an important component of families policy—and so is early childhood and care.

In their first budget, the Liberal-National government sought to cut around $1.1 billion from early childhood education and care, including through cuts to subsidies, cuts to outside school hours care and cuts to family day care. This year it has announced some good changes that are not unwelcome in relation to early childhood, particularly child care; though I would note that last week Goodstart Early Learning released some modelling that showed that some families would be a fair bit worse off, around $4,600 worse off, and that about 100,000 children would be affected. I do give the government some credit for finally trying to tackle the issue of child care access in this country, but it should not be making those changes that are desperately needed—not just by the individual families and for the kids themselves but by the economy as a whole, when we try to increase workforce participation—contingent on passing cuts that are going to hit families, such as the family tax benefit cuts.

The government has also announced cuts to paid parental leave which will see around 80,000 people a year worse off, some by as much as $11,500. It has rightly been criticised for accusing working parents of rorts, of fraud, of double-dipping. This cut shows that this government does not understand paid parental leave. I doubt that the Treasurer or the Minister for Social Services have even read the Productivity Commission report of 2009 that preceded the introduction of the first universal Paid Parental Leave scheme in this country that Labor introduced after many years of work from people including, particularly, the member for Jagajaga, Jenny Macklin. It seems that the coalition does not even understand the Paid Parental Leave scheme, which is regrettable. I certainly hope that they will start to think more carefully about the way that all of these different components of families policies interrelate.

These changes are worrying not just for their impact on the individual children and the individual families but also for their impact on the economy and on our society. It is particularly disappointing to hear the Liberals and Nationals talk about cuts to support for families as a means of encouraging people into work—as though people just need to be encouraged to work, as though people are just sitting around thinking that they might just prefer not to work. What planet are they on?

I do not think that it is realistic to think that there are people who somehow need to be encouraged into work. I think that a better use of everyone's time and effort would be dealing with the fact that we are heading for 6½ per cent unemployment in this country—that is on the government's own projections in its own budget papers. This is in a country where we also have a significant underemployment problem. But they are looking around, saying, 'The real problem here is people are not doing enough to look for jobs.' Where are the jobs? Where are the jobs coming from? Where is the work for small business?

We have said that we will support the small business package. Of course we will support an asset write-off—we had an asset write-off that this government took an axe to last year. But the fact is that, if you are a small business, if you are a tradesperson, if you have an ABN, if you are working in an ABN capacity and you are a microbusiness or a small business, then all of the policies in the world aimed at helping you to spend money are no use to you if there is no work out there for your business because the economy is in the doldrums. This government has overseen a situation where their first budget smashed confidence in this country, damaged confidence so much that the economy was damaged.

On that side of the House they like to call us economic vandals. They like to say that about us, but it is absolute nonsense of course. It is just sledging and rubbish. If you want to know who the real economic vandals are, look at the first Abbott-Hockey coalition budget. Do not forget that they were warned not to make too many cuts too quickly. Do not forget that they were warned that if there was too much austerity, that would hit growth. They were warned about that but they did it anyway. What was the consequence? The rate of GDP growth slowed every quarter last year. The rate of GDP growth slowed from the first quarter. If you look at the March figures, then the June figures, the September figures and the December figures—on a trend basis, at the end of December quarter, GDP growth had slowed to 0.4 per cent for the quarter. It slowed all year. Every quarter was worse than the last for economic growth, yet the people in the coalition try to lecture Labor about economic vandalism. They should look in the mirror.

What are they going to do about the fact that we are about to have unemployment at levels worse than at the height of the global financial crisis? As we are all aware, unemployment already hit 6.3 per cent last year. It is still above six per cent now. Those figures are also worse than unemployment was during the global financial crisis and they are worse than they have been for many years. In fact they have not been this bad since the current Prime Minister was the employment minister in the Howard government.

Our country clearly needs to focus on jobs right now, as a matter of urgency. What are the jobs now and what are the jobs going to be in the future? We need to look at the way work is changing. People's jobs are getting less secure and anyone who is employed on a contract for a term knows how hard it is to get a mortgage, to plan for your future—if you are on a short-term, insecure contract.

Wages growth is slow. The Economist was writing about this in the context of the UK recently, saying that they needed to be pushing up their wages growth in the UK. In fact, if you look at the figures, it seems that their inflation actually dipped into deflation just recently. They are in a terrible situation, but we have slow wages growth here as well. Unemployment being up is obviously one of the culprits, but the fact is that wages growth is the slowest it has been since the wage-price index started being kept in the 1990s. That is as much of a warning sign for our economy as you can get.

The wage share of the economy is decreasing; the profit share, obviously therefore, is increasing. These changes are affecting people's ability to meet their cost of living and they are affecting how far a dollar will go. This second Liberal-National budget is just as much of a disaster for jobs and for the economy as their first. This idea that somehow we can be happy about a budget in which there is a forecast increase in unemployment to 6½ per cent is wrong. The Liberals and Nationals have no vision for jobs of the future or for the training and skills we need to be building right now in relation to those jobs of the future.

So what is their plan to deal with this unemployment issue in the longer term? We talk about coding in schools. We talk about that in question time and the Prime Minister displays his utter ignorance on this issue by mocking us for doing so.

Our country needs to invest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics to make sure that Australians are ready to take up the jobs of the new economy. There are jobs in this country right now that rely on those skills that we are not filling with Australians. That needs to change. We know it needs to change. That is why Bill Shorten, the Leader of the Opposition, announced in his budget reply that we would take immediate measures to skill up primary and secondary school teachers to make sure that they get degrees in those stem disciplines, to make sure that other Australians get the opportunity to get degrees in those disciplines, and to make sure that those subjects are taught at primary and secondary level so that we are skilling people for the jobs of the future.

I do not want to hear companies or big business asking me why we do not have the talent in this country and have to import people. I do not want to have to hear them ask why the government is not doing enough to get more girls interested in engineering. I want us to fix that right now. Unfortunately, the current government thinks it is all a bit of a joke, but we are serious about STEM and we are also serious about innovation. A lot of the entrepreneurs I speak to, a lot of the people in the innovation sector, say to me, 'Australia has a culture of fear of failure. Why don't entrepreneurs go out and take more risks and build more businesses?' They point to Silicon Valley. A key difference between Australia and Silicon Valley is that in Australia if you start your own business you almost always are going to be risking your family home. That is not the case in the US.

What does Labor say about this? Bill announced a fantastic policy in the budget reply, saying that we are going to find a way to help those start-ups and entrepreneurs to get the finance they need without having to risk their family home. That is going to contribute to a culture of greater risk-taking and greater entrepreneurialism. Risk-taking is not a dirty word any more in business, and nor should it be. It is through building businesses, through not being afraid of failure, through it not being a catastrophe for the family, that we will find those innovations of the future and build the new jobs of the future, as well. That is also why I am so proud of his announcement in respect of partnering with venture capital for new entrepreneurialism. The budget needs to be taken seriously by people. Talk to your MP and do not support this sort of economic vandalism that we have seen from the coalition.

Tony Pasin (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-2016 and cognate bills before the House to highlight the significant contribution to South Australia, and particularly to my electorate of Barker, being made by the Commonwealth through the 2015-16 federal budget. We know that our first budget was strong medicine for the financial wreckage left behind by Labor, but it was necessary in the first budget to put the country on a stable, sustainable financial footing so that we could invest for the future in our second budget. This is a responsible, measured and fair budget that is investing in jobs, growth and opportunity.

I am disappointed that the member for Griffith just left the chamber, because I wanted to congratulate her on what was a herculean performance, and I am sure you would agree with me. But then we would need to finish the sentence, because it was a herculean performance of motherhood statement after motherhood statement—15 minutes of it. It has been interesting to watch the Labor Party scratch around since budget day to find something—some negative stuff—to talk about with respect to this budget. It is important that we push back.

The point about this is that we have push modelling from NATSEM and we have Labor's year of big ideas, which are really just a year of old ideas. And, of course, what is the solution? I was making notes about Labor's positive, substantive contributions in terms of how we go about improving the economic conditions in this country, and in the last 90 seconds I get effectively a reference to coding and to 'finding a way' to help start-ups succeed without risking their family home. Of course, we will get further than that.

While we are talking about the budget, let me talk about South Australia. We have a South Australian state Labor government that wants to spend its time talking down our economy; wanting to aggressively attack the federal Liberal-National government. So I thought I would point out to the House, through this speech, some of the contributions being made to South Australia as a result of our budget.

Over the next four years, the Commonwealth funding for South Australia will increase in each and every year, rising by 30 per cent or $2.4 billion over the forward estimates, bringing total Commonwealth spending in South Australia over that period to just under $40 billion. South Australia will benefit from: a 30 per cent increase in GST revenues, or $1.8 billion more over the forward estimates; a 19 per cent increase in funding for hospitals—I will repeat that: a 19 per cent increase to funding for hospitals—or $208 million more over the forwards; a 26 per cent increase for schools, or $280 million over the forwards; and $2 billion in funding for world-class infrastructure, including the much-needed work on Australia's most inefficient road, the North-South Corridor, and $1.5 million more Commonwealth funding over that period as a result of the 2014-15 budget. On every single measure, the South Australian state government is receiving more Commonwealth funding than ever before. Last year, South Australia was one of only two states where the number of small businesses declined. In this budget, the Liberal government is giving the engine room of our economy a jump-start. Struggling South Australian small businesses will benefit from the $5.5 billion of dollars of new measures lowering the small business tax rate and allowing them an immediate tax deduction for every asset they acquire that is valued up to $20,000. There are also new provisions for a simpler, more affordable, flexible childcare system, benefiting South Australia's parents, and for an $842 million extension of universal access to early childhood education, allowing up to 15 hours of preschool a week per child.

Having spoken about South Australia, Deputy Speaker, if I can be allowed to just parochially mention two commitments that were delivered as a result of this budget. The first is a $7.5 million grant to the Coorong District Council to underpin SA's motorsport park, Tailem Bend. From my electorate's perspective, this is most certainly the centrepiece of the budget; some of my colleagues might disagree, but I can assure you that the metropolis of Tailem Bend is looking very much forward to being the second venue for the V8 supercar racing in South Australia. The other commitment that I would like to refer to is the $5 million contribution for the Murray Bridge Racing Club which will underpin its Gifford Hill development, which will see the expansion of Murray Bridge's golf course, a significant residential development, relocation of the racing track to Gifford Hill, and an associated training all-purpose track and conference centre.

Having dealt with the parochial, I would like to move back to the budget from a national perspective. In preparing criminal trials, I always asked myself: 'What is my case concept? What is it that I am seeking to prove by calling this witness or this series of witnesses?' And so it is that I sat back in some quiet time after the delivery of the budget and thought: 'What was the Treasurer's case concept with respect to this budget?' I came up with, effectively, a pretty simple suggestion—he was keen to establish a better budget and a stronger economy with more jobs. And in every measure I saw delivered, both on budget night and in the detail thereafter, I kept coming back to: 'a better budget and a stronger economy with more jobs'. These are easy things to talk about but much more difficult things to deliver. What were some of the difficulties that the Treasurer faced? Well, he faced an iron ore price that was effectively falling off the cliff face—$92 billion in write-downs. Notwithstanding that, he was determined to deliver a better budget; a budget which more closely reflected balance. And you will see over the forwards, Deputy Speaker, deficits going from $41 billion to $35 billion to $26 billion to $14 billion to $7 billion.

As someone who has a small business background—my wife and I ran a small business; I grew up in a household where my mother operated a small business and my father ran our family farm—I am never comfortable, like, I am sure, the member for Braddon, with operating budget deficits. But the reality is that we inherited a budget which was structurally out of order. Our payments were significantly outstripping our receipts, and that was before we dealt with the calamity of an iron ore price which has so significantly decreased.

The member for Griffith suggested that we are the true economic vandals, and her principal submission was our previous budget. What our previous budget did was halve the trajectory of our net debt position, and we did that because we knew that if we did not get on with the business of improving our overall fiscal position then the task would be left to subsequent generations of Australians. As with any tough decision, the longer you wait to implement it the more trouble you find yourself in. So we set about that course.

We are now seeing some of the dividends from taking hard decisions in the budget. What were those dividends? Those dividends were principally in the form of a small business package—a $5.5 billion shot in the arm for the small businesses of our nation. In my electorate, there are some 102,000 voting-age constituents, and over 15,000 small businesses. I make that to be about one in seven involved in small business. Let's consider that for every small business there are often, as mine was, a partnership between a husband and wife, or a partnership between two individuals. I would hazard a guess that one in four of my electors are actively involved in a small business. So this measure is a $5.5 billion shot in the arm to those businesses. It says to small businesses that those who of us who get the privilege of representing our constituency here in Canberra understand that you are the engine room of this economy. We understand that, if we are to deal with the unemployment issue, which the member for Griffith was so keen to focus on, then you are going to be our strong allies in addressing that issue. So we took some real and practical measures.

We effectively said to the small businesses of Australia: you can have a tax cut—an effective 1.5 per cent tax cut. We also said that we would operate a system of instant asset write-offs, which have been seen principally in the agricultural sectors of my electorate. People have been rushing out to rural stores and buying that piece of equipment that they just have not had the confidence to buy to this point. It helps that we have commodity prices at record levels. The Minister for Agriculture has been opening up markets and putting export parity pressure on purchases of our commodities such that the beef price is now over 300c a kilogram. Sheepmeat continues to travel strongly, as do other commodities.

In addition to the small business package, we identified—and quite rightly, in my view; at least the Treasurer did—the need to deal with participation as an issue. We all know and have heard in this place many times that Australian female participation rates are well behind those of Canada. To deal with that, we have delivered a budget measure of $4.4 billion for families, to assist and to facilitate the return to the employment market of those in our economy who are currently undertaking parental responsibilities.

We have taken the Prime Minister's Paid Parental Leave scheme—which I can now say I was never a big fan of, something I made clear to the Prime Minister in private—a measure which was intended to work over the first six months of child's life, and we have applied that to the first six years of a child's life, to give assistance to families who are seeking to meet their responsibilities in the economy, particularly in capital cities, where one must operate from a position of being a dual-income family, but less so in Barker.

In the short time I have left to speak, I want to mention one other thing. Not all things occur on budget night and not all things find their way into the budget, but the budget processes are sometimes instructive. I want to take this opportunity to congratulate the Assistant Treasurer and the Treasurer on accepting an invitation to fast-track the consideration of a review of reforms for the wine equalisation tax. As the member for Barker I am effectively the member for wine. I represent more constituents engaged in the wine industry, either by value or by volume, than any other member. Given that I am also the member representing the river Murray, we like to say that we are specialists in turning water into wine—but that might be one claim too far!

Essentially, the Winemakers' Federation has called on our government to consider reforming the wine equalisation tax and removing it from bulk unpackaged, unbranded private-label wine; to abolish the New Zealand WET producers' rebate; to introduce a traditional rebate measure to allow a merger of two WET-rebate-eligible businesses; and, from the associated savings, to go about marketing Wine Australia overseas, taking advantage of the low Australian dollar and, of course, the recently established free trade agreements with China, South Korea and Japan.

Those reforms were to be shunted off to the agriculture white-paper process. I am pleased that advocacy in the lead-up to and in the course of the budget has seen those reforms fast-tracked for preparation of a discussion paper, which will hopefully be available in July and consideration of any reforms ready and implemented by the time of the next Australian vintage. These are critical reforms which will return the Australian wine industry to a position of long-term viability. I thank the Treasurer and the Assistant Treasurer for considering those reforms.

Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wish to address budget measures associated with the Attorney-General's portfolio—in particular, the measures that are designed to keep Australians safe from the threat of terrorism. I want to look at two particular programs: the $40 million allocation over a four-year period for investment in programs aimed at countering violent extremism; and the $21 million over four years for programs announced in February this year which are aimed at developing new measures to challenge terrorist propaganda online.

The federal seat of Calwell is one of those electorates that, for better or for worse, are focus of a lot of attention from the government in relation to keeping Australia safe from terrorists and extremist propaganda. That has been the case in my electorate for over the last decade or so, so we are pretty familiar with being the centre of attention for a whole series of government services. But this one is of particular concern to us.

In relation to those programs and given the nature of my electorate, I was quite concerned about an article I saw on the weekend in one of the Melbourne papers which raised the concerns of some ethnic community leaders about the allocation of deradicalisation funds, particularly those associated with counselling services and known as Living Safe Together grants. I am concerned about it because we are talking about allocating a lot of money to programs that are meant to deliver successful outcomes.

I would like to refer to some of those concerns today. Some of those concerns were raised, in particular, by Dr Berhan Ahmed, who is a very high-profile Australian of Eritrean background. He is involved with the African community in Melbourne in a very comprehensive way. He has raised concerns about the African community having missed out on receiving grants under these programs. His concerns are that some of the organisations that have received grants are not known, or there is no accountability; that there is no transparency around who is receiving grants. There is an element of secrecy, according to Dr Ahmed, about the allocation of these grants.

When we are looking at funding programs that are meant to deliver outcomes for the broader collective good, you have to be a little bit concerned when they are referred to, described as or alleged to be, perhaps, secretive—not necessarily going where they should be going or to the groups they should be going to. I am certainly concerned, and I understand the Islamic Council of Victoria has also expressed some concern in relation to the focus of the grants. I am not saying they are not rightfully focussed; they probably are rightfully focussed at countering violent extremists, but there is a group within the centre that requires some attention.

I would like to speak about some of the activities and initiatives within my electorate that come from my own community—from within the Muslim community and my own organisations—which do not draw on government funding and will not be relying on funding for these programs. Nevertheless, they are aimed at doing exactly what funding for counter-terrorism programs aims to do, and they do it in a very different way.

I had the opportunity on Friday to attend the sod turning of the Quba mosque, which is being built in my electorate. The Quba mosque is being built in Somerton on the Hume Highway. It belongs to an organisation whose prime focus is investing in the education of young people. The organisation believes that educating children and providing knowledge is at the core of helping young minds develop into positive citizens who want to do good in the community, as opposed to being destructive. We expect that the mosque will be ready and completed by the end of next year.

Also associated with the mosque is the Islamic Sciences and Research Academy of Australia, which provides an online degree course in Islamic studies in conjunction with Curtin University. It is a very novel and important way of teaching classical Islamic studies here in Australia. It will provide a Bachelor of Islamic Studies and also a Master of Islamic Studies, and in this sense, in conjunction with Curtin University, it will give people an opportunity to learn about Islam in a positive way. Its aim is to counter the narrative of the fundamentalists and the recruiters. This approach—that of teaching through education—is a very important approach.

Some of the core principles of the Islamic Sciences and Research Academy of Australia include: to help young people develop a sense of sincerity in their intentions and in their actions; to encourage positive action in every situation; to serve God and humanity; to behave in a manner of excellence in both practice and outcome; to provide for them a sense of balance in life and in the way the conduct themselves; and to give them an opportunity to learn to integrate, or to build relationships, with the broader community. The Quba Mosque and the Islamic Sciences and Research Academy of Australia are initiatives that come from within the community. They are excellent examples of how the community can take it upon itself to initiate very important relationship building that is helpful to young people today. Whether they are of Muslim or some other background, young people today need good, positive mentoring; they need guidance; and they need to be assisted in working their way through the development of their sense of self and their identity. At the core of some of these disturbances that we read about is the sense of not belonging and not understanding who they are or what their place is in the broader community. So I am very pleased that I have organisations in the federal seat of Calwell that are dedicated to providing excellence in education and are genuinely committed to mentoring and helping young people.

I also want to raise the Australia Light Foundation, which is a similar organisation in my seat of Calwell and which is committed to the same objectives of educating, helping and mentoring young people as they work their way through their education. This afternoon in my electorate one of the Muslim schools, the Ilim College, which is a very large school with about 1800 students, held a forum to which they invited participation from other schools in the electorate. Their aim is to reach out to students in neighbouring schools to try to establish communications and relationships.

It is very important that young people are not stereotyped and therefore made to feel that there is something peculiarly different about them or that they are in some way a threat to the community. There is a self-fulfilling prophecy in that sort of attitude. I am so proud of my local community because they understand the need for young people to belong, aw well as the nuances and the difficulties that young people face. They are taking it upon themselves to raise their funds and to invest not only in buildings but also in content. I am very pleased to be representing a community that is often maligned and is very much in the spotlight for the wrong reasons. It is a community that I know well, that has taken control of the stereotyping and is seeking to find a way through it in order to help young people, not just from within the Muslim community but also to reach out to the broader community and hopefully to set an example of best practice in genuinely countering extremism and countering that online narrative—a narrative which seems to lure young people away from their homes and into dangerous pursuits and which we seem to read so much about in recent times.

On the one hand, a lot of money is being allocated in the budget for this kind of work. Certainly, the previous Labor government also allocated a lot of money under the Building Resilient Communities program. We must be very careful that they are not tainted by the sorts of allegations we read about on the weekend that are coming from the African community and the Islamic Council of Victoria. The idea is not to make communities feel that they are being left out. You need to practise being inclusive, especially when you are talking about funding of that nature—$40 million over a four year period. You would want to think and believe that that money will be money well spent and that it will deliver results. I would like to think that my community can actually offer some advice and guidance—even to government generally—about how to pitch the message and how to better spend that money. I raise that in the context of an issue that is very important to my local community. Jobs and health and childcare and many other areas are also of concern to me, but I do not have enough time left this evening to go into those issues. But at the core of helping communities lies a sense of purpose, opportunity, education and being able to find work; in particular with young people, in an electorate such as mine which has a very high youth unemployment rate.

If we can address those issues comprehensively then we might find that we do not have to spend as much money on building resilient communities or countering violent extremism—because young people will have a purpose and they will have a focus. And this is the focus of the Islamic Sciences and Research Academy of Australia, of the Australia Light Foundation, of Ilim College and of many other organisations of Muslim faith in my electorate. Their focus is about reining in the commitment of young people and their focus onto things that are positive and that help develop an awareness of self and identity in a positive way, so that they can make positive contributions to the community—so that they can also then not be vulnerable to the narrative of the extremists and be lulled away from the safety of their homes and their neighbourhoods to places on the other side of the world which are, as we all know, places of violence and evil, quite frankly. The challenge is there, the money is there, and the will is there. My only concern is that the funds go to the organisations that will actually deliver the results that need to be delivered in order to keep Australia safe and to keep our young people focused on working their way through the integration process, which is very important in their understanding of self.

Brett Whiteley (Braddon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise this evening to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-2016 and related bills. It is a great privilege to be one of the regional members of this parliament from Tasmania. It is a thrill to be able to represent such a great community—people who are dedicated to the future and who are looking to be filled with hope and anticipation of the future. For me and for the electorate that I represent, I believe wholeheartedly that this bill will provide the stimulus for jobs, that it will provide encouragement and incentive for growth, and that it will provide real opportunities for Tasmanians, particularly those in my electorate of Braddon. This budget is the clearest sign yet that we have a federal government that treats Tasmania not just as a great place to live and a great place to visit—and if you have not visited, you should—but rather as a great place to work and a great place to invest and do business. We have a federal government that is willing to invest in the economic enablers for Tasmania—to give Tasmanian small businesses the confidence they need to take a chance, to grow their businesses and, more importantly, to boost employment.

My overview of the budget as translated to me over the last two weeks by my constituents would be this—and I will try and summarise it fairly and do justice to their comments. Even at the football on Saturday, while having a couple of beers with the teams in Smithton and Penguin, you get a chance to say, 'How do you think it's going? How do you think we're going? How do you think the budget's going? How's the boss travelling?' And with all of us, I am sure, our constituents are never backward in coming forward and telling us their views. This is the view that I have picked up over the last few weeks: the budget was good, the budget seemed to be positive and it was great to see support behind small business. Keep in mind that probably most of the people that I was speaking to were either small business operators, sole traders, partners in a small business or in the employ of a small business. So they were encouraged to see a significant—in fact, a $5 billion plus—injection into the small business sector and the agricultural sector, which is of course made up of small business. So that was their overview of the budget. They saw it as positive and encouraging of small business.

The constituents that I talked to understand the need for the government to live within its means. Does that mean that everything relayed to me over the last few weeks was that they agreed with everything in the budget? Certainly not. But they do, at the heart of their beliefs, know that we have to live within our means. They get that. They understand it for their families, they understand it for their business and they know that that is what is required at a national level. So they understand the need. Even our detractors understand the need to live within our means. When I, as a local member, get the opportunity to say, 'Do you know how much more we are spending every day than we earn?' They go, no, and they do not really understand that. When you put it in terms of, 'It was going to be $130 million a day more in spending than we earned, and we have it back to probably $100 million at the moment,' they look at you with great disbelief. But this is the reality. It is not my reality, it is not Joe Hockey's reality and it is not Tony Abbott's reality; it is Treasury's reality backed up by the best commentators and economists in the country. We are spending more than we earn, and any clown in any circus would know that that is not sustainable.

I will tell you what else they are feeling. They are starting, absolutely, to feel frustration at governance in this country. Again, I would be silly to presume that they agree with everything that this government wants to do, but what they do get is that in September 2013 we were given an overwhelming mandate to govern this country. They are now seeing the strategy or the tactics—call it what you will; I would probably say 'bloody-mindedness'—in the Senate of the Labor Party standing in the way of the mandate that we were given. They will say, 'I don't like that, Brett, but I do accept that you got elected and you really should have a go. If we don't like what you do and if we don't like the journey that you're taking us on, we'll kick you out in three years time'. So that is my overview of what my constituency is telling me.

What do you do, as a government, when you are preparing a budget and you are faced with so many stark realities about the future of this country? What do you do when you come to realise that life expectancy in our nation, in the next 30 or 40 years, will be 90 years of age? With all the advances in health, it could even be more. What do you do with that piece of information when you have it? Do you disregard it or do you take into consideration as you should? As you watch your own children grow, you plan for the future: you plan for weddings and you plan for university degrees—it is just common sense. So how do we plan when we know that life expectancy will reach an average of 90 years of age? In 1970, when I was 10, if you walked up the main street of my city you would run into 7½ people aged between 15 and 64—there was one with half a leg and an arm—before you ran into someone over the age of 65. Today, if I walk up the same street, I will only meet 4½ people on average before I run into someone aged over 65. But here is the thing: in 30 or 40 years time, you will only run into 2.7 people as you walk up your main street, Member for Indi, before you run into someone who is aged 65. We are going to be knocked over by Zimmer frames.

Seriously, what do you do in a public policy sense when you are faced with this reality? That is what governments do. You cannot win as a politician in government, can you? You are accused on one day of being short term and short sighted and only having your eye on the next election, and then, when you want to talk about the year 2030, people think you are an idiot and you should get yourself some therapy. Well, I remind people that it was 15 years ago that Cathy Freeman won the gold medal in Sydney. It was 13 years ago that two big planes ran into two big towers. It seems like yesterday, but in the same amount of time going forward it will be 2030, and these are the challenges we face. You can bury your head in the sand all you like, but the reality is that this budget and every budget that comes after it, whether it be by us or by anyone else, should reflect that in the plans.

We in this government are committed to living within our means and we are committed to energising small business, but among our opponents there is no commitment there. There is no commitment that we can see to rein in spending money we do not have. Bill Shorten, the Leader of the Opposition, had 30 minutes a couple of Thursday evenings ago to outline his plan, and what did we get? We got an unfunded spending spree of about a quarter of a billion dollars every minute of his speech, with no sign of where that money is coming from. So this leopard does not change its spots.

We have to face reality: we cannot keep borrowing money. We have a commitment to ensuring sustainability of the pension system, and what do we have from our opponents? No commitment to sustainability, preferring to ignore the problem and make out that it does not exist, when the stats about the age differentiation coming forward that I put up as I started this speech say to any person with any degree of common sense that there is an issue coming down the track. It is a tsunami, in fact, that obviously any government in its right mind and committed to the people of Australia would address.

We are committed to changes in the culture of welfare dependency. There is no question about that. Can I just say that I believe that the overwhelming majority of the nation supports this journey that we as a government want to go on—that is, changing the culture of welfare dependency. But our opponents have no commitment to changing that culture, because fundamentally I believe, sadly, that it suits them to leave people dependent on government, because at the end of the day that just leads to out-and-out socialism.

When it comes to health and education in the state of Tasmania, I want to put a couple of things on the record as a part of the debate on the appropriation bills. Despite all the best efforts of people like the member for Franklin and the senators who do not have much to do but just to make up things as they go along, the reality is that the funding to Tasmanian hospitals will increase by 19 per cent over the next four years. This is on top of the increase of 12 per cent that was in place last year. We are also increasing funding to Tasmania's schools by 17 per cent over the next four years. That is on top of the increase of another 17 per cent just last year alone.

So can I put to bed this myth that there have been cuts to health and education. There have not. You cannot cut money that was never there. We keep hearing this magical figure, $80 billion. This magic pudding figure that was put on the table by Rudd-Gillard-Rudd was never in the budget or in the forward estimates. We cannot afford what we are doing now. We certainly could not afford that. We never committed to it at the election, so how can you cut something that never existed—or was I imagining the Gonski protesters at every polling booth in my electorate? I went to the election saying we would fund Gonski for the first four years but not the last two. The people who voted me in fully understand that. There are no cuts; there are increases over the forward estimates. So I want to just put that on the table for everybody to clearly understand.

Just on those facts and figures for health, I am thrilled that just last week, as a part of the budget process, I was able to formally announce ongoing funding for the next two years for the Mersey hospital, the only hospital in Australia that the Commonwealth has a direct relationship with in its funding. I will not go into the history of that, although it makes for a good story, but it was thrilling last week to be able to announce $148½ million over the next two years, to be reviewed in two years time as the Tasmanian government rolls out the realignment of its health services. For the people who live at the eastern end of my electorate, that is certainly very good news.

Small businesses play a massive role in my electorate. They are the heartland of Australia and we need to pay more attention to them, give them more respect, more encouragement and more incentive. This budget does that. I have always said that if I could just get one in every three or four of the small businesses in my electorate to be empowered sufficiently to employ one more person, we would flog the unemployment figure in my electorate to death. It is as simple as that. That is what is at the heart of the small business package in this budget—tax cuts, not just for incorporated small businesses but for sole traders and artists. That is great news. Even better than that, the budget allows for unlimited accelerated write-offs as long as each individual item is no more than $20,000 in value.

There is a young guy in my electorate who is powering on, building his business and his vision in the community—Lee Murphy, the owner of the Harbourmaster Cafe on the banks of the Mersey where the TT-Line ships go past. Only days before the package was announced, Lee received the permit to upgrade his kitchen and expand his business. This small business package is going to offer him some amazing incentives to do that. What a great, positive, encouraging surprise it was to him: as he was about to invest his money, the government stands alongside him and says, 'Lee, well done—here are some incentives for you; here is some tax relief to reward you for your commitment to building a business in Devonport.'

As a result of the budget, Briar Maritime Services in Ulverstone—the business of Captain Brian Peters and Captain Anne Rutherford—made a commitment to buy two new boat engines and a new work trailer. They even said that, as a result of that, they are going to engage another full-time employee. Well done to them—congratulations. May those two people be a shining example to every other small business in my electorate as they move on with hope and opportunity for employment in the not-too-distant future.

This budget is about jobs. It is about growth. It is about opportunity. It is a budget that is courageous enough to tackle the issues that confront this country. You can either confront them or, for political expediency, you can bury your head in the sand and make out that they do not exist. But at the end of the day those issues exist and the country requires the government to deal with them.

Cathy McGowan (Indi, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My vision for Indi is one where our communities in rural Australia are prosperous, caring and alive with opportunities for everybody. To be part of the process for implementing that vision is one of the key reasons I am in federal parliament. I am 100 per cent committed to working in partnership with my community, with business and with governments to bring this vision to fruition. Of all the tools at the disposal of government and this parliament, the budget plays a key role in setting the parameters and creating the environment for that vision to be enacted.

The future is not some place we are going to. It is not a set destination. The future in fact is a place we are creating, and I believe the paths to the future are made not found—and the making of those pathways changes both the maker and the destination. What we do is important, but I believe that how we do things is equally important.

With these convictions, I am committed to working closely with my community in my role as MP on both the what and the how of good governance. Consequently, over the three weeks since the budget, I have been talking with my community in multiple ways about the budget. I have been running listening posts, driving the caravan near and far across the valleys and towns of Indi. I have held meetings, walked the streets and gained a sense of what the people of Indi think about the Abbott government's second budget—their hopes, their fears, their likes, their dislikes and their suggestions for improvement. I have called this process the budget impact tour, or BIT. Tonight I am pleased to present a summary of the findings to the House. A full report will be made available and distributed across the network and to my colleagues in early June. Together with kitchen table conversations and the 'get in Cathy's ear' postcard, the BIT is one of the consultation strategies I am using to ensure that I provide strong, fair and balanced representation on behalf of the people of Indi.

In summary, there were three main themes gathered during this consultation. The first is the impact of the budget on regional Australia; the second is the impact of the budget on individuals, families and businesses; and the third is the opportunities presented in this time of low interest rates and cheap money to invest in infrastructure in regional Australia. In relation to the budget and regional Australia, a major criticism of last year's budget was the lack of understanding, discussion and appreciation of the impact budget strategies would have on regional Australia. Following extensive discussions in my electorate and with colleagues in this place, at the end of March I presented to the House a private member's bill, the charter of budget honesty amendment bill, which outlined key aspects of what a regional budget impact statement would address.

For the information of my colleagues in the House tonight, the key aspects of that bill were the publication of a regional Australia statement, which contains information about the likely impacts on regional Australia of key government initiatives or significant changes since the last financial year. The budget would have regard to the following: the economic, social, cultural and environmental impacts of government initiatives; the economic drivers of regional communities; the effect that government initiatives may have on regional communities due to lack of infrastructure, particularly mobile phone coverage, reliable internet connections, access to public transport, and the lack of access that people living in regional communities have to government services due to cost, long distances and time; the effect that lack of competition in regional communities has on the cost of living and doing business in regional communities; and, finally, the cost and difficulties involved in complying with regulatory requirements for people and businesses in regional communities.

I am pleased that in this year's budget the government has responded to the call from regional Australia for more information and has tabled the blue book, which does outline key government initiatives. I congratulate the government on this publication. I also note that there is no discussion in the blue book of the likely impacts on regional Australia of key government initiatives and the process made in addressing significant structural inequalities. From my perspective, clearly this is a work in progress, and I will continue to lobby the government and advocate with relevant ministers on the importance of doing this analysis.

To the second part of my speech: the summary of feedback gained during the budget impact tour—the impact on individuals, families, communities and businesses. I will begin with the positives. The budget recognition and support for small business has been widely applauded, as outlined by the member for Braddon. Budget support for stronger communities through the small capital projects grants is seen as a positive initiative, and people are looking forward to seeing the detail and the guidelines. There is a general sense that this budget was not as controversial as last year's; it is seen to be more fair and has addressed some of the problems outlined in last year's budget.

However, the largest particular area of comment to me was in relation to taxation. As I mentioned, there is strong support for changes to small business taxation as well as support for changes to agricultural taxation. But there is a call to align these changes so that agriculture and farming both have immediate access. The current arrangement is that farmers have to wait for two years before they can claim the tax incentives. While there has also been concern about the impact of bracket creep and the burden being carried by middle-class regional Australia, there was strong support for reviewing taxation, and support for the taxation white paper and the related federation white paper.

The second area of great concern was the impact of the budget on social security: changes to pensions, fear of more changes to pensions, the impact of changes to family benefits, maternity leave arrangements, pensions and changes to disability support have all caused great concern. In the health area, there has been concern about changes to arrangements for funding aged care and, in particular, residential aged-care packages, as well as ongoing concern about GP co-payments and what might happen in small rural communities where we have no bulk-billing services.

In the area of telecommunications there is an ongoing and consistent call for better access to mobile phone coverage. The government has an excellent program underway to address this issue, and there was great disappointment in my electorate that the budget failed to put more money into the mobile phone black spots program. I will continue to advocate very strongly to the minister that this needs to be done.

Around transport, fears relating to the potential impact of the sale of the Australian Rail Track Corporation and what this might mean for ongoing train and rail maintenance on the Melbourne-Albury line was a constant concern, as was the need for much more support for the inland freight route and the eventual funding of high-speed rail.

Around agriculture, there was general disappointment in the time it is taking to release the agricultural white paper; and the hope that recommendations in the white paper, when it is released, will be well funded. Particular mention was made of the importance of agricultural research and the need for a long-term strategic approach to investment in innovation, particularly in agricultural innovation.

Other issues canvassed included cuts to our aid budget and support for young people, particularly support for young people to make the transition from school to work, from work to university, from town to city and from city back to town. There was real worry that the long-term implications of cuts to our aid budget would turn up in rural and regional Australia as problems. People have asked me, again, to advocate to the Minister for Foreign Affairs to see what we can do, particularly about providing support to our near neighbours in the Pacific.

Apart from these issues raised during the consultation process, I also had a series of discussions about the government commitment to regional Australia with the financial experts in my community, and a number of questions were raised for consideration by the government. What would it take to get the government to seriously invest in infrastructure in regional Australia? With the low cost of money and low interest rates, the question was asked, 'Why doesn't the government borrow money to invest in infrastructure such as high-speed rail connectivity, telecommunications and regional services?'

I was also asked why there is not a national policy around decentralisation. Why are we getting only ad hoc titbits, moving agricultural research to centres? We need a policy of decentralisation. I was asked what we would have to do to get such a policy in place. How do we grow service industries in regional areas? How do we really grow small business? What can we do to remove the impediments of cross-border anomalies and very specific taxes such as the payroll tax?

I was asked to think about what we need to do to create incentive for regional development, what incentives are needed and how government could provide these. What would we really need to do to get super funds to invest in regional infrastructure?

Generally, the people of Indi were supportive of the government's attempt to manage the budget. However, they want a much greater appreciation of the impact of budget measures on regional Australia, and they want larger investment in regional infrastructure. They are worried about the slow pace of addressing the many mobile phone black spots, and the lack of commitment to high-speed rail and public transport. The people of Indi are calling on the government for inspiration and for partnerships—especially partnerships with young people; for the government to work with young people to enable them to become active participants in our new economy. They see opportunity for the government to provide aspiration—to really move from a sense of entitlement to a sense of innovation. There is so much more we could be doing, and regional Australia wants to partner with government in being part of that innovation.

Many constituents also commented on the important role of young people in regional Australia, and the need to stem the export—to reach out to young people and offer them support, encouragement and mentoring in order for them to reach their potential and become active participants in our regional economies. They said to me that young people do not need punishment—they need encouragement. They need a hand up. We need to be able to ensure that young people's energy, enthusiasm, vitality and skills can be used to help create the future that we all desire—a future full of prosperity and caring and alive with opportunity.

If I could make a note regarding the member for Braddon's speech, he expressed, perhaps, a fear that our regional communities will be full of old people. My sense is if we keep going in that direction, that is where we are headed. I call on the government to not go in that direction, to actually pay attention to young people in regional Australia and encourage them to come and live in our communities, to open small businesses, to partake in higher education and to be active participants in our communities.

It is my hope that next year's blue book—that concentrates on the government's budget and its impact on regional Australia—will focus on how the budget has impacted on the lives of young people who live in regional Australia, how it has advanced education, how it has given them access to mobile phones and NBN, how it has given them access to public transport, how it has given them access to create jobs and innovative ways of doing agriculture. And, finally, I hope that when we look at the balance of that particular budget that it shows we are in a surplus and that young people choose to come to live in regional Australia because that is the way we want to have it.

Louise Markus (Macquarie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-2016. All budgets are important, and as a member of this House I have had the fortune, indeed the privilege, to see 10 budgets. Each budget though feels more important than the previous one. For everyday Australians, at that point in time when the budget is handed down they are focusing on what it means for them and for their futures. I am particularly proud of this budget as it follows on from a particularly difficult one last year, which took much conviction to deliver. While difficult, it changed the trajectory of the nation's debt; while still tough, it now puts us on a much straighter path.

In spite of what was left by the previous government in the form of debt and deficit, this coalition government is delivering on its commitments to ensure our nation remains, in the long term, sustainable and able to provide for its people and that of the future generations, which I note was also mentioned by the previous member, the member for Indi. The cost of unemployment cannot be measured fully to the unemployed, their families, to the economy and to society as a whole. Having a job is the best ammunition against the battle of welfare dependency and poverty. I have said on many previous occasions in this place that where there are jobs there are indeed opportunities.

Those opposite have used many choice words about the 2015-16 budget but this budget is one that recognises that everyone deserves an opportunity in life. I am sure that this is what the people in the electorate of Macquarie want—they want opportunities, they want confidence, they want to know that not only do those who are currently employed and in the workforce have opportunities but also that the generations to follow them do.

This government understands the importance of small business—the engine room of our economy. This government understands the personal risk that many small businesses take in an endeavour to build and to grow jobs not just for themselves but also for their communities. If a business grows then we see job growth. In Macquarie there are more than 11,000 small businesses—more than 5,300 in the Blue Mountains and more than 6,400 in the Hawkesbury area—each employing staff and contributing to the local economy. That is why we have delivered a budget that will help small business grow and not stifle them with uncertainty, as was the case under the previous government.

This budget will ensure small business see the lowest company tax rates since 1967. We will give a tax discount for unincorporated businesses. This government will provide a five per cent tax discount to unincorporated businesses with an annual turnover of less than $2 million from 1 July this year—this will deliver a tax cut of $1.8 billion over the next four years. The discount will be capped at $1,000 per individual in an income year delivered as a tax credit in their tax return. We will give an immediate tax deduction for any individual asset a small business buys that is worth up to $20,000. And in ensuring that we do not stifle small business, we will continue to cut red tape. A tax deduction on assets up to $20,000 will help businesses expand—for example, in a hairdressing salon that has people eagerly waiting for their turn this one simple measure of accelerating depreciation means the business could purchase additional hair-washing basins, therefore saving time and creating more productivity for their business.

This government understands infrastructure and the importance it plays not only in the life of business but in the day-to-day living of all of us and our families. It is a travesty that people have had to sit in traffic jams and chaos, day in and day out, for so many years under those on the opposite side. Almost daily, I receive complaints regarding the congestion experienced, particularly in the Hawkesbury. That is why this government will contribute towards the important infrastructure required for the electorate and it will work with state governments that are interested in providing better outcomes for all residents. Important infrastructure for Macquarie will include a recommitment to the Ross Street intersection at Glenbrook and the Richmond Bridge improvements to approaches and surrounds. This will not completely resolve the challenge of traffic flow on the bridge, particularly in the mornings and evenings, the peak hours, but it will go some of the way towards improving it. Other measures include the Great Western Highway safety works at Mount Victoria and the black spot projects for Peninsula Road, the Great Western Highway at Valley Heights in the Blue Mountains and, of course, the Hawkesbury Valley Way at Hobart Street to Racecourse Road in Richmond. These projects will deliver a modern local transport network and will unlock the economic capacity of Macquarie. The budget will also see funding for the Roads to Recovery program double for urgent local road repairs, delivering $2.1 billion over the five years to 2018-19 directly to local councils, including the double payment in the coming financial year. Projects funded under the Roads to Recovery program are nominated by local councils according to local priorities. This is good news for local councils and residents alike.

The first responsibility of government is keeping people safe. The government is continuing to make a significant investment in the safety and security of Macquarie. Macquarie has two defence facilities: RAAF Base Glenbrook in the lower Blue Mountains and RAAF Base Richmond in the Hawkesbury. Together, these bases see 2,399 defence personnel, including civilians, and their families in our community. This year, the government has already invested $201.1 million in defence in Macquarie, with over $1.1 million to be invested in the coming year. This government will provide Defence with $31.9 billion in the 2015-16 financial year—an increase of $9.9 billion over the forward estimates. When this is compared to the 2014-15 budget, it represents a record expenditure on defence and is a stark comparison to the former Labor government, which took $16 billion from defence, reducing spending as a percentage of GDP to the lowest level since 1938. Investing in defence locally will have direct and indirect economic benefits for Macquarie.

The Macquarie community support for our defence families and local defence investment is one part of a whole range of measures helping to bolster our defence capabilities, supporting Australian defence industries and ensuring Australia remains safe and secure into the future. I take this opportunity to thank all the defence personnel and their families for the commitment and dedication they demonstrate as they serve our nation.

Feeling safe and secure is fundamental to our lives. However, feeling safe not only includes our defence capabilities and border protection; feeling safe is also paramount for our families and communities to build a future in which to live out our daily lives. Knowing our children are safe is a major contributing factor to our ability to work, as well as flexible arrangements that cater for our new emerging society. Recently, I welcomed the Minister for Social Services, Scott Morrison, to my electorate to meet with families and to speak firsthand about the Jobs for Families package. The $4.4 billion Jobs for Families package will give parents more choice and opportunity to work. The 2015 budget delivers on the government's commitment to support families by making child care simpler, more affordable, more flexible and more accessible.

Families with shift workers such as police, firefighters, ambulance officers and nurses often experience great challenges in accessing mainstream childcare services. They are often unable to access government-supported child care due to the unpredictable nature of their hours and work. This is why we have committed to spend $250 million on an interim home-based carer pilot program known as a nanny's trial. This trial will provide more choice and flexible childcare options, funding 4,000 nannies and providing subsidised care to approximately 10,000 children. Eligible nannies must, of course, be attached to an approved service, be at least 18 years of age and have a current working with children check and meet first aid requirements. Families that are eligible will receive a subsidy at a percentage of an hourly fee cap rate of $7 per child based on family income, similar to the childcare subsidy parameters.

The world is changing. Our nation is changing. There is a greater need and expectancy for accessibility to goods and services. It is therefore recognisable that we need child care that caters for these changes. Whilst my children are now in their early adult years, I too worked whilst raising a family and understand the need for a safe, caring and flexible system.

It was wonderful for the minister and I to be welcomed so warmly at Jasmine Preschool in Freemans Reach by owner Andrew Junor, the families and the children, who indeed have a lot of fun. Also visiting the electorate the week before last was the Assistant Minister for Social Services, Mitch Fifield, who joined me, the New South Wales state minister for disability services, John Ajaka, and my colleague the federal member for Lindsay, Fiona Scott, for the signing of an agreement to begin the early rollout of the National Disability Insurance Scheme in the Nepean, Blue Mountains, Hawkesbury and Lithgow areas of Greater Western Sydney. This represents a $20 million commitment by this government, enabling the NDIS to be rolled out for up to 2,000 children between nought to 17 years of age in the electorate of Macquarie—one full year ahead of schedule.

There are 2,000 children living with disability in Greater Western Sydney and this early rollout enabled by the budget will see families in the Hawkesbury and the Blue Mountains receive more support to help meet the needs of their children and support them to achieve their goals and aspirations.

Minister Fifield then joined me in a roundtable session with local organisations and stakeholders for a discussion regarding NDIS, which enabled many questions regarding this important matter to be answered. While there has been much progress, we all understand that there will be challenges and processes to work out, to iron out any wrinkles, if I may use that terminology, as we roll out this wonderful program.

I, as does the government, recognise and appreciate all families and loved ones that care and dedicate their lives to support those living with disability. Australia has almost 2.7 million carers that care for people with disability—those with medical conditions, mental illness or someone who is aged. They are the unsung heroes that often silently and diligently go about their responsibilities with passion and often without thanks. I would like to thank them here tonight. The government recognises the contribution they make and wants to make their lives easier.

Carers currently access services through gateways such My Aged Care or the NDIS, focusing on the person that is cared for. Under the Integrated Plan for Carer Support Services, IPCSS, and the National Carer Gateway, which is due to commence on 1 December this year, carers will have easier and simplified access to information for their social and economic participation. The National Carer Gateway is budgeted to cost $10.9 million in 2015-16 and a total of $33.7 million by 2018-19.

Also two weeks I attended the launch arranged by WSROC of the Light Years Ahead project with the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Industry and Science, Karen Andrews. This government has committed $5 million towards this innovative project which will see the replacement of approximately 13,000 old street lights, with LED lights across nine councils. This will result in a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions of approximately 24,000 tonnes and $21 million in energy savings for nine councils over 20 years—the life of the lights. I am delighted this project includes the Hawkesbury and Blue Mountains city councils.

Opposition is a sad place to be in—I have been there myself—and it is worse when you have no meaningful and alternative solutions, like those opposite. The 2015 budget is the next step in our responsible long-term plan to build a stronger, safer and more prosperous future for all Australians. What people want is confidence and certainty. It is my hope, then, that those opposite who helped contribute to the mess they themselves created will now assist by enabling these benefits outlined in the 2015 budget to be passed.

Gary Gray (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In this appropriations debate I will speak of the former finance minister, Peter Walsh. Peter Alexander (Alexanda) Walsh was a farmer, a finance minister, a husband and a father. Peter was born in Kellerberrin in 1935; he left school at 14 and entered the Senate in 1974. He entered cabinet in 1983 and left parliament in 1993. His achievements in public life are quite remarkable. When Peter died on 10 April he was surrounded by his loving and understanding family. He was not always easy to live with—he was acerbic and gruff to political opponents while being friendly, social and caring, always loving and intriguing to his family. Hardworking, he enjoyed a party and he was an enduring friend to a broad political church of public policy enthusiasts. Peter applied a consistent set of values throughout his life—Australia is better for that. He distrusted the new class, saw government as having an efficient and effective purpose, only doing what governments do best—taking one tax dollar more than was necessary was, he said, theft.

But I am getting ahead of myself. In his younger days Peter, Rosalie and brother John and sister-in-law Margaret farmed wheat and sheep at Doodlakine in Western Australia's grain belt. In a family of outstanding farmers, Peter was a good farmer and a good left-handed 100 sheep a day shearer. Harry Perkins told me that. Harry was beaten by Peter in a junior farmers regional shearing zone final in the early 1950s. Peter was very pleased—Harry was Country Party! Peter's farm neighbours were always impressed by his remarkable capacity to estimate crop yields. He was known to get it right to within 0.1 of a tonne per hectare. It was an invaluable skill and an ability he retained to the end. Even through the gathering cloud of dementia and as other skills left him, in October last year he could convert grain length and density of the head into bags of wheat then bushels per acre, then to tons per hectare and finally into tonnes per hectare—all in his head. Although it was thought radical in the 1960s, Peter built contour banks across the farm to contain and direct heavy rainfall. Peter was proud of his contour banks. They remain in full working order today, saving soil and water and controlling erosion.

In the early 1950s Peter did National Service with the Army at the Northam camp. But he was not an enthusiastic soldier of the Queen. Peter was an enthusiastic soldier in the battle for a stronger economy. He was a general in the fight for a better, fairer budget. Peter was outstanding at that.

Peter had a clarity of thought, an ability to reduce the complex to simple principles. This was a critical facility. When he spoke he made sense, and people listened. The Labor Party, led by Bill Hayden, with John Dawkins, Don Grimes, Neal Blewett, then Bob Hawke and Paul Keating, found Peter's approach invaluable. We thank his colleagues for finding not just a place but a purpose for what Paul Keating called 'Peter's reactive economic rationalism'. As resources minister, Peter introduced the petroleum resource rent tax, which, like his contour banks, remains in place today, working for the benefit of future generations. Bob Hawke said:

… it was as Minister for Finance that Peter really made his mark. His highly principled, no-nonsense and at times acerbic style made him ideal for this position. In agricultural terms, of which he was well versed, he was able to sort the wheat from the chaff in a very efficient manner. His talent and contribution has been widely acknowledged, including high praise from Nick Minchin and other Liberals as the Best Ever Finance Minister. No-one could disagree with that.

Significant expenditure cuts were required in 1986 in order to weather collapsing terms of trade. The government adopted a simple trilogy: do not raise taxes as a share of GDP; do not raise outlays as a share of GDP and reduce outlays in real terms. For four years, using IMF expenditure definitions, Peter fulfilled that trilogy.

For four years, using IMF expenditure definitions, Peter fulfilled that trilogy. He produced four budgets which reduced outlays in real terms, something that no other government finance minister has done more than once. So Peter remains the gold standard, cutting spending in real terms while increasing the fairness of outlays. The old child endowment, a payment to every family regardless of wealth, was abolished. The family allowance was introduced. It was income tested and provided a greater payment only to those who were less well off. Peter worked with a team of aligned souls, as Paul Keating called it—a company of ministers and public servants who understood the need for fairness and frugality, pursuing a philosophy of 'restraint with equity', ensuring that the least well off were protected as overall government spending fell.

Peter was always at work—even at a diplomatic corps dinner at the embassy in Tokyo. Ross Garnaut tells of Peter's visit in the latter days of the 1980s property boom, when Peter was finance minister. Ross says:

The Australian Embassy residence was set in an old and beautiful Japanese garden that had been bought for a number of inconvertible Japanese yen during the postwar occupation. It was famous around the old and great of Japan, and the pride of the Australian Ambassador and diplomatic glitterati. 'How much is this garden worth?', asked Walsh. The Ambassador said that he didn't know for sure, but, proudly thought it was probably a billion dollars (that's the dollars of the late 1980s). The Finance Minister said he would check it out.

A Cabinet meeting a couple of months later authorised a process to put part of the garden in Tokyo out to sale by tender, and to build fit for purpose offices for the Embassy in a corner of the site that would not be sold. The next year's budget papers revealed a surplus of more than $800 million from the sale of land, after deducting the costs of new Embassy buildings in Beijing and Tokyo.

So, fairness was increased as a consequence of restraint.

Labor's primary vote rose and its two-party preferred vote rose. At the 1987 double-dissolution election held on Gough Whitlam's birthday, 11 July, with declining government outlays Labor increased its parliamentary majority. Peter was proud of that, and we are proud of Peter—proud of him as a Western Australian and proud of him in his role as a Labor senator and a Labor minister.

Peter enjoyed a party. He was not going to let hard work or politics get in the way of that. Members, senators and public servants would seek out Peter's corridor parties, in the company of Gareth Evans, John Button, Ralph Willis, John Dawkins, John Howard, Peter Costello, John Hewson, and another son of the WA wheat belt, from the town of Korbel, John Stone. I could keep on going but you get the picture. Peter was also close to John Hyde, another dry, wheat-belt public-policy obsessive from Dalwallinu. He respected Eric Ripper's fiscal management. He liked and respected Nick Minchin and made a friend of Mathias Cormann. He liked Tony Burke and he enjoyed showing Burkey around the family farm.

Peter's daughters remember a loving father, proud of his girls, unlike the reserved, stoic, sunburnt grain-belt types. He was always soft and gentle—but don't ever tell his foes that; they thought the softest thing about Peter was his teeth. He was a contradiction. To daughter Deborah, he was a pessimistic optimist, an anti-green conservationist, a frugal man who loved to party, a grandfather who doted on his grandchildren but who was a dodgy babysitter. Deborah talks of a Saturday morning when the boys were in Peter's care. Deborah came home to find two wild ducks walking to the boys' bedroom and a trail of duck poo from the back verandah to the bedrooms. Deborah asked Peter why he had let the ducks into the house. He looked up from The Australian Financial Reviewand said, 'Well, I didn't leave the door open.'

To Anne, Peter was a teacher and a role model, remembering Peter's connection to Muresq Agricultural College through which a young and troubled Vietnam war conscript came to stay on the family farm. Peter taught the girls that you could hate the Vietnam War but honour, sympathise and support its participants. Peter taught that creed and colour play no part in the worth of a person. Peter taught never to confuse the volume of noise with the number of people making it.

To Shelley, Peter was a playful father, teaser of kids and family pets, and a serious competitor in childhood games on the farm. He taught that it was always possible to add one more to the dining-room table.

Peter had three lives: the family man, the senator and the farmer with enduring attachments to the dirt at Doodlakine.

Karen remembers Peter living by the numbers and precision; farming required that. The girls were daughters 1, 2, 3 and 4. Peter was fun, spontaneous and out for adventure, while Rosalie restored the order. Karen remembers his vast general knowledge, and how learning new things was exciting with Peter. To escape the heat on a hot dry summer night, the family would often drag their mattresses out onto the back lawn. Peter was fascinated by the stars and the universe, and he would encourage the girls to find constellations in the Milky Way. On the farm on their back lawn, on their backs looking up; going to sleep they would discuss the universe and its wonders.

While Peter retired from politics in 1993, he left a legacy that transcends politics. He learnt from the land and he brought from the wheat belt that gave him life an appreciation of the real value of things, and the rigour to apply those values throughout his life. Those values included a 'restraint with equity' philosophy to protect the most vulnerable, which ultimately meant a better and fairer outcome. He blazed a new path for finance ministers. Peter enjoyed football, first as a player locally, then as a lifelong member of the Swan Districts Football Club, and he was a proud—original—West Coast Eagles member. Peter was always true to himself. Australia was made stronger and fairer for Peter's public service. No Australian could aspire to do better than that.

We thank the whole Walsh family for letting Peter perform his public service; John, for holding things together on the farm; and Rosalie, for holding things together at home. The Walsh family, through Kevin and Philippa, continue today to farm at Doodlakine, where as dust Peter will settle. Peter is survived by Rosalie, by his daughters Karen, Shelley, Anne and Deborah, and by 11 grandchildren, Rhiannon, Daniel, Imogen, Christopher, Alexander, Laura, Siobhan, Michael, Riley, Darcy and Toby. We thank you, Peter. We thank you for your service.

Jason Wood (La Trobe, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too wish to speak in this debate on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-2016 and related bills, in particular on the benefits to my electorate of La Trobe. But first we need to go back in time and have a look at what Labor left the Abbott government. Labor delivered $191 billion in deficits, plus $123 billion in deficits over the next four years, that is the period from 2013-14 to 2016-17.

This budget shrinks the deficit from $50 billion this year to $3 billion in 2017-18. Under our Economic Action Strategy, debt will be $277 billion lower in 10 years—I repeat, $277 billion lower in 10 years—than it would have been under Labor government policies. In 10 years, we will be saving $16 billion in annual debt interest. This saving is more than the annual cost of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme; more than the annual cost of the National Disability Insurance Scheme; more than the annual expenditure of higher education—so it is an incredible saving.

We are doing our job to repair the budget and build the future. We are doing this by investing in infrastructure—a record $50 billion in critical road projects, rail, ports and airports—and, sadly, as a Victorian I must say that I am devastated that the East West Link project will not be going ahead under the current state Labor government with Daniel Andrews, but the great news is that $3 billion is still on the table with the federal coalition. We are also abolishing the carbon tax to grow the economy and save households on average $550 next year alone. We are helping apprentices with concessional loans to help them to complete their training; it is vital that we help young people. We are helping small businesses create jobs, cutting the company tax by 1.5 per cent and reducing red tape costs by $1 billion per year. We are introducing a special $20,000 tax deduction for small businesses investing in equipment and materials, from hairdressers to tradies. We are pursuing free trade agreements, such as those negotiated with South Korea and Japan, to help boost our exports. These are the facts when it comes to health: over the next four years, the Australian government funding to the states for public hospitals will increase by 40 per cent, and total spending on health will increase by more than $10 billion a year over the next four years.

These are the facts on schools: the government is investing $64.5 billion in schools over the next four years—over $1.2 billion more than Labor would have spent. Between 2013-14 and 2017-18, annual funding from the Australian government to schools will go up by 34 per cent—a $4.6 billion a year increase. These are the facts when it comes to pensions: pensions will not be cut during this term of parliament. The pension will continue to increase twice a year, as it always has since indexation was introduced under the Howard government. Aged pensioners will benefit significantly from the carbon tax being scrapped, which will save households on average $550 next year alone. The family home will not be included in any pension asset test.

Now I would like to look a bit closer to home in my electorate of La Trobe. Once again, I am very proud to say that, midway through this current term, we have continued our motto of listening and delivering. In the last federal budget we had delivered three major projects in La Trobe. I congratulate those who put the project applications together. In total, I believe that there were over 400 applicants and 51 of those were successful. Three of our local councils came up with successful applications.

Bunjil Place is actually in the seat of Holt, but I am very proud to say that I worked with the Casey council on this project. It was formerly known as the Casey Cultural Precinct. The federal government has committed $10 million to this project. The Casey council is putting in an amazing contribution of $110 million for this project. Sadly, the state Labor government has made no contribution. The CEO, Mike Tyler, told me that the $10 million put in by the federal government will decrease the amount of interest the council has to pay by reducing the loan term from 30 years to 21 years. If the state Labor government were to contribute $10 million, that would further decrease to 16 years, which would take great pressure off local council ratepayers such as those living in Narre Warren, Narre Warren South, Berwick et cetera.

During construction, this project will create an amazing 1,200 jobs, and that is what we truly need at the moment, considering the Labor Party is not backing the East West Link in Victoria. This will be a premier arts destination for the outer south-eastern suburbs of Melbourne. It will include a theatre, a studio space, a function centre and a regional art gallery. I again acknowledge the CEO, Mike Tyler, for his hard work. I also acknowledge the Mayor of Casey, Mick Morland, as well as Deputy Mayor Louise Berkelmans, Councillor Rafal Kaplon, Councillor Wayne Smith, Councillor Geoff Ablett, Councillor Susan Serey, Councillor Rosalie Crestani, Councillor Gary Rowe, Councillor Amanda Stapledon, Councillor Damien Rosario and Councillor Sam Aziz. The reason I have mentioned all of these councillors is that this is truly an amazing project. I doubt whether, in Australia, there will be any project where a council contributes $110 million. For all those who have been involved in Bunjil Place, I congratulate you, because this is really going to be a fantastic local community project.

We also delivered funding for the Emerald Community Hub—$1.5 million. This will have enhanced capacity to provide existing and new training courses, including accredited training of radio operators—and that is very important up in the Dandenong Ranges each fire season. It will provide courses enabled by a new commercial kitchen. It will provide an arts space to promote the local art community. Again, we were very much involved in the past, funding the Gem Community Arts Centre and also the Emerald Secondary College's performing arts, which has just been fantastic for the local area. An incubator hub for local businesses is also part of the Emerald Community Hub, as is the promotion of local tourism, which is very important to small business. The hub also includes facilities to provide enhanced mental health services and allied health services, and accessible community space for local residents and social recreation groups. I would like to thank the CEO of Cardinia Shire, Garry McQuillan; we met with him several times on this project. I would also like to thank councillor and Mayor of Cardinia Shire, Leticia Wilmot, Councillor Tania Baxter and Councillor Brett Owen, as these three are councillors for the ward the Emerald community hub will fall within. I must thank all the other councillors, too, because it obviously comes down to the votes. All councillors want to look after their wards first, but they acknowledge this is a fantastic project.

From the Emerald community I would like to thank Ray Spencer, representing the Emerald Mechanics Institute, and Russell Soderlund, representing the Dandenong Ranges Community Bank, which very generously contributed $250,000 to this project. Above all, I thank all of those involved in the Emerald community hub. This is a project which is being led by the local community.

We were also, under this current budget, very proud to announce that the Belgrave Multipurpose Health Hub will receive $3.835 million. This will include council's maternal and child health services and youth services. Regarding youth services, I have again advocated very strongly that I would love to see a headspace service offered from the Belgrave health hub; mental health issues are a huge issue in Australia and, in particular, up in the Dandenong Ranges. We will also see aged and disability services, Inspiro Belgrave services and the Dandenong Ranges Emergency Relief Service. I would like to thank the Mayor of the Shire of Yarra Ranges, Maria McCarthy, for all her support; Lyster Ward Councillor Mike Clarke, who is newly elected and who has been a great support; Inspiro CEO Karen McPeake, Director of Social and Economic Development Ali Waistie, with whom I have had numerous conversations, and the Dandenong Ranges Emergency Relief Service for all the fantastic work they have done for so long. I still recall, back in the days when Alan Fincher was the mayor of Yarra Ranges—we met on the site; it was one of those projects I never saw get off the ground, but the great news is this project will now be going ahead.

The very interesting thing about these three vital projects for La Trobe is they were sourced from the National Stronger Regions Fund. I am very saddened to hear that the Labor government has come out in opposition to all these vital projects. I just cannot believe it. Why would they oppose these vital projects in my electorate?

Another hugely beneficial funding source for my electorate has been the Dandenong Ranges Environmental and Bushfire Reduction Grants Program. Again, I must thank Greg Hunt, the Minister for the Environment. He understands all too well how important the issue of bushfires is in my electorate; on the other hand, weeds are also a huge issue. People sometimes say weeds cause bushfires; they do not cause bushfires, but if you have a mountain ash or any other sort of gum tree, and you have ivy going up it, during a fire that is like a runner straight up the tree. That is why we need to address the issue of blackberries, and sycamores too, which sadly are all through the forest. This is a fantastic program. This program is unique as it allows works to be done across public and private land by community groups like the 'friends of' organisations and the CFA. When I attended various CFA public meetings, that was a big issue they had. They could look after crown land, but they could never look after private property. This does both.

The first result from round is that 29 projects have been approved. Out of the 29 projects, there are 22 different community groups and organisations coming together to complete works across the Dandenong Ranges. These include: Agribusiness Yarravalley—I know Tony Smith, the member for Casey, did great work with out there; Cardinia Shire Council, CFA Belgrave Heights and South; the Chandler Hill Parkcare Group; the Emerald Tourist Railway Board—they put a great submission in; the Friends of Baluk Willam Nature Conservation Reserve; the Friends of Ferny Creek; the Friends of Harbury; the Friends of Hazel Valley Group in Tecoma; the Friends of Sassafras Creek; the Friends of Sherbrooke Forest; the Holly Hill Community Fireguard group; the Johns Hill Landcare Group; the Macclesfield Fire Brigade, Monbulk Landcare group—again, I know Tony Smith worked with them and the same with the Montrose Environmental Group; the Friends of Selby Conservation Reserve group; the Sherbrooke Community School; the Sherbrooke Lyrebird Study Group; the Southern Dandenongs Landcare Group; the Southern Ranges Environmental Alliance; and StopPitt. This round of grants comes to the very exact figure of $1,033,912. Sadly, the state Labor government have ripped out all their funding for weed management through the Dandenong Ranges, which is not only going to be bad for those trying to look after our beautiful environment; it is also going to create more of a fire danger. I really hope they reconsider that decision. With this project I would like to thank Steve Thuan from the Port Phillip and Westernport Catchment Management Authority for all his hard work in working with all the groups.

I would finally briefly like to talk about a big announcement we had with the opening of headspace at Fountain Gate. I must give the member for Holt, Mr Anthony Byrne, a plug. He has been a tireless worker in preventing youth suicide in his electorate and also in La Trobe. This is one of those issues we have worked tirelessly together on. The great news was that two weeks before the federal election we had the funding approved. I was so glad to be there at the official opening and see this beautiful premises. I say 'beautiful' because it is a really nice-looking venue which has been opened. That will address issues such as mental health concerns for young people, youth suicide, under-age alcohol consumption, depression and anxiety. It was a great day. I must give Chris Tanti, the headspace CEO, a great mention for all he has done in youth suicide prevention to combat the awful scourge of suicide.

Michael Danby (Melbourne Ports, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to note my concern in this debate on the appropriations bills at the plans of the coalition government and the Minister for Arts, Senator Brandis, to strip the Australian Council of half of its funding, moving it to a new program, the National Program for Excellence in the Arts, NEPA. This is to run within the Ministry of the Arts, with the ultimate authority for funding decisions resting with Senator Brandis. As Barry Humphries, now Director of the Adelaide Cabaret Festival, said through his alter ego Sir Les Patterson: 'Sir Les has got a good idea. He said, "Why can't we say that the Australia Council is a sporting body?" If we pretended that it was there for the promotion of football and cricket, the government would give it even more money.'

Since its inception, the Australia Council has supported Australian arts and arts organisations with two guiding principles: the pursuit of artistic excellence based on peer assessment and that funding decisions be made at arm's length from the government. All previous governments have long been committed to these principles, and we will continue to be in the next government. Senator Brandis is a cultured man, but neither Sir Les Patterson nor Lorenzo Medici are appropriate models for arts funding in Australia in the current era.

In 2013 the then Labor government legislated to deliver key recommendations of a 2012 review of the Australia Council. Importantly—and I would wish my colleagues across the aisle to hear this—the reforms that Labor enacted took place after extensive dialogue and in conjunction with the arts sector. In contrast, at Senate estimates last week Senator Brandis admitted he had not consulted anyone in the arts community before making the announcement. The Chair of the Australia Council, Rupert Myer, was only told of the impending cuts—that half of his funds would be cut—late in the afternoon of budget day. For a budget that was supposed to be about no surprises, perhaps Mr Myer and Chief Executive Officer of the Australia Council, Tony Grybowski, found this something of a surprise.

Labor has long had a dedication to the arts. One of the greatest achievements of former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam was on Australia Day 1973, in founding the interim Arts Council, which later became the Australia Council and incorporated and streamlined the roles of many other arts bodies. Within the council, there were seven specialist boards representing literature, music, theatre, crafts, Aboriginal arts, film and television, and visual arts. During the Gillard government I had the honour of being Parliamentary Secretary for the Arts. Indeed, I moved the second reading for a major piece of legislation remodelling the Australia Council so that its organisation would not be siloed and so that interaction would occur more easily.

As a result, I fear, of the minister's consolidation of power, the Australia Council suspended the grants process for the six-year funding program for many arts organisations before any money was awarded. There is a real sting in this cut to the Australia Council. Funding arrangements between the Australia Council and state and federal government bodies mean that funds to the 29 major art companies are quarantined. This means that the cuts to the Australia Council budget will disproportionately affect hundreds of small to medium arts companies. It is these companies that will be most dramatically affected by the stripping away of the $100 million of arts council funds. They are, in particular, the grassroots of the arts community which grow all of the future creativity of arts activity around Australia.

Amid all of the ambiguities over the council's functions, Senator Brandis has revealed he will award projects that have already received or been promised private funding. While the bigger companies will find it easy to attract philanthropic investment, the smaller ones will struggle to do so. They will be more likely to go to the wall because of these changes. Ironically, it is the helping hand that the Australia Council provides that enables some of these small companies to be noticed and to obtain private funding. Therefore, whether it is intended or unintended, Senator Brandis is cutting this process off at the knees.

The ministry for the arts will now be scrambling to set up a bureaucratic infrastructure to handle the applications for funding that will be pouring in. Beyond establishing the NPEA, the ongoing maintenance and assessment of applications will add a considerable burden to a Public Service already cut to the bone. For a government so obsessed with the efficiency of the Public Service, it is ironic that the Minister for the Arts will be pushing what is effectively a doubling up of work, because the Australia Council already does that work.

The true danger of this move is that there will be ministerial discretion over what arts in Australia is funded. As I said before, this may have been appropriate in centuries past with Lorenzo de Medici or in the imagination of Barry Humphries with Sir Les Patterson—but the whole idea of noninterference in the arts was to have arms-length funding and assessment by one's peers. Some in the media have questioned Senator Brandis's role as an arbiter of excellence in the arts. They have a good point, but I think the problem is deeper. To ensure that political interference does not affect the arts in Australia, the Australia Council supports art based on peer assessment, as I said, at arm's length from government. The council determines a pool of peers who measure an application for funds against eligibility criteria before coming together to discuss proposals. It is confidential, it shuts out political interference and, to date, including during the 11 long years of the Howard government, it has worked. What is to stop Senator Brandis deciding that arts projects to be funded just happen to be in marginal seats or just happen to be connected to people connected with the Liberal Party? It is the old song—'I dance with the man who danced with the Prince of Wales.' Who will keep the senator accountable?

I observed an interesting anecdote in The Guardian last week. Its columnist wrote:

One of my sources directed me to examine the Twitter feeds of the arts companies to determine reactions to the changes. "The most you'll get is a 'wow', or an expression of shock," the source said. "Amidst this kind of uncertainty, no company can afford the risk of making criticism public."

It is a sad fact that the Minister for the Arts, who is also this country's Attorney-General and a fierce defender of free speech, has caused the arts sector to be so afraid of their own voices that they are not saying anything for fear of losing more funding. That is quite a legacy! I commend the Australia Council for its courage in at least issuing a press release saying to arts organisations across this country that the six-year funding round will be abandoned and that it is totally affected by both this cut and the split and double bureaucracy that has been created.

I turn now from this unfair budget's effect on the arts community nationally to other disproportionate impacts in my state of Victoria. Over the next five years Victoria is slated to receive just eight per cent of the $19.8 billion the Abbott government will invest in road and rail infrastructure. Compare that to the 39 per cent share that New South Wales will receive. Indeed, in the coming years Victoria's share of the Commonwealth's National Partnership Payment scheme will drop to just 12 per cent, despite the fact that my state has a quarter of Australia's population. Is it because Victorian cabinet ministers, such as the members for Kooyong, Menzies and Goldstein, are not able to stand up to their Sydney based colleagues who seem to run this government? Or is Victoria being punished for being the only state to elect more Labor than coalition MPs? The Age newspaper—a newspaper I do not cite very often—did say that Victoria will get 19 per cent of the Commonwealth National Partnership payments and this will drop to 12 per cent over the next four years—less than half of Victoria's population share. I think the way Victoria is being treated is a very inequitable. The figures are indisputable, particularly in infrastructure. I realise we are in the middle of the political stoush that will eventually be resolved, but there is no other conclusion one can come to than that Victoria is being punished for electing a government that is unacceptable to the current federal government.

Let me turn to the last area I want to identify, and that is claims made by the foreign minister last week in response to the intense questioning from the shadow Attorney-General that somehow during the previous Labor government expenditure on national security was diminished and the opposition was somehow unsupportive of the safety of all Australians. Nothing could be further from the truth. As we all know, in the last three tranches of national security legislation—including with some intense debates on our own side—we have supported the government to protect Australian people on every occasion and that includes not only in legislation but also in expenditure on non-Defence national security. If you examine expenditure by the Howard government from, say, 2001 to 2014 expenditure on non-Defence national security it goes, in the billions of dollars, from about three in 2001 to seven when Labor finished office and it has remained at that high level under the current government, although I note that it is projected to decline in 2017-18 to six and a half. I am not going to quibble with members of the coalition about what might happen in the future, but all I would say is: over the years, between 2001 and 2007, when the Howard government was in office, there was a slow increase of expenditure in this area. It remained high when Prime Minister Rudd was elected and went to greater heights when Prime Minister Gillard was elected. So the claim that Labor is not interested in legislatively or financially supporting Australian national security is plainly false.

The review of Australia's counter-terrorism machinery produced a chart that is available from the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet in their January 2015 report, and it is clear that we were mindful of expenditure in this area because circumstances demanded the increase. I do not think it serves either political party to say that one is more patriotic than the other, if there is no evidence of it. So, both in legislation and in expenditure, Labor has been responsible and supported the government. It is regrettable for a glass-jawed Foreign Minister to be unable to answer questions about what the Attorney-General should have done with national security and to say that we were not spending sufficient money when we were in office or that we did not support them on legislation.

Since we have time in these debates to reflect on things, I might say that the foreign minister and the Attorney-General do not understand these things. That piece of paper from Monis could have been very important for a professional intelligence officer if he had evaluated it. Who knows what other information they had? This might have indicated that this person had become very active when he suggested that he wanted to be in contact with the head of Daesh.

Not everyone reacts like the Attorney-General's office did. I am not saying the Attorney-General himself. I am sure that if he had seen the correspondence he would have referred it on directly to the security services, not just to his department. I received a letter from a convicted terrorist some years ago. I was alarmed because I thought the person sounded very emboldened. I did not understand why he was writing to me. I not only sent it on to ASIO; I also rang the director-general. I came to the view that the security services found this piece of correspondence a particularly important part of the picture with this individual. That is why all of us, from the highest to the lowest, have a responsibility when these matters come before us to refer these matters directly on straightaway to the appropriate authorities.

It is not good enough to say that former Attorney-General McClelland received a piece of correspondence. The difference is the situation. The security alert was at the highest level it has ever been and it should have been referred. The foreign minister should not be so glass jawed about it.

Alan Tudge (Aston, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In rising to speak to the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-2016 this evening I would like to touch on three or four issues from the budget and then briefly mention the ice epidemic which is occurring in my electorate, as it is across the entire country, and some of the things which we are doing in relation to that. If I could start by talking about the aggregate budget and what we are trying to achieve. Let me touch on two or three things. First and foremost, we have to get control of Labor's debt and deficit disaster. This budget continues the work of last year's budget in terms of getting control of the spending and providing a very clear pathway back to surplus.

When you look at the macro figures of this budget, the budget deficit reduces each and every year from $35.1 billion in 2015-16 to $6.9 million in 2018-19. We do that in part because we have been very disciplined on the spending side, keeping spending down to 1.5 per cent, whereas we inherited spending growth at 3.7 per cent, real growth, which of course is just completely unsustainable. That is the most important macro measure, if you like—getting control of Labor's debt and deficit disaster. That is so important because really this is about the future generations. If we do not get on top of the debt and deficit today then it will be our children and our grandchildren that will be having to pay it back. That was Labor's legacy. They set up a tremendous debt trajectory and we are getting firmly on top of this in this budget, building on last year's budget work.

The second point I would like to raise from this year's budget is something very important for all Australians, and it is particularly important in my electorate—that is, small business support. There are 11,000 small businesses in my electorate, which is a huge number of small businesses. They are the backbone of our local economy. Amongst those, about a third are business services, a fifth are in construction, a further fifth are in distribution services and about a 10th are manufacturing businesses. In all cases, those business owners work hard and they frequently mortgage their house in order to get loans to keep their business afloat. They are typically incredibly proud about the services they offer and about the employees that they can take on and provide for.

What this budget initiative does—and this is the centrepiece of the federal budget—is to provide a turbo boost for these small businesses, and it does it in two ways: firstly, by providing them with a tax cut of 1.5 per cent, which occurs whether you are an incorporated business or an unincorporated business; and, secondly, by providing an instant asset write-off for every purchase up to $20,000, and that is effective immediately. What that means is that businesses can go out today, make a purchase and then immediately write that off against this year's tax, effectively reducing their tax and increasing their cash flow. What that will do is provide a real stimulus for those small businesses to go and spend money to invest, to grow and to employ people locally. That is what I think is so positive about this particular budget measure: it really provides a stimulus for the small business sector, which is at the heart of our overall economy in my seat of Aston and, indeed, across the nation. I hope that the Labor Party will support that initiative. We do need to get legislation through the parliament, and I trust that they will back that initiative, because it is so important.

I touch on the families package. Small business was the centrepiece. The families package was also very important, and Minister Morrison oversaw this. In essence, it is providing additional support for those parents who want to go back to the paid workforce. It does this by providing additional assistance for the childcare sector. The effect of this particular measure is that, on average, low- and middle-income families will be about $1,500 a year better off if they are using the childcare system. What it does is to provide just that extra incentive, should they choose to exercise it, to get back into the paid workforce, because they can afford the childcare system. You would know, Mr Deputy Speaker, as I do, that so many families sit around the kitchen table and decide that one of the parents will not go back to work, because it is not worth it when they weigh up what they will earn versus what the costs of child care are. This particular measure tilts the balance in favour of providing the opportunity to go back to the workforce should they choose to do so.

Finally in relation to the budget, I would raise the issue of infrastructure. This is very dear to all of our hearts, and it is particularly important in a state like Victoria and a city like Melbourne. Melbourne is growing by 100,000 people each and every year. It is by far the fastest growing city in Australia. What that means is that, unless we are building infrastructure to keep up with that, the road and rail systems come to a standstill. We have been seeing that over the years. Increasingly Melbourne's traffic has been slowing down and congestion has been getting worse. What we had, though, was a huge infrastructure project to address that particular congestion issue, and it was called the East West Link. It was put on the agenda under the Brumby government, planned for under the Baillieu government and then funded under the Napthine government, and it was all ready to go, with contracts signed. And, of course, we know what Daniel Andrews did to that: he cancelled that contract. He spent $640 million in the process not to build that road, and it effectively means that we do not have a single large infrastructure project in Melbourne at the moment. It is the only city in Australia that does not have a big infrastructure project underway, and it is the city which has the fastest growth by a considerable margin. What we have done in this budget is to say that there is $3 billion quarantined for the East West Link should a Victorian government choose to build it, and a Victorian government will build it, because it must be built, because it will create 7,000 jobs, end the Hoddle Street bottleneck and finally make a further connection from the eastern side of the city to the western side of the city, a project which every single transport plan has suggested.

Let me finally mention a further topic which is not directly budget related but is nevertheless incredibly important. It is an important one for all members of this House—that is, the ice epidemic and how we should be addressing this and thinking about it. Every single member of this House has probably come across families that have suffered from the consequences of ice. We know it is an absolute epidemic in Victoria and in the nation—and it is increasingly a problem in my electorate in Victoria. The rate of ice use as the main form of drug for amphetamine users has doubled in the last 12 months alone, from 22 per cent in 2010 to 50 per cent in 2013. Those using ice are doing it more frequently, with people using it at least monthly doubling from 12 per cent in 2010 to 25 per cent in 2013—around 90,000 Australians aged 14 and over. This drug is an insidious drug. It is killing our young people and it absolutely destroys families. We know that the ice addiction itself can cause all sorts of psychoses and long-term mental health issues. It makes people aggressive. It considerably increases the risk of stroke and heart failure. Offences involving ice now make up 16 per cent of all drug crime compared with only three per cent five years ago. This is an epidemic which we must get on top of. I will not say it is the epicentre, but one of the biggest problem areas in the outer east of Melbourne is the Knox municipality, which basically has the same boundaries as my federal electorate of Aston. Twice as many drug offences occurred in Knox compared to the adjacent municipality of Maroondah. Charges from possessing drug manufacturing equipment in Knox have grown from zero to 20 over just the last few years. It is an incredible drug. There were 687 drug offences recorded in Knox last year—more than twice as many as in Maroondah.

We have a national task force which is looking into this problem. It is headed up by the former Victorian police commissioner Ken Lay, who is a very highly regarded figure. He is consulting across the nation to look into this problem and to get ideas as to what we can do nationally, what we can be done at a state level and what can be done locally and amongst communities. I will be hosting an ice forum in my electorate in the coming weeks in order to gather the evidence and information from local people in my community. Attending that forum will be political representatives, experts in the field and people who have been affected by this, as well as people who are concerned about its incidences and believe that they have a contribution to make. I have already received an enormous amount of local feedback in relation to this problem largely from emails, from responses to my newsletters and from Facebook. Broadly the themes which people put through, at least from my electorate, are very consistent in relation to this problem—for example, they say we must tackle the supply of ice, particularly through stronger penalties for suppliers. Many people made that comment. There was a strong view that we need to consult very broadly, including with ice users themselves, as we develop our strategy. The third theme which came out was that we need additional funding for rehabilitation, for prevention services and for early education services in order to be able to ensure that people are fully aware of what the problems are, and then to be able to seek help very quickly should they find themselves in difficulty. I look forward to this forum, which we will be posting in a few weeks time. I think this will be a very good way of eliciting further feedback from our local community. That feedback will be then be fed into the National Ice Taskforce. I know of very few people in our local community who are not concerned about this drug. They have either seen or heard of its effects, and it is something that as a nation we are taking very, very are seriously and something at the local level that I am taking seriously also.

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2015-2016. A Commonwealth budget is an account of what any government intends to raise in the course of the following four years and, of course, what it intends to spend. Axiomatically, the 2015 budget is as much about Tony Abbott's first budget as it is about his second. In other words, this is year 2 of the Prime Minister's budget effort. In the absence of any change in year 1, we find that his second budget is very much a function of his first budget.

I make that point because, while this budget has essentially been rebranded due to lessons learnt from the way in which the first budget was badly sold, it is essentially the same budget. It is the same budget, because all the nastiest cuts that were included in the first budget remain in the second budget. Sure, there are changes, which are welcome—for example, the $7 GP co-payment is no longer there. But the freeze on the indexation of rebates to GPs is still there, and the people who will be most affected by that freeze are those with the least ability to pay. Changes to the PBS system, which will impact on low-income earners the greatest, are still there. The reintroduction of fuel tax excise indexation is still there, and those with the least ability to pay will pay.

The big one is the $80 billion worth of cuts to the income of state and territory governments—income which they in turn use to fund the all-important education and health systems in their jurisdictions. They will hurt very, very much. Of course, we do not see the impact immediately. It may take years before we start to feel them, but they will come. Kevin Rudd, when he was Prime Minister, took a greater responsibility for the funding of the state hospital systems because it was very clear the states' ability to fund those systems to a standard we have come to expect in Australia was coming to an end. The then Prime Minister did not give over the extra money because he felt like it or because he wanted to or, indeed, because it might make him popular. He handed over the additional money by necessity, in the recognition that in the absence of that additional money our public health system would eventually grind to a halt. These cuts will, if not grind them to a halt, almost certainly lead to a significant deterioration in the experiences of people who attend our public health system for assistance.

The pension cuts as they were presented in the first budget are not there, but another method has been found to cut into the pension payments of many Australians. There were cuts to a range of not-for-profit groups around our country, who are doing good work in our community. The member for Aston was talking about the scourge of the drug ice. Yes, the Prime Minister has established a task force. I have no criticism of the task force. I wish it well. I hope and trust it will be able to do something off the back of its community consultation and other work to address this scourge. But what the member for Aston does not appreciate is that many of the groups which had their Commonwealth funding cut in the Prime Minister's first budget were the very groups which work in our communities to help people who are facing drug addiction problems and to support those around them, including their children. For example, there is a grandparent's group in my electorate, in Maitland, and they are there to care for grandchildren who unfortunately have suffered the consequence of parents who have difficulties and challenges—typically drug-addicted parents. They were getting a modest amount of money from the Commonwealth to cover the administrative costs of their program—money they probably cannot survive without. That money went in the first budget and has not been restored in the second. If the member for Aston really wants to help us deal with the ice problems, and of course other drug problems in our communities, he might want to reflect on that.

There have been massive budget cuts for Landcare groups—hundreds of thousands of dollars cut in the first budget and not restored in the second budget. The list goes on and on. There are cuts to research and development—to our CRCs, to the CSIRO, to the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation. None of that has been restored. CRCs will soon fold because the Abbott government, unlike every other government, did not continue their funding into the next round. It is all gone.

This all goes to jobs. The best thing you can do to help someone avoid going into drug addiction and dependence on drugs and all the social fallout from that is get them into work. To do that you need a strong economy, which we do not have. It is funny—before the election, Tony Abbott said our economic challenges had nothing to do with the global environment; it was all to do with the fiscal mismanagement of the then Labor government. There was no recognition of the global financial crisis and the fact that we were one of only a very few Western economies to come through the GFC without falling into recession. Now, after the election, it is all about the global economy and nothing to do with the current Prime Minister and the current Treasurer. That is wrong. We know in this budget that unemployment is on the rise and, sadly, it is projected to continue to rise.

As complex as the national economy is, there is a pretty simple explanation for that. Sure, iron ore prices have fallen dramatically, but that was happening before the Prime Minister was elected. I genuinely believe a major contributor is the way in which this Prime Minister and his Treasurer have talked the economy down over their 20-month period. You can see consumer confidence plummeting as a result, and that is not a way to generate employment in a slowing economy. Now we see, in this budget, the narrative has changed: 'Now we need fiscal stimulus; there is no budget emergency any longer; there is no debt crisis—now we are free to spend some money to stimulate the economy.' This is the problem with this government—it lacks an economic narrative. It lacks the capacity to pursue structural reform. We all agree with social policy reform. Labor governments in the past have done excellent work in reforming social policy—for example, the way we paid pensions and other benefits in 1901 differs from the way we pay them in 2015. Society changes dramatically—our demographics change, our population changes, our age profile changes. Social policy is an area that is constantly in need of adjustment. But this is not adjustment. This is a government that has gone in search of easy, quick savings measures not affecting those with the capacity to pay, not reflecting the fact that some people have come out of a situation where they might not have needed as much government support as previously was the case—they went right to the bottom, to pensioners, the unemployed and those who are relying on allowances like Family Tax Benefit B to make ends meet on a weekly basis. That is not structural reform—that is just lazy policy change designed to make up for the inadequacies of this government's economic approach.

Unemployment matters in my electorate very much. I like the old Neville Wran phrase—there are only two issues in politics: jobs, jobs and jobs. We have a very diverse electorate in Hunter—a whole range of agricultural pursuits such as dairy, beef, grains, horticulture and viticulture, for which we are most famous. We also have within our boundaries the horse capital of Australia, we have a huge services sector and we have a very large manufacturing centre—albeit a lot of that manufacturing is tied to the coalmining industry.

In all the time that I have been in politics, both local and federal, I have dealt with land use conflicts, and we have plenty of them in the valley. Coalmining is huge—it is a huge employer and a huge contributor to economic output—and, of course, it has lived side by side in relative harmony with viticulture, thoroughbred breeding and other agricultural pursuits for many years. That relationship got a little bit tougher when through the mining boom coalmining expanded at a rapid rate and in doing so came closer and closer to sensitive sustainable industries like thoroughbred breeding, agriculture and viticulture more generally. These are big challenges but, as diverse as our economy is, it is coalmining that puts the icing on the cake for us. It is coalmining that gives communities like Muswellbrook a median weekly income second only to beachside Merewether in Newcastle. It is coalmining that caused our unemployment rate to drop from, when I was first elected, 13½ per cent to at one stage 3.9 per cent. We could never hope to do that without coalmining. It is the decline in the boom, the move on from the investment phase of the boom, which is causing unemployment now to rise again towards double-digit figures. I make an appeal to people: surely in this 21st century we have the wit to ensure that we can protect our sustainable industries while at the same time continuing to rely heavily on the coalmining industry to put the cream on the cake, or in this case to keep the cream on the cake.

I go to school presentations and look out into the crowd at all the parents, and a very large slice of them are wearing the typical fluoro-type uniforms worn in coal mines. I go to the pubs and the clubs and the supermarkets and I see them everywhere, and I often ask myself what sort of economy we would have without them. Some might say we can replace them. I am happy to hear that argument, but I have not heard any bright ideas yet.

The frustrating thing for me is that this is largely the domain of the state government. I am not going to be generally critical of the state government, but I am increasingly concerned that state governments are moving towards these blanket bans on coal seam gas resources and coalmining resources. We should never put blanket bans on resource projects. We should treat every case and project on its merits. Some will be developed at no expense to our sustainable industries—and I should say that sustainable industries take priority, because hopefully they will be with us for thousands of years while some of these projects will be with us for maybe 100 years, if that. But there are projects that can be sustainably developed without a threat to other industries, and we should always ensure that these things are treated on merit.

It takes me to an issue that is fairly close to my heart these days, and that is the capacity of the Commonwealth to intervene in these projects. I think it is good to have a second referee, if you like. Once a project runs the gauntlet of the state government consideration process and approvals processes, the EPBC allows the Commonwealth to take a second look if there are issues around flora, fauna and, since the initiative taken by the former Labor government, now water. I think that helps us make the industry more sustainable because it gives a guarantee to the broader community that there are checks and balances in place.

I am concerned that this government, the Abbott government, wants to send those rights and that role back to the very state governments making the first decision in the first place. I say: do not do that. Keep the Commonwealth involved, and in the case of water keep the scientific panel involved. Let's build community support, important support, for our resource industries by being able to tell people: 'Don't worry. It's not just a matter for the New South Wales government in my case, or state governments generally, but indeed there is a second referee on the field, the federal environment minister.' I am hopeful that, if we build that confidence again in our local communities, we will in turn build greater levels of support for the coal and coal seam gas industries where they are appropriate, and that is going to be so important to employment in my electorate.

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is great to be able to talk a little bit about some of the benefits for my electorate of Petrie in Queensland and for the whole nation that are being delivered through packages in this budget of 2015-16. There many opportunities not just for the people in my electorate of Petrie but for all Australians. I want quickly to touch on the budget position; I want to touch on families, the environment, small business, domestic violence—there are loads of issues—and projects in my electorate.

I am pleased to say that there is a plan to bring the budget back to surplus. I got involved in the 2013 election because I was terribly disappointed after many years of Labor's appalling financial mismanagement. It is very important that there is a clear plan to bring the budget back to surplus and that, as the Commonwealth government, we spend less than what we earn each year. At the election, the coalition promised to get the budget back under control. We promised to stop the boats, to scrap the job-destroying carbon tax and mining tax, to end the waste of taxpayer money and to build the roads of the 21st century.

We have kept those pledges and we are doing a lot more in this year's budget. I speak directly to families—families in my electorate—in saying that we are committed to supporting you by making child care simpler, more affordable, more flexible and more accessible. As a father of three sons, I know that having children is a blessing, but I also understand that families are faced with costs when parents want to get back into the workforce. This year's budget sees an additional $3.5 billion invested over five years to establish a new and simpler childcare subsidy from 17 July. The subsidy will assist parents in meeting the costs of child care if they are working, looking for work, training, studying or volunteering. This is very important for mothers, in particular, who want to get back into the workforce.

We know that every person who wants to get back into the workforce is a benefit to the government, particularly if they are on Newstart. If they come off Newstart or welfare and are no longer reliant on taxpayers' funding, that is a bid advantage to all taxpayers. Families with incomes of between $65,000 and $170,000 a year will be $1500 a year better off because of the Families Package that the Abbott government has introduced in this year's budget. All parents want the best for their children. It is hard to stay positive, I guess, if you are going back to work and not seeing a great financial reward, and that is where this package will help those families wanting to get back into the workforce. The measures in this year's budget will help parents who are juggling that work and family life balance.

Of course, I also want to acknowledge the pensioners in my electorate of Petrie. As I get around, I talk to a lot of seniors and I know that pensioners and seniors have contributed a lot to this nation over the decades. I am sure members on both sides of the House would agree that we live in the best country in the world—we really do—and a lot of that is due to the legacy that senior Australians have given us. I want to thank them for their contribution as a group and as individuals. I know that many of them also volunteer, and that is worth billions to the economy each year.

The age pension is the government's biggest expense. At something like $44 billion a year, it represents more than 10 per cent of all government spending. But it is an important safety net for many Australians, which is why we need to make sure it is sustainable as our population ages. Since the Abbott government was elected, pensions have continued to rise—and they will continue to rise twice yearly at the higher rate. For individual pensioners, there has been something like a $1,200-a-year increase from September 2013 to where we are now. For couples that are on the full pension, there has been a $2,000 increase since September 2013. I am very pleased to say that. The age pension will continue to rise twice a year, this year and every year, at the highest available indexation rate. We are also increasing the number of assets someone can have at the lower level, which will see a higher pension of around $30 a fortnight for some 170,000 pensioners around Australia, including 50,000 pensioners who will go on to a full pension.

I want to particularly acknowledge the Minister for Social Services, Scott Morrison, who consulted widely before this year's budget. I thank him for that. The families and pensioners package that we have delivered is great. I also want to particularly thank him for the support given to a group in my electorate of Petrie, Encircle, that provides domestic violence services and support to victims. It also works with people who inflict domestic violence. I have no tolerance for people who do that. It is an absolute disgrace. We know that two women a week are killed in this country, through murder or manslaughter, because of domestic violence. Frankly, it is a national disgrace. I know there is bipartisan support to see that end. I want to thank the Minister for Social Services for ensuring that Encircle has adequate funding for the services that it provides in the Moreton Bay Regional Council area.

I also want to thank the Treasurer and the Prime Minister for consulting widely on this year's budget. It is a great budget, I am very pleased to say. There are fantastic opportunities for small businesses in my electorate of Petrie and right around the country. There are more than 3,000 small businesses in my electorate and more than two million nationwide. The budget's small business package is the biggest small business initiative in our nation's history. Local small businesses will have the lowest company tax rate for public and private companies since 1967. It will help local employers create jobs. That is what we want to see. We want to see more local jobs created through private enterprise to assist the unemployed, particularly unemployed youth and older Australians, build skills and get back into work.

The company tax rate will be cut for up to 780,000 incorporated businesses with a turnover of less than $2 million. It will go from 30c in the dollar to 28.5c in the dollar. There will also be, from July 2015, a five per cent tax discount for over 1.5 million sole traders, trusts and partnership structures which are unincorporated businesses with an annual turnover of up to $2 million capped at $1,000 through their end-of-year tax return. From right now, small businesses with a turnover below $2 million can claim an immediate tax deduction for tax purposes for every asset they acquire that is valued up to $20,000.

I really want to thank the Minister for Small Business for listening. I acknowledge that the Labor Party implemented a small business tax write-off. But, unfortunately, it was linked to the mining tax, so it was not raising any money. I said to the minister, 'One of the best things that we can do is reinstate a serious instant tax write-off for small business.' Quite frankly, I was shocked that, on budget night, that went up to $20,000 for each small business. It really is great for small business. I was very pleased to hear in question time today that the opposition will support that measure through the Senate, because it will make a big difference for small businesses in my electorate and right around the nation.

So, what does that mean for small businesses? It means that right now they can go out and buy a new vehicle—perhaps at $19,900; you will get a HiLux ute for that—and that cost can be instantly written off before the end of this financial year. It means that they can reward their staff. They might want a new coffee machine, for $3,000, to look after the staff in their small business. They can buy that now and have an instant tax write-off on it. It means that if small businesses in the electorate of Petrie want to install solar panels on their roof—

Debate interrupted.