Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will ask the House a question today: when is a progressive not a progressive? The answer: when they become an ultra-conservative Prime Minister. This Prime Minister, this new shiny Prime Minister has told us this week that he supports all of the policies and all of the measures that preceded him, which tells us that he is determined to pursue the destruction of Medicare—our world renowned universal health care system. He is determined to Americanise our universities and introduce a $100,000-degrees. He supports cuts to apprenticeships and support programs. He supports cuts to schools and hospitals—the $80-billion cuts our schools and hospitals are living with. He is standing by every broken promise. He is standing by every unfair measure.

This Prime Minister needs to hear very clearly that if you stand by the decisions that have doubled the deficit, you are not a friend to the Australian public. He has led the Australian public to believe that he was a modern man but he is just another backward-looking Tory Prime Minister.