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

It is with great pleasure that I rise today to speak in support of appropriation bills Nos. 3 and 4. Since taking office in 2013 the coalition government has been focused on making the lives of all Australians better, safer and more prosperous. The coalition government has passed some $22 billion in budget repair measures and is working to pass further savings. As part of this we have expanded the Department of Human Services fraud prevention and debt recovery capability and, by recovering welfare overpayments and those payments that have been received on a fraudulent basis, we will recover some $2.1 billion in net savings over the forward estimates. But our focus on restoring the budget surplus involves more than finding savings. Our multinational tax avoidance legislation, which we passed last year, will raise more than $2 billion in the 2016-17 financial year, and the coalition government's diverted profits tax legislation is expected to raise a further $3.9 billion over the next four years.

It is instructive—and I know my good friend over there, the member for Moreton, is always keen to contribute to the debate—that the multinational tax avoidance legislation was opposed by those opposite. I find it passing strange that, when they get the opportunity, those opposite—who complain all the time about multinationals not paying their tax—actually vote against the legislation to make sure they do pay their tax. It is the coalition government that has succeeded in passing these important savings measures and ensuring that multinational companies pay their fair share of tax in Australia. We have not stopped there. We have also recently made changes to the Life Gold Pass for former members of parliament. We have also indicated that any decision to increase spending, including all our election commitments, must be fully offset by spending reductions in other parts of the budget. What we are saying to Australians is that we will not pass uncosted, unfunded legislation—a position diametrically opposed to the approach of those opposite in their time in government. Any funding promise will be costed and accounted for, in an effort to reduce borrowing and prevent tax increases.

It is also important to focus on what we are doing locally in the electorate of Forde. The coalition government continues to deliver for the local communities in my electorate. We have proudly delivered on every election commitment from the 2010 and 2013 elections, and we are working hard to ensure we continue to deliver on the commitments made during the 2016 election. This includes getting work underway on Stage 1 of the M1 upgrades in Logan. Road quality and capacity are big issues in my electorate, and the coalition government has proudly delivered more than $40 million in Roads to Recovery funding to Logan and Gold Coast city councils. This funding is supporting our local governments to repair and maintain our local road networks. The coalition government has also delivered for the residents of Upper Coomera, with a $10-million contribution to the Exit 54 upgrade, which is now being completed.

I am passionate about supporting my local community, whether it is helping our local organisations and sporting clubs with grants, or securing funding for larger projects. I will always back our community groups, who go above and beyond. Beenleigh & Districts Senior Citizens Centre is one such organisation that goes above and beyond. I am proud to say that we have provided them with $90,000 in funding as a grant to upgrade their kitchen facilities, which are also used by our local Meals on Wheels team. They do such a terrific job, not only for Meals on Wheels but also for the many seniors that attend regular events there. It is actually one of the largest senior citizens' clubs in South-East Queensland. The coalition government's Safer Community Program has delivered more than half a million dollars for CCTV cameras, and our Solar Communities program will deliver $100,000 across six local organisations to install solar power and to assist with reducing their electricity bills.

When I speak with constituents around my electorate, the overwhelming consensus is that they want to see governments live within their means. Recently, we sent out the Biggest Survey to the entire electorate, and as I have taken time to sift through the hundreds of responses, time and again, I see that two of the most important issues are a strong economy and job security. These two issues go hand in hand—building a strong economy creates more jobs and creates job security. The only way to do this is to stimulate growth in our business community, while also getting Labor's budget deficit under control—and this has not been an easy task, but it is one the coalition government is tackling head-on.

In times like this, when we need to pass difficult legislation to grow the economy and reduce debt, it is only the coalition government that can provide the economic leadership necessary for this country. We have already proven our capabilities: a great example of this is the success of our free trade agreements. I spoke at length earlier today about the Australia-Singapore Free Trade Agreement, which has resulted in strong growth in Australia's trade and services—up some 7.7 per cent to $146 billion per annum. Our free trade agreements are driving Australian jobs and boosting our economy. Tourism has accounted for half of all services exports in 2015-16. As an electorate that takes in part of the Gold Coast—unfortunately, I do not have any beaches or surf—there are an enormous number of people in my electorate who benefit from this tourism-led growth in our economy.

But it is not only tourism. Education exports have increased some 8.3 per cent and business services exports have increased some 8.3 per cent. I also know, from talking to Teys abattoir, our largest employer in the electorate, the value they have received from the free trade agreements with Japan and Korea, in particular, and the growth that it has generated in their business. It allows them to continue to grow and develop their business and continue to keep 800 people in jobs.

Appropriation bills Nos 3 and 4 underpin the government's expenditure decisions, which support a number of important government responsibilities. They will provide more than $143 million to the Department of Health to fund a range of important measures, including updating communication technology systems; supporting health, aged-care and veterans' payments; strengthening mental health care in Australia; and supporting the establishment of a national research network that will focus on improving the survival rates of childhood cancer.

These bills also provide funding to the Department of Defence to the tune $810 million as well as just under $200 million to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection. The Department of Human Services will also receive just under $156 million for the second tranche of the Welfare Payment Infrastructure Transformation Program.

The coalition government is providing financial support to our departments that contribute to the betterment of our nation. Under the former Howard government, Australia was in the peak of the mining boom with a $20 billion budget surplus and over $40 billion in the bank. Unfortunately, our strong financial position was driven into debt by six years of a Rudd-Gillard-Labor government. Labor's poorly planned and poorly targeted stimulus package during the GFC left us with not only lives lost under the pink batts scheme but also $900 cheques to dead people and a multitude of other wasteful spending initiatives.

Since winning the election, the coalition government has been working constructively with the crossbenchers to tackle the job of budget repair. Over the last nine months, we have passed more legislation through the Senate than we did in the three years of the previous government. This is despite having fewer seats in the House and fewer seats in the Senate.

It is the future of our nation that this government is focused on. That is what is so important about us succeeding with our legislative agenda, because everything that we are looking to do is to build a better Australia for all Australians.

As a coalition government, we will continue to focus on the future of this country, ensuring that we deliver the services and supports that we need to build a strong economy, provide long-term stable jobs but also provide welfare and safety-security nets for those in our community who are genuinely in need. I commend these bills to the House.

Lucy Wicks (Robertson, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Forde for his contribution. Could I just encourage members who are having conversations to do so at a level that does not interrupt those members speaking.

Stephen Jones (Whitlam, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development and Infrastructure) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker Wicks, for your protection; I am sure I need it. This government came to power on a promise to fix everything and cut nothing, and they have broken both promises. They have fixed nothing and cut everything. This is the government that came to power—we will never forget that pre-2013 press conference with the then Opposition Leader, then Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, promising that there would be no changes to Medicare, no cuts to pensions, no cuts to the ABC and no cuts to the SBS. Of course, they broke each and every one of those promises in their first budget, and things never got any better from there.

This is a bill about money, about appropriations and about how the government appropriates more money into the general expenditure account so that it can be spent on government programs. Labor will not block supply—we do not do that. We think that our job is to hold the government to account for the promises it makes. But we will not block supply, because we have seen the devastating impacts that that has on our democracy.

A money bill is all about the priorities of the government, and, over a long period of time, from the earliest days of the Abbott government to the shaky days of the Turnbull government, we have seen a government that has got its priorities all wrong. I want to take you back to those early days after the 2013 election when, in one of its very first acts, the government thought it was going to be a good idea to give some tax concessions in superannuation. You would think a government would have an eye to the importance of creating more equality in this country, and an eye to ensuring that we could encourage those people who most needed to, to put some more money away for their superannuation so as to have a dignified retirement, and that those would be the people the government was trying to encourage, at the same time as not making it any worse overall for all taxpayers. Well, it did exactly the opposite. In one of its very first acts, the government gave a superannuation tax concession to some of the wealthiest Australians—people with over $2 million in their superannuation accounts. I can guarantee you that the majority of people who work in my electorate do not have $2 million in their superannuation balance. But these people got a tax cut. And, in the same decision, the government had a tax increase for people earning under $38,000 a year. You might find that hard to believe, but that is exactly what the Abbott government did: it gave a tax concession to some of the wealthiest Australians at the very same time as removing the low-income superannuation tax offset for people earning under $38,000 a year, thereby penalising the people who needed tax assistance the very most. It did not end there. Of course, famously, the government, at the same time as crying poor, wrote a $6 billion cheque to the Reserve Bank of Australia. Shortly thereafter, it was cutting benefits and floating a whole range of proposals that I will go through shortly.

You would think that the government might have learnt from the backlash that it got in the immediate response to the 2014 budget, but that has not been the case. We understand the challenge of budget repair, and Labor will work constructively with the government on the task of budget repair, ensuring that it is fair. We must ensure that, as we are going about the task of bringing the budget back to balance, we do not hurt the most vulnerable Australians—those people who look to people in parliament in Canberra, and look to people on the Labor side of parliament, I have got to say, to ensure that we do not make life harder for them, and that is exactly what we will do. We in Labor demonstrated our bona fides by negotiating with the government to secure around $6.3 billion in budget savings—more savings than the government initially put forward in their first omnibus bill—and, in doing so, we managed to protect a few things in the national interest, such as the Australian Renewable Energy Agency.

Last year's Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook showed that the Turnbull government was still committed to many of the unfair Abbott-Hockey-era measures that I have criticised at the outset—measures such as increasing the qualification age for the age pension to 70, meaning that Australia would have the oldest qualifying age for the age pension in the developed world. You have got to shake your head at this. I mean, only a bloke who has worked in an office all of his life would think that you could work until the age of 70 and still have your body functioning in the way it did when you were aged 35. But, when I get around my electorate and talk to people who have worked in physical labour for the majority of their life, I hear that, by the time they are hitting their mid-60s, their backs are starting to give way, their knees are starting to give way and arthritis has set in, not to mention the problems with skin cancers and all the rest of it, and the people in this group shake their heads and go, 'This government simply just does not get it.' But this is still a proposition that is seriously put forward by the Turnbull government.

The Medicare freeze, which is wreaking havoc upon general practices around this country, is an initiative which had a devastating impact on the fortunes of the government at the 2016 election. The Medicare rebate freeze is forcing doctors to do something the parliament has refused to do, and that is increase the cost of medical consultations between a patient and their GP.

The government could have improved the budget and locked in Australia's prized AAA credit rating at MYEFO by doing two things—and not only would we have supported them; we would have come out and congratulated them. The first thing they could have done is axe their ridiculous, reckless and unaffordable $50 billion tax giveaway to big business and to banks, which will do nothing for growth but is going to cost Australians dearly. They should have ditched that and we would have supported them—no, we would have congratulated them. The second thing they could have done is adopt Labor's sensible negative gearing proposals and the proposed changes to capital gains tax. These are changes that not only would have improved the budget bottom line; they would have made a big difference to people who are struggling to buy their first home and struggling to get into the housing market. It would have made a contribution to the federal government's effort to make housing more affordable for struggling Australian families. They failed on both fronts.

Not only did they fail to introduce these initiatives but the debt and deficit are increasing. Every government speaker has got up in this debate and said that they are treating the issue of budget repair seriously and are working hard to deal with debt and deficit. Those very same government members have failed to point out that, on their watch, the deficit has more than tripled. Far from bringing the budget deficit down, on their very watch the budget deficit has tripled.

A government member interjecting—

I hear the honourable member opposite saying to me that we opposed a number of their measures—not all of them but a number of their measures. The answer to his interjection is this: we will not help you break your election promises. Those measures that we opposed were the very same measures that you promised not to do, and we will not help you break the promises that you made to your constituents when you went into the last two elections. We will simply not help you do it. We have given our support to the government on measures that are fair and reasonable, including on more than $6.3 billion worth of budget savings. We have offered additional savings to the government, but they refuse to take them up. But we will not help the government take an axe to the benefits of the most vulnerable Australians and we will not help the government break their election commitments.

Since the MYEFO, the Turnbull government has again reheated or rehashed unfair cuts from previous budgets in its latest omnibus bill. These include cuts to family payments, whereby one million families will be worse off. A typical family on $75,000 a year will be around $1,000 a year worse off. In addition to this, through cuts to parental leave, over 70,000 new mums will be worse off—many of those in your electorate, I dare say, Madam Deputy Speaker Wicks, and in mine. I see the member for Lindsay in the chamber. A lot of them will be in her electorate as well. On the subject of pensions, let us not forget that sacred promise that was made by the former Prime Minister and repeated by the current Prime Minister that they would not cut pensions, and yet this very same government is proposing to cut pension payments by up to $21 a fortnight, leaving pensioner couples up to $550 a year worse off. They are cutting pensions for single pensioners by $14.10 a fortnight, leaving them $365 a year worse off. This is a direct breach of a promise given by the coalition parties before the election, yet here they are today criticising us for failing to support it. I say again: we will not help you break your election commitments.

Budgets are about priorities. Instead of protecting the AAA credit rating and supporting families, supporting the most vulnerable in our communities, the Turnbull government is siding with multinational corporations and big banks. New figures released by the member for Rankin and our finance spokesperson have revealed a startling fact. This centrepiece of the government's economic plan—or, at least, last week's centrepiece—a $50 billion tax cut to big business, is going to cost Australians around $4 billion in additional interest charges.

Think about that for a moment. This equates to $162 for every man, woman and child in the country. This $50 billion tax cut is not only unfair it is going to cost every man, woman and child in this country $162. Can you imagine that? It will cost $162 to give the biggest companies in this country a $50 billion tax cut. Is there any wonder people in this country are shaking their heads and saying, 'This Prime Minister just doesn't get us'? I do not know where he lives. I do not know what planet he is coming from. But it is not the place we are coming from. He simply does not get what we are on about.

If ever you were in a situation of uncertainty about this, Deputy Speaker, I ask you to remember this one backflip. A week ago we had the Treasurer of this country—sometimes a comical character—stand up, look the cameras in the eye and say, quite seriously, that his No. 1 priority was to try and get wage-earners a wage increase. He had suddenly cottoned onto the fact that the very flat rate of wage growth in this country, under this government's watch, is creating a drag on economic growth and unless workers have more money in their pockets they have less money to spend in the shops and the businesses, so everybody is suffering. It has taken him a while but he has finally cottoned onto the fact that workers need a pay rise.

Unfortunately for him, he, his Prime Minister and his entire government—and all of these backbenchers here—voted against a bill that would have protected workers wages today. Far from putting in place initiatives that will give workers a pay increase, he is voting against a proposition that will protect workers' penalty rates. He says one week, 'Our No. 1 priority is to give workers a pay rise,' and the next week he comes into this place and votes for legislation that will ensure they get a pay cut.

This is a government that cannot keep an economic priority from one week to the next, and they certainly cannot be trusted to put in place the sacred promises they put before the Australian people. That is why this government has to change and that is why we have to ensure that we change the priorities of this government. (Time expired)

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

I too rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2016-2017. I will use this opportunity to highlight commitments from the last election campaign and where some of those are up to in the electorate of Latrobe. One of the most exciting announcements we had in the last election campaign, with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, was with Puffing Billy. We had a fantastic day and I would like to thank all the volunteers. There are many hundreds of volunteers working with Puffing Billy and they have been doing a fantastic job for so many years. In fact, Puffing Billy has in excess of 400,000 tourists each year and is great for the local economy. It is great not only for Victorian tourism but also for national tourism, because a lot of people, especially Chinese tourists—in fact, over 200,000 Chinese tourists—visit Puffing Billy each year.

We have committed $5.5 million for what will be known as the Emerald Discovery Centre, which will tell not only the history of Puffing Billy but also the history of the area. This is something that I am very excited about, and I congratulate the CEO, John Robinson. I met him recently to see how they are going. They are working with the Cardinia Council and I believe they are planning to appoint an architect soon to get the project moving forward. We also discussed an initiative that I had put forward, which has become known as the 'red rattler' project. That project is to restore an old red rattler train. These used to be very popular in my school days, when you would catch the red rattler and go to the CBD. These were at one stage very annoying trains to get on but, obviously, with nostalgia, we are very keen to get the old red rattlers back up and running and bring the international and interstate tourists from the CBD right out to Belgrave, so that they can have this great opportunity to go on a red rattler. It will be great for tourism and great for the local area. It will be one of those tourist opportunities that I have no doubt those coming from interstate and overseas will participate in.

A big issue has always been the Monash Freeway. This is something that I have pushed for for probably the last two years, because we have this huge growth corridor out in Casey and Cardinia. I was speaking to the CEO of Cardinia the other day who was saying that 128 new families are moving into that area a week, which is extraordinary growth. But the infrastructure needs to keep up. When I spoke with the state Labor minister, Luke Donnellan, and raised the need to actually commit to upgrading the Monash Freeway, he thought it was a bird-brain of an idea. Yet, the good news is that he has come to see how important this is and he is, under state Labor, taking the Turnbull lead and works have started between Clyde Road and the South Gippsland Highway. I welcome those works.

I would also note that we still have $500 million on the table for this project, which, sadly, is money left over from the East West Link project. The state Labor government spent a billion dollars on not building a road. So we now have $500 million additional funding which has been committed to the Monash. Work has not started yet, but I believe—and I have spoken to ministers federally—that there are positive discussions with the state Labor government. This is a project has to be done. It is so important. The state Labor government is really fixed on the $5.5 billion Western Distributor project. I have no issue with that at all, apart from the fact that only seven per cent of the return will be invested in the Monash; yet we know that the state Labor government is very keen to toll the Monash users, which is something that greatly concerns me and local residents.

A project which is vitally important is the completion of the Beaconsfield Diamond Exchange. When this project was build it did not have on-off ramps, which are now desperately needed with the growth in that area. Another important project is the extension of O'Shea Road. I thank ministers Paul Fletcher and Darren Chester for their support on this part of what I regard as the Monash proposal. This is so important because you now have the Federation University Australia taking over Monash University. I said to Minister Simon Birmingham that the next operator of that university site—as Monash was leaving—had to be very much focused on advanced manufacturing and innovation and creating the jobs of the future, and I am very proud to say that that is something that we are looking at. When you talk to businesses who want to get involved and focus on innovation and advanced manufacturing—something I know Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is very keen on—you realise we need to make sure the roads link up to the Monash Freeway, otherwise these sorts of businesses will not make their way into the local area.

The Dandenong Ranges are a unique part of Australia and somewhere I have lived all my life. We have had a $4.2 million environmental package over the years, including the $3 million Dandenong Ranges Environmental and Bushfire Fuel Reduction Grants. There have been two rounds, and I think all the volunteer groups who applied for funding have been successful. Sadly, at the same time as we put federal funding in, the state Labor government thought they would not put any funding into the local environmental groups—and I thank all those involved in CWAD for what they do.

This is about a combination of local environmental groups who have projects which they may have been working on for years. The money we put in federally—I thank Minister Greg Hunt, who at the time was environment minister—has just been extraordinary. It is one of the most exciting projects we have, and it comes down to biological control. I committed to this back in 2007 to 2010. Finally in 2013, with the election of the coalition government, funding was made available for this biological control. I thank CSIRO scientist Andy Sheppard, who I met the other day. We are looking at releasing what is known as a pathogen smut, which will basically get in there and destroy the wandering trad plant, which is overcrowding all the local creeks. This is very exciting if you are in an environment group. This is a weed that has devastated New Zealand. The good news is that we have again committed $1 million, mainly to focus on biological control. As I said, I met recently with Dr Andy Sheppard from the CSIRO, and the great news is that potentially we have enough money to wipe out ivy in the Dandenong Ranges. This is not the English ivy; this is the South African ivy, which is the one which creates a huge fire danger. Why does it do that? Because, when a bushfire comes along, the fire will go up to the crowns of the trees via this ivy. Also, onion weed is doing a lot of damage throughout the hills locally.

There are some other big projects we have got underway. I acknowledge Casey council for the work being done on Bunjil Place. The coalition committed $10 million to this project. Again, I note the state Labor government put no money into this $120 million regional project. There is going to be a state-of-the-art regional arts centre, theatre, studio space and function centre. It is just an incredible local project. The builders are out there doing great work at the moment. We are hoping to see this open by the end of the year. It is something that all Victorians, I believe, will get very excited about when they see it.

We committed $3.835 million to the Belgrave health hub. This was through the regional grants, prior to the last election. I was driving past there the other day, and the great news is that work is well and truly underway. The multipurpose health hub is vitally important. Belgrave and the surrounds need this project badly. It is something a lot of people have been fighting for for many, many years, and it will include services such as community health, emergency relief—and I acknowledge those who have been working so hard helping other local residents—youth services and aged services. They are all very important, but this is something that has been missing in the area.

I met the CEO of Cardinia shire, Garry McQuillan, recently and we committed $1.5 million to the Emerald community hub. The project has been taking some time to get off the ground, which is sad, but I have been told now that it will continue at greater speed. They will be looking at new commercial kitchen space and facilities for the University of the Third Age, U3A; a Men's Shed; a new foyer-entry; and an art display space and local tourism information on the ground floor. To me, again, this is a very exciting project in the local area.

There are two other projects I will speak about. One is what the Yarra Ranges Council call the Ridge Walk—but I like to call it the heritage walk—between Upwey and Monterey. This will connect all the local towns. It is very much focused on the famous landscape artists and is something I have worked on for a number of years, applying for national heritage listing of the Dandenong Ranges. It is based on our famous landscape artists: Tom Roberts, Arthur Streeton, Indigenous artist Lin Onus and international artists, such as Eugene von Guerard—to name a few.

We also have Horatio Jones' house, a kerosene-tin house, which was constructed at the end of the First World War by Horatio, himself, and is where Tom Roberts and the Heidelberg Artists Society met. That is the history of the arts in the area. We want to highlight this for tourists so that when they come here they go into the hills. Very much up in the Dandenong Ranges we want to focus on tourism, and down in the south we want to focus on innovation and advanced manufacturing. That is where there is huge growth.

We also committed $1 million in funding for the completion of the walk between Cockatoo and Gembrook. This would be used by bike riders and horseriders—again, something very important for jobs and tourism. That is something the Turnbull government has been very focused on. The projects we committed to at the last federal election tie in, very importantly and crucially, with the overall game plan at a national level—that is, the focus on innovation and the focus on advanced manufacturing—to ensure that we give young people the best opportunities to get local jobs.

We also want to make sure we do everything possible to stop people coming out, in the southeast, by hopping on trains and hopping on the Monash and the Eastern to travel in the CBD. We want to create—and we are creating—a great opportunity into the future. I am talking about a vision into the future of high-tech advanced manufacturing, innovation jobs, locally, something which we will be very proud of into the future. That is the sort of government we have—a forward-thinking government creating these long-term opportunities.

Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2016-2017 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2016-2017. In my contribution I want to concentrate on the appropriations to the Department of Environment and Energy, particularly outcome 2, regarding efforts to reduce Australia's greenhouse gas emissions. To set the scene, last week the World Meteorological Organization found that the record-breaking temperature rises of last year have pushed us into 'uncharted territory'—2016 was the hottest year since measurements began in 1880. In fact, there is very strong evidence that it was the hottest year in the 115,000 years since evidence of the last global warming event. In our own Australian summer, which was very hot, we broke 205 temperature records across the period.

Emma Husar (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What about in Western Sydney?

Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Member for Lindsay, Western Sydney is a classic heat island. There are not many trees in certain parts of it so they felt the full brunt of climate change in the hottest year on record. I see the member for Canning smiling over there, but it is a very serious issue. Nine out of 10 of the hottest years on record have been in the last decade.

The evidence is incontrovertible that global warming is occurring and it is man made. And that leads us to the conclusion that the world must take action, in concert, to dramatically reduce our greenhouse gas emissions if we are to combat and avoid the worst excesses of climate change. It is not just about losing great environmental items like the Great Barrier Reef, it is about the economic impact: 70,000 jobs and $6 billion of economic activity. It is the health impact. Heatwaves will lead to greater deaths. Unfortunately, Western Sydney is a significant example of that, and so is Melbourne. Heat waves lead to deaths of vulnerable people, and climate change leads to more extreme heatwaves. Therefore, climate change has a direct impact on the safety of Australian citizens, not to mention the bushfire risk and the risk of more extreme and regular cyclones.

Urgent action is needed. We need to be part of that. The Paris climate change treaty was groundbreaking in the level of commitment from around the globe and the level of concerted global action. Unfortunately, Australia's targets as lodged by this government were woeful. They are a joke. A 26 per cent reduction by 2020 is well below comparative efforts from other industrialised nations. Even then, if we look at the 2020 target for this government, which is minus 5 per cent, we will only hit that by accounting tricks based on the use of Kyoto carryover units that occurred due to the visionary policies of Peter Beattie and Anna Bligh around land clearing in Queensland. If we look at the 2030 target, the government's own woeful target of a 26 per cent reduction, the government's own figures demonstrate we will not achieve that target. There is a 1,315 megatonne gap, which, if the government attempts to meet it with their disgraceful and shambolic Emissions Reduction Fund, will cost at best $16 billion.

In contrast, Labor has a target that is scientifically responsible and that is, based on the best available climate change science, a responsible contribution from Australia. We have a mechanism to deliver it: a hard cap on our carbon pollution with an emissions trading scheme being used to deliver that—in the first instance, an emissions intensity scheme. It is an emissions intensity scheme that most of the community, certainly the environment and business sectors, have embraced. In fact, if I read the list of organisations supporting an emissions intensive scheme, they include the Business Council of Australia, BHP, AGL, EnergyAustralia, the National Farmers' Federation, Origin Energy, the Australian Energy Market Commission, CSIRO, Energy Networks Australia, the Chief Scientist, the Climate Change Authority, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, the Prime Minister's own former energy adviser Danny Price. State governments Labor and Liberal, like many other energy stakeholders, have all endorsed an emissions intensity scheme as put forward by the Labor Party. In fact the only people resisting it are the Turnbull government and One Nation. They are the bed partners of the current government, and that is a great tragedy because an EIS is essential if we are to deliver the investment certainty that will unlock the next generation of investment in the energy sector.

I now want to turn to the current energy crisis facing this nation. It is an energy crisis that this government has done nothing about in its four years in power. It is an energy crisis that they had denied until about three months ago and since then they have used it in a petty and cynical attempt to gain political advantage. They have done nothing. Now their solutions are either illusory or way off in the never-never, such as the Snowy Hydro's scheme, if it ever delivers. What we need now is urgent action. What we need now is an emissions intensity scheme that will not only provide investment certainty for a generators but deliver lower power prices than the business-as-usual model. The government's own modelling, commissioned by the Australian Energy Market Commission, has found an emissions intensity scheme will lead to energy prices that are $15 billion lower than with business as usual, which is effectively what the government is proposing. That is the way forward, that is what Labor is proposing and that is what we intend to do. On top of that, we will combat the sham and confected outrage of those opposite around the rise of renewables in this country. When we look at South Australia, the increase in renewables in South Australia has been driven by one policy: the bipartisan RET. The bipartisan RET has led to the construction of all but one of the wind farms in South Australia, so their opposition to wind farms is opposition to their own policy.

There are challenges when integrating renewables into the national grid, but these challenges can be overcome and, in fact, they are already being overcome by other countries around the world. Using simple tweaks, we can arrive at virtual inertia and virtual synchronicity, which are the two main challenges around integrating non-inertia renewables into the grid. Tweaks to the network rules can achieve that. In fact, EMO admitted that simple changes to the way wind farms operate, which have been adopted around the world, would have avoided a lot of the issues that people have drawn.

Unfortunately, for the government, if you look at the future of energy generation in this country, I cannot see coal-fired power being part of that unless it is in receipt of massive government subsidies. The fact is, if you look at the levelised cost of energy in this country, AGL is writing contracts for wind farms at $65 a megawatt hour. Bloomberg New Energy Finance has found that large-scale solar farms are being constructed at around $100 a megawatt hour. In contrast to that, a new coal-fired power station in this country will cost at least $160 a megawatt hour. Carbon capture and storage, if they are ever viable, will be at least triple that at $480 a megawatt hour.

Coal will not be part of the mix on current trajectories. In fact, clean coal—which is the latest fad from the government—is a lie. Clean coal is a lie. We saw a farcical position where the Prime Minister rabbited on about it in the National Press Club. We saw that joke of a Treasurer bring a lump of coal into question time, embarrassing and cheapening his position and the position of Treasurer of this country—and it is a lie. The cleanest coal-fired power stations in our region, the newest and latest, still produce 700 kilos of carbon dioxide for every megawatt hour. Let me repeat that: 700 kilos of carbon dioxide for one megawatt hour. Closed-cycle gas is around 370 kilos of CO2 for a megawatt hour, base load gas is almost half lower in carbon emissions and, obviously, renewables are completely carbon dioxide free. Clean coal is a lie; it is not the future for this nation. In fact, it is doing a great disservice to the coal communities of this country to dangle the prospect of future coal-fired generation in this country.

I have often said that there is nothing more disrespectful and low than to lie to workers. That is what the government has been doing. It is been going to coal communities around this country, including mine and yours, Madam Deputy Speaker Wicks, and saying: 'Nothing has to change. You can keep performing your job. Your industry can keep behaving as it has done for the last 40 years, and nothing has to change.' That is a lie. It is dishonest. It is disrespecting those workers and those communities that depend upon those jobs. Instead, we must have a plan for a just transition, and that is what Labor is committed to.

We recognise that, even without carbon pricing, the four Hunter power stations have use-by dates. The Hunter produces one-third of the coal-fired power generation in this country, and all four of them have dates for closure set by their owners: Liddell's owner has said 2022; Vales Point—most people have said 2028; Origin have said 2034 for Eraring, the biggest power station in the country; and AGL have said 2035 for Bayswater. All four power stations are going to close down in the next 20 years, regardless of any other government policy.

What they need is a plan. Those workers in the communities that depend upon those jobs need a plan for their future, and that is what Labor is committed to. We have a plan for a just transition that takes lessons from around the world—that looks at what Germany, for example, did in rationalising their coal mining industry, where you can do this properly and do not have to have forced redundancies.

I support and applaud the Victorian government's efforts to do that for the Hazelwood power closure. They have managed to redeploy 150 workers from the 550 affected by that closure to other power stations in that region. It is great news for that community. That means 150 families do not have to uproot their lives because of something outside their control. It is really good that Labor at the state and federal level is embracing that. We need to contrast that with the coalition's inaction on structural adjustment.

The coalition have an appalling record on structural adjustment in this country, and that is because they do not care about workers. They pay lip service to caring about workers. We had the Deputy Prime Minister rabbiting on in question time about support for labourers and everyone else but it is purely hot air. They do not care. You only have to look at their actions. Look at what happened last year when the Northern power station in South Australia closed down. When those workers lost their jobs there was virtually no assistance from the government other than a CV-writing course.

You only have to look at our region to understand what happens when large industrial establishments close down under the watch of the Liberal government. When the BHP plant closed down in the late nineties, guess what was the biggest piece of structural adjustment funding the Liberal government provided? Funding for renovation of the Newcastle yacht club. Let me repeat that: we had thousands of steelworkers put out of work, and what did the John Howard Liberal government invest in? A renovation for the yacht club. Madam Deputy Speaker Claydon, you have met plenty of steelworkers in our home town, and I do not think many of them are keen yachties. They certainly cannot afford to run a maxi out of Newcastle yacht club. But that is the vision of structural adjustment from the conservatives.

Urgent action on climate change is needed. We cannot put our heads in the sand. We owe it to future generations not just to ensure they have a better environment than we have but to ensure they have an economy that is able to compete in the 21st century, compete in the era of the clean industrial revolution and low-carbon jobs. You can only do that by having an emissions intensity scheme, by having an emissions trading scheme, by having a hard cap on pollution and by promoting jobs of the future in clean technology industries. But this government are committed to going down the other path, to putting their heads in the sand and saying nothing has to change, to bringing lumps of coal into question time, and to betraying not just future generations but the current generation. One-third of jobs in renewables have disappeared under this government's watch.

When I look at my kids in the future, I want to be able to say to them that this parliament acted in their interests; that this parliament acted to ensure they had a better environment and an economy, with cleantech, low-carbon jobs, that would be able to compete in the 21st century. Unfortunately, the appropriations bill that we are debating right now is yet another symbol of this government not taking action on climate change and not trying to solve the energy crisis we are currently facing. All they care about is pandering to the conservative reactionaries in the Liberal party room, pandering to columnists like Andrew Bolt—pandering to people so out of touch with science and economics—and betraying this country.

Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Social Services and Disability Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak in support of Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2016-2017 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2016-2017—bills that provide some vital expenditure. These bills also allow me to segue into other facets of my electorate that are supported directly and indirectly through these bills and associated coalition government policy.

Ryan is proudly home to the Gallipoli Barracks, the second largest military base in the country. I am pleased that the coalition are committed to defence, with an $810 million appropriation to the Department of Defence. The coalition have a long history of supporting and bolstering the Australian Defence Force, and we are increasing defence spending, improving capabilities and providing better support for current and past personnel.

The coalition government is also looking after those younger Australians who suffer from childhood cancer by committing $10 million to the establishment of a national research network which focuses on improving childhood cancer survival rates. In fact, it was only late last year that the Turnbull government provided $20 million to the Zero Childhood Cancer Collaboration Network to help improve health outcomes for children with cancer. The aim of the Zero Childhood initiative is for every child with cancer—up to a thousand a year—to be able to access the network's cutting-edge technology and collaboration by 2020 to push survival rates for childhood cancer towards 100 per cent. Not only will this initiative change lives; it will save lives.

As a government whose welfare mantra is about a hand-up, not a handout, I welcome the funds through these bills that will provide for the expansion of the Department of Human Services' fraud prevention and debt recovery capabilities. I acknowledge that this topic is of great contention at present, especially from those opposite, who would hand welfare out willy-nilly if they had their way. Members only need to think back to 2009, when the Rudd government's failed stimulus package paid $900 cheques to hundreds of people who were dead—because, as we know, according to the Labor side the afterlife economy was in dire straits as well.

Australians must remember that we, as a government, must ensure that those most vulnerable and in need amongst our community are cared for. To this extent, we must also maximise the welfare dollar. We are a government based on strong economic foundations, which are providing the means for the success of all Australians. We are wealth creators and see fit to do everything in our power to do what is right for each and every Australian. After 12 consecutive quarters of decline, it was encouraging to see new business investment increase for the first time in the final 2016 quarter—up almost two per cent, results attributed to the coalition's strong economic policy. To do this is often met with obstruction from those opposite, at the direction of their acrobatic leader Bill Shorten, who is better known for his flip-flop tricks, saying one thing yet doing another. Each time Labor and the Leader of the Opposition attempt to stymie the successful passage of worthy policy through this House, they are inflicting unknown havoc on hardworking Australians. One needs to look no further than the recent frivolous debate thrown around by those opposite in their blocking the necessary steps, only the coalition is taking, to fully fund the NDIS—something that Labor could not and did not do during the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd era.

Let me highlight some subjects that are closer to my home in the Ryan electorate and, in some, way will affect all Australians. First, I would like to discuss Closing the Gap. Let me be clear, there should be bipartisan support for anything that can be done to right the wrongs of yesteryear. Aboriginal policy must be personal not political. The Prime Minister recently noted:

Yet even with the determination of our First Australians to create a better future … with successive Commonwealth and state governments … and thousands of dedicated Australians seeking to contribute … we still are not making enough progress.

During the past month, my office and I have engaged in discussions with Lyndall De Marco, the ever enthusiastic CEO of IDEAS—an acronym that possibly has your mind full of ideas stands for Indigenous Diabetes Eyes and Screening. Lyndall began our conversation eloquently, referring to eyes as being the window to our sole. With this aptly put, Lyndall began to discuss the IDEAS Van, an initiative that is closing the remoteness and health gaps for Indigenous Australians.

Not many people are aware that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 40 years or more have six times the rate of blindness than any other Australian, or that 94 per cent of this vision loss is preventable and treatable. Considering that Australia is home to some of the world's leading optometric and ophthalmic specialists, how can this be? IDEAS Van is not just a semitrailer with basic medical facilities in tow; rather, it is a mobile and fully-equipped ophthalmology, optometry and imaging specialist centre with state-of-the-art diagnostic tools. It is bringing the care most needed by our first peoples, who do not have access to the services that many Australians take for granted. It contains everything you need to diagnose and treat eye problems in diabetics, who have suffered vision impairment through diabetic retinopathy and associated complications. On board, telehealth facilities also provide a link to the Princess Alexandra Hospital in Brisbane for endocrinology consultations. Supported initially by the Queensland LNP government in 2013, the IDEAS Van has travelled more than 186,000 kilometres of regional and remote Queensland. By visiting regional hubs around Queensland every four weeks, the IDEAS Van allows remote communities regular access to services. Commendably, the IDEAS Van is providing vision with considerable support from the private sector and the professional specialists who volunteer their time. However, there is still an underlying operating cost that needs to be funded to continue this visionary service. The IDEAS Van realises savings for the government by transporting two patients as opposed to the government subsidising expensive airfares for patients to travel to major centres like Brisbane or Townsville. I am currently working with Lyndall De Marco and my ministerial colleagues to discuss potential support for the initiative.

The coalition is supporting science, innovation, research and commercialisation in Australia. My electorate of Ryan is home to many outstanding research facilities and scientific minds, all of whom are benefiting from our commitment to the National Innovation and Science Agenda. Industry research and development are well and truly established in my electorate, which boasts some of the world's leading discoveries in research.

I have said it before in this House but I am proud to say it again: the prestigious University of Queensland, ranked 55th in the top universities of the world and in the top 10 in commercialisation, is in the heart of my electorate. UniQuest, the main commercialisation arm of UQ, is one of the world's most experienced private companies in technology transfer. I congratulate UniQuest, as they have had a direct involvement in many of the university's successes, which, in turn, have led to the betterment of humankind.

I was delighted to visit the University of Queensland recently, to meet with some of their leading researchers and for a guided tour of the university's state-of-the-art research facilities, including the Institute for Molecular Bioscience. The innovation coming from the University of Queensland never ceases to amaze me. The universal language of science draws the brightest researchers from all over the world. I was intrigued, during my visit to the Institute for Molecular Bioscience, to find out more about the Queensland Emory Drug Discovery Initiative, QEDDI, which aims to translate innovative academic research to clinical development and commercialisation by investing in partnerships with industry. By investing in further development and commercialisation, the university is ensuring that vital research is not being forgotten in the often deep academic abyss—research like that by Dr Kate Schroder, whose breakthroughs in cell biology and molecular medicine are paving the way for cures and treatments for diseases like Parkinson's. Described to me by Dr Schroder and her colleagues as being 'the potential silver bullet', they may have the efficacy to treat multiple other diseases. Dr Schroder's research focuses on the innate immune system and is leading this field in the world in understanding how immune cells launch healthy inflammation to fight infection and unhealthy inflammation to promote disease. The brilliant minds of those like Dr Schroder; Professor Ian Frazer, with his HPV vaccine; Professor Maree Smith, with her treatment for chronic pain; and Professor Mark Kendall, with his breakthrough Nanopatch immunisation technology, have placed the University of Queensland on the international map.

Let me pose a question to the House: how many members here would find it acceptable that residents of suburbs in their electorate also shared the same postcode with suburbs more than 130 kilometres away? I dare say that members would be flabbergasted to know that this is the situation in which thousands of residents in my electorate find themselves. Postcode 4306 is one of Australia Post's largest delivery zones, covering some 53 localities, including Karana Downs, Kholo and Mount Crosby in my electorate of Ryan. I have called on Australia Post to review the allocation of unique postcodes for localities which currently share a postcode with geographically separate localities. On many occasions, I have written to the Postal Industry Ombudsman to seek his intervention in this matter and, as of December 2016, I note that the ombudsman had written to the Managing Director and CEO of Australia Post to seek action. I am still waiting for their response. It seems that the CEO was too busy sledging my colleague the member for Corangamite, instead of doing his overpaid job. Australian taxpayers have recently shown their dismay at the excessive salary of former Australia Post CEO Ahmed Fahour, but what about the dismay of many of my constituents who are affected by what is often dubbed 'the postcode from hell'? These constituents have sought action to remedy this matter for more than 20 years, yet are still no closer to a resolution. We are not talking about an electorate as large or as spread out as that of the member for Maranoa; we are discussing a metropolitan seat within 20 kilometres of Brisbane city. I take this opportunity to again place on the record Ryan electorate constituents' disdain towards Australia Post's continual oversight of this significant issue. It affects five federal seats, and five federal members are in bipartisan unison that this must improve.

We have seen, time and time again, the ALP plague Australia with poorly-formed policy and economic mismanagement akin to an adult with mountains of credit card debt who constantly shifts debt from one card to another. Irresponsible moves by those opposite at the behest of their union puppet-masters and Greens allies jeopardise the future of this country. The actions of the Labor Party are comedic, to say the least, resembling the antics of the Griswold family from the National Lampoonseries, endlessly circling the roundabout, trying to exit. This was clearly demonstrated by the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd reckless governments, and now by this current cohort, with many of the same, recycled faces, who traverse a familiar, well-worn path.

During the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd era we saw the establishment of the Fair Work Commission, an independent body with full independent powers. Yet Labor has the audacity to try to blame the coalition for stripping workers of their penalty rates. The decision of the commission is a direct result of the process put in place in 2013 by none other than Bill Shorten, the Leader of the Opposition. Meanwhile, the unions have already done a deal with big business to cut their penalty rates for their workers. Part of the deal is that the business collects the fees for the unions. No longer can they claim to look after the worker. It is no wonder the Tree of Knowledge at Barcaldine died!

Meanwhile, once again, it is the hard-working mums and dads in small business who are on the receiving end of Labor's attacks and unfair policy. And do not get me started on another of Labor's masterminded policies, the Energy Efficient Homes Package, which saw the pink batts debacle and the deaths of innocent hardworking Australians. It is one thing to form bad policy but to implement bad policy and to have Australians die is another. And who is responsible? The Labor government.

These bills are integral to ensure the continuity of the government's programs. As a strong coalition government we are ensuring that Australian taxpayers' money is being spent wisely. Unlike those opposite, we are creating a stronger future for Australians, for their safety, health, education and employment prospects. We are creating the foundations for investment in this country. We are reducing Labor's debt and providing for those least able to.

I can assure the House that only the coalition will provide for all Australians. We not only have a plan for today we also have a plan that ensures longevity and prosperity of the nation into the future. Just like Australians who want to provide for their families, we will continue to provide for all Australians. I commend these bills to the House.

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

Labor is fighting for what matters to Australians. We are fighting a local jobs, we are fighting to protect Medicare from the attacks of the coalition government and we are fighting to build a strong economy that delivers for all. If we win government at the next election Labor will build Australian first, buy Australian first and employ Australian first.

In contrast to Labor's position and Labor's approach, you just have to look at the Turnbull government to see the division and chaos that is amongst the ranks of that government, both on the front and back benches. The Turnbull government is a government in disarray. It has a leader that is caving in to the hard right of this party, who is doing it over and over again. The leader of our party, the member for Maribyrnong, on the contrary, has unified Labor and Labor is a very solid team. We are working together to create the policies to take the next federal election, to present ourselves as the alternative government of this nation. Just look at the contrast.

On the Liberal-National side you have a situation where the Prime Minister thinks he will be able to appease those on the hard right who keep trying to make more and more demands on him. Prime Minister, appeasing bullies does not get rid of bullies, it just emboldens them. Stop trying to appease the hard right. This week is yet another example of that—his decision to cave in on some demands around the Racial Discrimination Act when he should be focused on jobs, health and education. Those are the things the Prime Minister should be focused on. He should be doing something about the fact that unemployment in this country is high and that underemployment in this country is at record levels—since the records started being kept in 1978.

He should be doing something about the fact that underemployment means there are 1.1 million Australians who have some work but want more work and cannot get it. He should also be doing something about the fact that the wage price index, which measures the growth in wages, is stagnant. In fact, wages growth is at record lows since we started keeping the wage price index in 1997 in this country. So you have really low wages growth at the same time you have unemployment and underemployment very high.

The third piece of that puzzle is that the profit share of income is at a very high level compared to where it was in the late 1970s. In fact, the profit share of income has been increasing steadily ever since the late 1970s. So you have very high levels of the profit share of national income, which means correspondingly low levels of the wages share of national income. What that adds up to is that businesses are doing well and workers are not doing well. This is a government that does not care about those issues. In fact, you only have to look at their record on jobs and wages and incomes to get a sense of what this government's priorities are and what they are not.

This government's priorities have been about finding a way to give a $50 billion revenue giveaway to big multinational corporations and the big banks while at the same time approving of and agreeing with a decision of the Fair Work Commission to cut the take-home pay of hundreds of thousands of working people. This is a government that has an interest in trying to cut family tax benefits, affecting middle- and working-class families, while at the same time doing nothing to arrest the severe decline in apprenticeship numbers, which of course is going to make it much harder for young people to have the skills that they will need for the jobs of the future. This is a government so preoccupied with its own follies that it is missing the main issues that are confronting households across Australia right now, every day of the week.

In my own electorate of Griffith apprentice numbers have dropped by a third since this government was elected. It is an absolute disgrace. There have been $2½ billion in Liberal-National Party cuts to TAFE and apprenticeship support since they were elected in 2013. In real terms, what it means on the ground for real people in real households with real problems is that there have been 1,046 fewer apprenticeships taken up in Griffith. At the same time youth unemployment is very high—13.6 per cent youth unemployment—even in my local area on the south side of Brisbane, which is a relatively affluent area.

Under the Liberals, Australia has shed 128,000 apprenticeships in the last 12 months alone. Trade apprentice commencements have dropped 10½ per cent across the country. But Labor is committed to doing something about these issues. In fact, boosting the number of apprenticeships is a key part of Labor's skills and training agenda to deliver more local jobs, because we need the workforce of the future to have the skills that they will need for the jobs of the future. It is pretty simple. When we see the bottom falling out of vocational education and training in this country, it makes it pretty difficult to imagine how we are going to make sure that people do have the skills that they need.

If you want an example of how pig-headed this government has been on this issue, there was a great program running in my electorate—you will remember it, I am sure, Madam Deputy Speaker; it ran across the country—that had an incredible success rate of getting kids who were really at risk, teenagers who were not in school and not at work, and helping them get the skills that they needed just to be employees. They were really basic skills that a lot of us take for granted, but these kids did not have the opportunity to get them. They were in very high-risk families and domestic situations.

That program, which helped these kids get into education or work, was called Youth Connections. It was very much a value-for-money program. It was incredibly cheap for the Commonwealth to fund. It had high levels of success. In my electorate the program was being run by Boystown. I visited the program at the time that it was being run. It was doing a great job. This government came in and cut that program. Can you imagine cutting an inexpensive and highly valuable program that helps young at-risk kids in their first year at a time when youth unemployment is high and young people are desperately in need of support and reassurance that there is going to be a future for them in this country.

If you want another example, just look at the penalty rates debacle. The Fair Work Commission has made a decision that will cut the take-home pay of hundreds of thousands of employees. It is not like an enterprise bargaining agreement where workers get a vote on the agreement, where they can decide whether to trade away some conditions in favour of other conditions, where there is a situation where the commission has to test the proposed agreement against the modern award to see whether the proposed agreement leaves working people better off overall than the modern award. That is not the situation that we are talking about here.

I think it has been a pretty unedifying display by the Prime Minister, who really should understand enterprise bargaining. We have had enterprise bargaining in Commonwealth law since 1993. It is not as though this is some new concept. You get productivity gains in return for increases in pay and conditions, and that means that working people, through their representatives, and employers negotiate, bargain together to find a win-win solution. That is the point of enterprise bargaining. It is certainly the case that some penalty rates may change and, at the same time, base rates may increase, or you might get paid parental leave, or you might get cultural leave, or you might get other conditions like roster changes or ratios of staff. You might improve conditions at work. It is certainly the case that enterprise bargaining works that way, but this seems to be news to the Prime Minister, who has made it pretty clear throughout question time this week, and in previous weeks, that he does not even understand how enterprise bargaining works. Nor does he understand that working people get a vote on whether to even agree to the enterprise bargaining agreement—it is not some deal struck somewhere in secret and the next thing you know you have this new set of work conditions. That is not how it works; people actually get a vote on these deals.

Maybe he is confused because, in legislation he voted for—Work Choices, back when Work Choices was introduced by the Commonwealth—there was a thing called an employer greenfields agreement that the employer just wrote and had certified; they did not need anyone's agreement for that. Or maybe he is confused by the fact that the legislation he voted for, Work Choices, promulgated individual statutory agreements that were allowed to, and did, undercut all sorts of conditions including penalty rates, annual leave loading and sick leave entitlements. They actually did undercut conditions and pay, and did not even have to pass a no disadvantage test. In fact, the Prime Minister voted for legislation abolishing the no disadvantage test that the commission was then using to make sure people were not left worse off. Maybe he is confused; he has voted for legislation that allows that to happen in the past, but he has form—and he has a lot of cheek, frankly, to come into the parliament and have a go at us for agreements that actually passed the better-off-overall test, when he voted for legislation to get rid of it altogether, to not even have a no disadvantage test.

And look what happened: if you go back into the history of those statutory individual agreements, you will find they actually did get rid of pay and conditions—of course they did. Employers made it a condition of getting a job that you signed up to these individual deals that left you worse off than the prevailing award. Perhaps that is why the Prime Minister is confused. But, to be fair to him, I think he clearly does understand—even though he has been disingenuous about it—that the Fair Work Commission decision in relation to penalty rates is a cut to the take-home pay of working people. It does not leave people better off overall than they had previously been under that particular modern award.

To give you a sense of how it affects my electorate, more than 11,900 people in Griffith, or one-in-seven workers, work in the retail, food and accommodation industries, which are industries affected by the cuts. The workers who are affected by the cuts stand to lose up to $77 a week. Madam Deputy Speaker Claydon, I do not think that you or I would be very happy with a pay drop of $77 a week. I think that would make our lives more difficult, so imagine how much more difficult it would make the lives of people who are under these awards, who are in some of the lowest paying occupations in the country.

The Prime Minister supports this Fair Work decision—he supports it. He claims it is going to lead to more jobs, but what it is really going to lead to is people having to work longer to get the same pay. It is going to affect all sorts of people, but the Prime Minister does not care about them. He has been out there defending this pay cut up and down town. Labor does not agree. In fact, Bill Shorten, the Leader of the Opposition, has brought to the parliament a bill to make sure this cannot happen, to make sure the commission, when it is reviewing awards, cannot reduce the take-home pay of working people. That is what our bill does. It does not prescribe penalty rates in law, in legislation. It does not do any of that, but it does say that the commission cannot cut the take-home pay of working people when reviewing these awards.

You would think that would be pretty non-controversial legislation. You would think that anyone who is reasonable would sign up to a bill that says to the nation's Fair Work Commission—which is an excellent body, a great body, a body that has been around since 1904 in various guises—'By all means review awards, but don't cut the take-home pay of working people.' You would think anyone would vote for that legislation, and yet the Prime Minister is carrying on as though this is somehow unreasonable, as though it is perfectly fine for the Fair Work Commission to cut the take-home pay of working people. That is simply not true, and it just goes to show how out of touch this Prime Minister is with the concerns that are being talked about around the kitchen table.

The Prime Minister likes to talk about cost of living. What helps with the cost of living is not having a massive pay cut. If the Prime Minister cared about cost of living, he would want to do something about the fact that low-paid workers are having their pay cut. How can he say that these will be the last people who will have this pay cut? The opposition asked the question in question time: how can he guarantee that other awards will not have their penalty rates cut, with more pay cuts for other workers? The only way he could guarantee that would be to support Labor's plan to set in legislation a requirement that the commission does not cut the take-home pay of working people. He could back that; he could back it right now. It is a very simple proposition, and it makes economic sense.

Not in the most recent quarter just gone but in the quarter before, we had a negative quarter of economic growth in this country. Let's just think about that for a minute. What is going to help make sure that we have strong economic growth? Would cutting the pay of working people encourage them to spend more money? Would cutting the pay of working people promote more household consumption? Would that promote greater economic growth? Of course it would not. The same working people who are employees who are having their pay cut are also customers, the same customers that small businesses rely on to buy their products and services. They are also citizens and taxpayers, the same taxpayers we rely on to pay their taxes and the same citizens we rely on to be out there doing their bit for Australia to really spur on the economy.

Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to talk in favour of Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2016-2017 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2016-2017. With these appropriation bills, there is a lot of good money being spent in a lot of areas that are needing it. In Appropriation Bill (No. 3) the Department of Defence will be receiving extra resources for some of their roles. The Department of Health is also getting extra resources, and there is some infrastructure spending in that as well.

I want to pick up on an issue that was raised earlier by a number of speakers. I am talking here about the proposed company tax rate cuts, and I think it brings up a really interesting philosophical point. As members of parliament and as members of government, one of our primary roles is to provide services to our community, whether they be in health, education or infrastructure projects. What we always have to do, and try to do, is grow the pie of available government resources for those types of projects but at the same time help grow that section of the economy, or that section of the country, that is producing the wealth of the country.

The company tax rates are a really interesting philosophical debate. For the first time in probably 30 or 35 years, we are now having a debate about this. I go back to the Hawke-Keating governments and acknowledge them for some of the things that they did. They in some ways started this whole process. The prevailing economic thought, accepted in most countries around the world, is to maintain a competitive business tax rate. We have moved into a space with globalisation and technology advancements, where countries that operate with isolationist policies, or in isolationist-type environments—and I suppose an exaggerated example here is North Korea—tend not to do well. Most successful countries trade, and they have to compete in a way that keeps them efficient. One of those ways, whether we like it or not, is to have a competitive company tax rate, because many companies now have a choice about where they operate. They can choose what part of the world they want to domicile their business in, and there is lots of competition in that.

Dare I say it, Paul Keating as Treasurer recognised that. One of the first governments in Australia to really take this on board and to lower company tax rates—not just for small business but for big business—in a massive way was Paul Keating and Bob Hawke's government. They lowered company tax rates enormously over the years that they were in government, because they understood that we had to maintain competitiveness in this field. With the election of the Howard government, that continued: the Howard-Costello government, over the 10 or so years that they were in power—again, in a modest, continual way over time—lowered the company tax rate. We went from something like nearly 60 per cent down to the current 30 per cent. We have one of the highest company tax rates in the OECD, and we have if not the highest then very close to the highest company tax rate in our region. We need to keep looking at it and we need to stay competitive on it. Even with the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government there were proposals to lower company tax rates, and we are doing the same thing now—so for the first time in 30-odd years, there is a debate about this.

I want to remind the House what has happened in the past when we have cut company tax rates, because what you would think—potentially—is that when you cut company tax rates, the amount of revenue that you receive goes down. But that is not the historical or empirical evidence of what happens. In fact, it is exactly the opposite. What happens is it encourages more businesses to get established. It encourages, potentially, more businesses to move to your country. I want to quote some figures—from the ABS, of all places!—and I think we can have reasonable faith in these. To go back to what I was talking about before, company tax revenue rose—this is back in 1987-88. There was a 10 percentage point cut in the company tax rate in this period. Company tax revenue actually rose from 8.6 billion in 1987-1988 to 12.7 billion in 1989-90. So there you go, Madam Deputy Speaker Claydon—we had a company tax rate that was cut, but company tax revenue actually rose in totality. And that was because more businesses were established, more businesses were making much more money, and more businesses moved here. Also—and this is an important statistic—company tax as a share of government revenue rose. Was that a one-off? No it was not, because revenue rose when the Howard-Costello government did the same thing. Revenue rose from 26 billion in 1999-2000 to 35 billion in 2002-03. It also lifted as a percentage of the share of revenue after we had cut the company tax rate from 36 to 30. So again, we need to understand—and it has been well accepted throughout the world, and in Australia by both sides of politics—that cutting the company tax rate is important for maintaining a competitive tax rate. And, as you free up and liberate that private sector, they actually do better and will generate more money. So this is a really significant change from the Labor Party: they are talking in a way which they have not done and about something that they have not spoken about in over 30 years.

We need to look at recent history, over the last 20 to 30 years, and at exactly what has happened with company tax rates. In fact, revenue to government has increased as a result of those changes. Let us think: why would that happen? It is almost counterintuitive—until you look at the figures. We would think that if company taxes are lowered—but we are not collecting less money, we are collecting more. It goes with that whole philosophy—it encourages investment, it encourages existing businesses to expand, it encourages them to invest in new things, and it encourages new businesses to establish and other businesses to move here. It creates the bigger pie, and the bigger resource for government then to provide the essential services that it needs to. I remember there was a famous case, a well-studied case in academic circles, about Ireland. You may remember, Madam Deputy Speaker, that Ireland in the eighties was in a very poor way financially. They had a company tax rate that was very high. They slashed it to 10 per cent—I think it was from something like 60 or 70 per cent to 10 per cent. They were collecting more money in three years at 10 per cent than they were at 60 per cent. Again, why? Why did that happen?

What happened back then was that they became the centre of investment in Europe. In the eighties, obviously, one of the biggest emerging industries at the time was the IT, and everyone sent to the IT bases in Ireland. Lowering it was great for their economy and great for their company tax collections. It has been well accepted throughout the world and, indeed, on both sides of politics in Australia for 30 years, but apparently the Labor Party, unfortunately, now knows better and is ignoring empirical evidence about what has been proven over the last 20 to 30 years.

Also with the appropriations, I would like to acknowledge some of the investments this government is making. We very much understand that government play an important role not just in essential services but also in infrastructure spends—and I want to quickly run through a few infrastructure projects in my electorate. We have, through different things like the Stronger Regions Fund, made really important investments in infrastructure that are targeting job creation and jobs growth in local regions, and I want to quickly run through a few in my electorate. One is the Ballina marine rescue tower. It is very important to our fishing industry and very important to our tourism industry. The old tower was literally falling over, but it was known that, if that tower closed, vessels would not be able to enter the bar safely and both the tourism and fishing industries would be adversely affected. We made a commitment to them to fix that, and we will be opening that in the next few weeks. That is going to be good day for Ballina and, indeed, the tourism and fishing industries.

At Lismore, there is the Quadrangle project. We are going to be opening a regional standard art gallery and a cosmopolitan-type square within the library and the new art gallery. This will bring new tourists and new visitors to our region spending money, which is going to be very valuable. Deputy Speaker, I do not know if you have ever been to Kyogle. It is a great part of the world. There is a very well-visited dam called Toonumbar Dam. Unfortunately, it does not have a completely sealed road, and we have invested in making sure that road is completely sealed to encourage more tourism activity in that region. The Harwood Sugar Mill, down the Clarence, is a very important employer in the lower Clarence. We have given them some financial assistance to completely reform their logistics, which is going to make sure they remain competitive. That is also a job-creating investment.

Casino has the biggest private employer in the region for hundreds of kilometres, and that is the local abattoir—a local meatworks. They employ over 1,000 people. The saleyards, located just a little way away, needs to be upgraded to make sure that Casino remains a regional hub for the cattle industry. We are making an investment in that, with the local council. This will be a nearly $7 million investment with both parties investing, to make sure that the saleyards are upgraded and to make sure they remain a regional processing centre.

There are many more. Oakes Oval, in Lismore, is the premier sporting facility in the region. That is getting an upgrade. It is being extended to incorporate AFL. The change rooms and some of the grandstand infrastructure will be upgraded as well to make sure that we keep winning these regional sporting events so that people keep visiting our region and spending money. There is the Maclean Riverside Precinct. Maclean is a beautiful Scottish town on the Clarence River. They are upgrading the riverside precinct, and we are helping them by making an investment and really turning the town around to face the Clarence River again, with boardwalks and promenades. That will increase tourism visitors to Maclean and the economic performance of Maclean.

Kyogle has an inordinate amount of wooden bridges. It has quite a small LGA in population, but it is very productive. They have a blueberry industry, they have beef a cattle industry and they have a timber industry. And they have a lot—and I am talking hundreds—of wooden bridges that are in a state of disrepair. The financial burden on them is too great, so we, as a federal government, have been assisting them for a number of years to slowly upgrade the wooden bridges in a uniform way. We are aware that they are a very productive area of our country. They produce things, they make things and they grown things, and that is providing income not only to their region but also to the country. We are also upgrading some of the amenities in town for them, like the pool.

Woolgoolga is a great blueberry-growing area and a great tourism area just north of Coffs Harbour. There is a great Sikh community there as well. The surf lifesaving club is not in a good way and we are going to help to move it and invest again in crucial infrastructure for social reasons. There is more going on in Casino, with an amphitheatre that we are going to help to develop at the local drill hall complex. They approached me a number of years ago. The complex was surplus to Department of Defence requirements and they asked me if we would not sell it into private hands but keep it in community hands as a community space. With the Minister for Defence we did a deal that was quite advantageous to the local council and sold the drill hall to the Richmond Valley Council. It is now going to become a community space and we are going to help them make some investments into that as well.

Further on the subject of social infrastructure, it was wonderful recently to involve the Minister for Health. Like many communities around our country, Clarence Valley has been touched by mental health issues. I do not think there is a family that has not been touched by mental health issues, but Clarence Valley and Grafton have been especially hard-hit. There have been many tragedies. Every loss of life is a tragedy, but they have certainly had more than their fair share in this very sad way. It was almost having a flow-on effect—when someone did it someone else would follow. We are making some huge investments into this space. The Minister for Health was there with me recently and we announced a new headspace facility for Grafton, but also a whole array of other extra mental health services to help the community.

Lastly, the biggest investment that we are making is important not just to prevent fatalities but also for revenue and commerce revenue—and not only when it is being built by the 3½ thousand people who work directly on it. I am talking about the upgrade of the Pacific Highway. The Woolgoolga to Ballina section is very important. This government is making a multibillion dollar investment to create more jobs.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I speak in relation to the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2016-2017 and the Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2016-2017. Labor will support supply; we always do—not like those opposite. They have not, by the way, blocked supply since 1975, but they have frustrated Labor governments repeatedly. We are always committed to supporting supply, so we support this legislation. In 2016-17, MYEFO announced $2.7 billion of net expenditure saves. Many of them, of course, were a carryover from the 2014-15 budget, which is a bit like Lord Voldemort in Harry Potterwe dare not speak its name. That budget was full of zombie cuts, and they are still there, lurking around. Even today we have seen that those zombie cuts remain. I noticed a press release from the shadow minister for families and social services today. The Treasurer, in an interview on Sky News with Peter van Onselen, made the point that those cuts continue to stand as government policy. They include cuts to paid parental leave. Seventy thousand new mums will be worse off. The government are trying to scrap the energy supplement and make a $1 billion cut to pensioners, people with disability and Newstart recipients. The five-week wait for Newstart, which will force young people to live on nothing for five weeks, will continue if the Liberal and National parties have their way. The cuts to young people between 22 and 24 years of age, pushing them off Newstart onto the much lower youth allowance, will see them $48 to $49 a week worse off. Of course, they are continuing to support the scrapping of the pensioner education supplement and the education entry supplement, and they continue to support the cut to the pension for migrant pensioners who spend more than six weeks overseas.

These cuts continue. This is the policy of the government, confirmed by the Treasurer this afternoon. They might have split the bill, but this remains the policy of the government. The government, when in opposition, claimed, in relation to the debt and deficit under Labor, that the budget was 'in freefall'. They promised to 'stabilise and repay Labor's debt'. The debt was 'skyrocketing' and 'spiralling deeper and deeper'. They identified $50 billion of savings for a reduction of $30 billion in debt and claimed that they would deliver a surplus in their first year of government and every year thereafter. That is what the former member for North Sydney, the former Treasurer, Joe Hockey famously said—apart from the fact that he also thought poor people do not drive cars, and, of course, before bringing down the budget, decided to enjoy himself with tobacco by having a cigar just before he cut the funding for pensions, young people and so many people across the board.

This is a government that promised big when it came to office. They did an audit and talked about the fact that there would be a disaster: we were maxing out the credit card, there was a debt time bomb that was terrible and there was a debt blowout spiralling out of control. And what have they done since they came to office? It is always interesting to talk about appropriations. They have tripled the deficit since 2014. Their first budget predicted that the deficit for 2016-17 would be $10.6 billion. They did not actually get that surplus in the first year or any year thereafter. It is now going to rise to $36.5 billion this year. Having promised a surplus in their first year and every year thereafter, they predicted that for 2016-17 the deficit would be $10.6 billion and now it is going to rise to $36.5 billion. The debt has risen! The Pre-election Financial and Economic Outlook—PEFO—in 2013 is not done. Entirely independently, before we lost office, the net debt was confirmed at $184 billion. The 2016 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook—MYEFO—shows that it has blown out to $317 billion this year.

This is a government that promised big but has not delivered, and they have lost all focus. They are a government that seems to be completely out of touch. They are driven by division and dysfunction and seem to be at war with each other. It seems that every year, every month and every week when they are in government, before we return to this place there is another blowout from the member for Warringah or the putative leader, the member for Dickson. They all seem to be jostling to get the position—that is what seems to be happening. You can see the angling and the auditioning in question time, certainly by the Treasurer.

This is his appropriations bill, but where is their surplus? Where is the reduction in debt under these guys? They have just not looked at it. They gave up government funds, such as from the carbon price, which was bringing in about $13 billion per annum—they gave up that resource. They lifted the debt ceiling and they blew the debt off—with the concurrence of the Greens, I might add. So they gave away revenue sources and then decided that their big election campaign would be about jobs and growth. How they would do it would be to give away $50 billion in corporate tax cuts and by not looking at other potential areas of taxation reform that might be fair. Their logic is, 'We will give away $7.4 billion to the big banks'—that will go down well in marginal seats—'and $50 billion in tax cuts to big business,' a lot of which will go overseas in multinational tax avoidance.

At the same time, they do not fulfil their previous election commitment of needs-based funding, like Gonski funding. Remember those signs on election day that said they would match Labor's funding dollar for dollar if they won the 2013 election? They did not fulfil that. We know that in the middle of 2018, budgetary funding for education goes off the cliff. Since the last federal election, I have visited almost all of the schools in my electorate—I have close to 80 schools—and what I get from the school principals and the school committees when I visit them is that they have used the funding that we put in—which is contingent, and goes off the cliff—for literacy and numeracy upgrades to improve the standards of those kids who have been left behind, professional development for teaching and putting on extra teacher's aides. Investing in education should be the priority. The Gonski funding investment will give three times the benefit to the Australian economy as the tax cuts they want to give to big business.

Now, we had the member for Page talking about evidence and about the importance of these $50 billion in tax cuts to big business; the importance of it for economic growth, for jobs, for attracting investment into the country. But not a shred of evidence was given by the member for Page about that.

Let's look at what The Australia Institute said about the plan of the government to give $50 billion in tax cuts to corporate Australia, including up to $1 billion for companies earning a billion dollars a year. The Australia Institute said:

… that there is no evidence to suggest that lower rates increase economic growth. Secondly, a historical analysis of Australia’s own corporate tax rate shows that, if anything, lower rates have a negative impact on the kind of economic indicators spruiked by their proponents.

Furthermore, The Australia Institute said:

The evidence presented here suggests that if there are any growth dividends of lowering the company tax rate they are so weak as to be outweighed by other factors. Neither cross-country comparison nor Australia’s own history lend any support to the ‘tax-cuts-are-good’ thesis. If the aim really is increased economic growth, then Australians would be better advised to ignore the business lobby’s call for lower company tax rates and look seriously at other policies.

Let's look at what the Treasury said in their various assumptions. They looked at a number of assumptions—and we are talking about a decade or more away—and said that in the long term, employment might increase by 0.1 per cent. We are potentially talking about a 1.1 per cent increase in GDP.

This is in circumstances where we have a real problem at the moment in this country in relation to unemployment. We saw the figures that came out: the unemployment rate increased from 5.7 per cent to 5.9 per cent, the highest in more than 12 months. And that was just on 16 March this year. There were 6,400 fewer jobs last month, including a decrease of 33,500 part-time jobs. There are about 135,000 fewer apprentices since this mob came to power; unemployment is up and about 1.1 million Australians are underemployed and saying that they would like more work; and the answer to all of this seems to be to put at risk the AAA credit rating by giving tax cuts to big Australians—to big corporate Australia—and at the same time not being prepared to protect the penalty rates of about 700,000 Australians, who would lose $77 a week.

How is it possible that Australians are going to spend more money, consume more services and buy more goods if they have less money in their pay packets and if unemployment goes up? It is now higher than it was during the GFC, when we, by our stimulus, not just once but twice, managed to avoid a recession. We had negative growth not that long ago under this mob—just the previous quarter to the current one. So at risk is our economy, and our fundamentals are quite tenuous. We have high unemployment, low growth—the lowest wages growth on record—and the highest, the worst, inequality in the country in nearly 75 years. And these people think that we are going to fix it with some ideology of trickle-down economics? Honestly, these are parties—the Liberal-National parties—which pride themselves on their alleged economic experience and management. But the economy has gone backwards in so many areas under this mob—whether it is employment, apprenticeships, jobs, training or investment. Now, they do not look at proper sources of revenue, such as negative gearing and capital gains tax reform, which together cost more than $10 billion to the budget each year, they do not look at an emissions intensity scheme and they do not look at a whole range of areas which might improve equity as well as the economy of the country. Economies which are more equal are often fairer and also more progressive, and actually invest in jobs and achieve things. They do not achieve things if people are losing their jobs, if their kids are not getting apprenticeships and if people do not have the money in their pay packets to purchase items.

So how about this government finally stand up for middle-class people who are doing it tough and ditch this idea of a corporate tax cut to big Australia. But, hang on a sec, today we have seen speakers in the House making speech after speech in relation to the Treasury Laws Amendment (Enterprise Tax Play) Bill 2016 and talking about the fact that there would be $50 billion in tax cuts for small business—small business being $1 billion in revenue every year—and thinking that this 10-year tax plan is going to be achieving a lot of things. But perhaps they were not actually in the House during question time when the Treasurer again and again refused to commit to this enterprise tax plan.

My thinking is that what will happen is that the government will have to split the bill. They will not leave the bill in its current form, because they probably will not get it through the Senate. I think they probably know that they cannot. So what they will do is gut the centrepiece, the raison d'etre, for their re-election. I said in a speech earlier today that this mob, in rugby league terms, got up by a field goal in the last minute. That is how close the election result was. In AFL terms it would probably be a behind in the last minute. The centrepiece of everything they talked about was jobs and growth. They are not achieving anything on jobs. And, if they think $50 billion in tax cuts is going to get growth, they are not listening to the evidence which clearly demands a verdict the other way.

Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

These are interesting appropriation bills, and I am sure we will have a good debate on them in the parliament. Today I want to talk a bit about the superannuation scheme, particularly about some of the ideas that are emanating out of the government as the budget approaches and the effect that they might have on our national savings and on our economic conditions. Superannuation has been a particularly important part of this nation's economic strategy since 1983. It has been a very successful part of our economic story, to the extent that the funds under management are over $2 trillion. That is an extraordinary achievement.

In industry funds alone, there is about $500 billion under management. To give you an example of what that means to ordinary workers, if we are talking about retail workers—who are getting a lot of mention in the parliament at the moment—the Retail Employees Superannuation Trust has $39 billion of funds under management. There are two million members, Australians, and there is $39 million of funds under management. That is an extraordinary part of our national savings. This is every check-out operator, night filler, trolley collector and retail worker in department stores and the like. Their retirement savings are being put away for their benefit. These are national savings that would not have existed but for the creation of industry super and the superannuation guarantee charge.

Just to give you an idea of the returns to members, over the 10 years it has been 6.25 per cent, over the seven years it has been 8.39 per cent, and over the five years it has been 9.98 per cent. That is a great story of industry super and superannuation for retail workers. We have had a big debate about their penalty rates, but it is important to note that this has been a very successful part of securing their retirement incomes free of excessive charges and free of the profit motive. Industry funds exist for their members and not for the profit motive.

These funds have also been a very big contributor to national savings. As I said before, we have now got $2 trillion under management in the retirement income and superannuation system, and this was a very big part of the success story of giving the economy ballast, predictability and security during the global financial crisis. It was a great asset to this nation. We hear cries about foreign investment, which I know gets thrown at your party, Deputy Speaker Coulton, and mine. People say: 'Why don't we buy back the farm? Why don't we invest in our own country?' You can only invest in your own country if you have significant national savings. The reason we have since the nation's founding always been sucking in capital from overseas, first from the United Kingdom, later from the United States and later from Japan and other parts of the world such as the Middle East, is that we have had a shortage of national savings. Industry superannuation and the superannuation system, properly managed, add to that pool of national savings and give the economy great ballast. A lot of it is invested in Australian fixed shares. A lot of it is invested in Australian fixed interest. A lot of it is invested in property and the like. These are primarily funds that are invested in Australia but also give some investment profile overseas. So it has been a very successful scheme.

I do not want to drop names, but Mary Easson was launching a book in parliament: Keating's & Kielty's Super Legacy: The Birth and Relentless Threats to the Australian System of Superannuation. It is a very good book. We have a tendency, I think, to either embark on feats of nostalgia about reforms, thinking that they were easily achieved, or to take them completely for granted. I think this is certainly the case with superannuation. It is worth noting that people like Simon Crean and Bill Kielty, who got the idea of broad based industry superannuation put in the first accord, did the right thing by this country—not just the right thing by workers but the right thing by the country. One of the greatest achievements of the Hawke-Keating government is the superannuation scheme. Prior to this, superannuation was really the province of people who were professional or worked for one company for a long time. They were predominantly, though not always, men, and there were often defined benefit schemes which took you 40 years to realise the benefits and really did lock you into a company or occupation—a company more often than not. So the scheme that existed prior to this did not cover women, did not cover casual workers and did not cover people who moved jobs and thus was not a contributor to national savings and certainly not a contributor to most workers in the wages system.

What do we find? We have got this great success story. We have got this great achievement largely left alone by the Howard government, I have got to say. They did not add to it. They should have added to it. It is worthwhile noting that, if the Keating government program of superannuation increases had continued, we would be at 15 per cent for most workers today and our national savings would be correspondingly higher. It is worth noting that, if this government had kept to the schedule of the Rudd-Gillard governments, we would be at 11 per cent at the moment. Most workers would be at 11 per cent superannuation instead of nine. It gives you an indication that, most of the time, conservative governments do not meddle so much with this system. What we have found, I think, in recent days is that this government is having their internal debate out in the open. Normally, when they have economic debates—and we are debating the appropriation bills, so it is topical as we come into budget time—there is a bit of the opposition asking the government what they might do in the budget with the government playing a dead bat. Very rarely have we ever seen a government having its internal debates out in the open—it is extraordinary.

We had Mr Michael Sukkar, the member for Deakin, coming out—he has been given this new job and he is keen to get on with it. His first step was to tell people that they should get a highly-paid job in order to buy their first home; and the second idea that he had, off the top of his head, was to use superannuation—that a first home buyer should be able to use their superannuation to buy their first home.

This was immediately shot down—it was interesting—by the finance minister who pointed this out in 2014, apparently, that if you activated this option, you would only drive up house prices because it pumps more liquidity into the market. Interestingly enough, the member for Deakin is not happy to have one side of the debate; he is producing this idea but he is happy to have the other side of it. He says those comments are largely correct—I am quoting from the Financial Review here on March 14, 2017:

If all a government does is try to pump further liquidity into the residential housing market, inevitably, all you do is push up house prices.

So he wants to push people's superannuation into the housing market, even though he knows it will push up housing prices and thus become completely self-defeating.

But he goes on to say:

… the classic example—

this is what I love—

was the Howard government's $7,000 first homeowners grant which, he said, may as well have been given straight to developers such was its effect in pushing up prices.

Pretty extraordinary criticism of the Howard government's first buyer grant—I commend his candour. But, if you think about it: it is exactly what he is proposing but then turning up the dial, because what we would suddenly create is a completely sophisticated industry of spivs and corporate pirates. We have all seen it with the real estate spruikers in this country. Imagine if they could get access to your superannuation. Imagine the vast army of white ants that would come out to nibble into people's superannuation: you would very quickly get a very sophisticated array of people who would hold seminars, who would create self-managed superannuation vehicles and who would take large accounting fees for the privilege of raiding superannuation. I know the Deputy Speaker represents blue-collar workers in the bush. He knows exactly the people I am talking about. We have all seen them.

We have got the member for Deakin taking both sides of the argument. We have had the Treasurer rule it out but not really rule it out. We have had the finance minister being quite explicit about what he thinks of it. There is a debate going on in the government. We have had the Prime Minister considering the superannuation property plan—that was in Samantha Maiden's article; I am not sure if that was in TheSunday Mailit was Sky News on Thursday 16 March saying that he would consider it, despite having called the option a thoroughly bad idea in the past. The Prime Minister knows it is a bad idea. He knows it is a thoroughly bad idea and yet continues down this path of considering this thoroughly bad idea.

You think maybe the Senate might save us from this lunacy where we would have the nation's national savings given to the real estate spruikers. But, no, we have got the Xenophon team—Nick Xenophon is the ultimate populist, so this is a great idea; it sounds good on a radio grab somewhere. It is not very well thought-out, because Xenophon has previously promoted this and said that we should look at the Canadian scheme; it is a great idea. There is just one problem. Garth Turner, who is a former Canadian MP and a mate of Mr Xenophon's—I do not know how they have become friends—has cautioned him not to mimic Canada's policy, as reported in The Guardian:

"Nick, I'm not loving your most recent crusade—

Most recent crusade! There are a lot of crusades, but anyway—

In fact, I think you need a better research assistant because you've just messed up as far as Canada is concerned," Turner wrote in an open letter. "We're reaping the bitter harvest sown when that dumbass legislation passed.

"Allowing first-time buyers to remove tax-free money to buy a modest home they could not otherwise afford, then restore it to their long-term retirement savings makes perfect sense in theory. In practice and inexperience, just the opposite [happened]."

I do not agree with Mr Turner. I think it is a bad idea in theory. It is a terrible idea in theory. It is a ghastly idea in theory, and anybody with an ounce of common sense could see that driving your national savings, that allowing a young person to remove their retirement savings and put them into the hot real estate markets of Sydney or Melbourne, is only going to make those markets hotter.

What will happen is that the minute you allow first homebuyers to do it the pressure will come on: 'Why can't I take Mum or Dad's super and invest it in my house?' We know this is already happening around the place. There is already pressure on parents to put their savings into deposits for their children. This is a terrible idea. The government should end its internal debate and we should just put this idea in the bin, where it belongs. It is a terrible idea and it is an indictment on this government that they are even considering it, because it will be disastrous with a capital D if it is implemented. It is a disastrous idea, and I plead with the government not to do it.

Debate adjourned.

Federation Chamber adjourned at 19:18