Susan Lamb (Longman, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This really is a divisive government. It may well be the most divisive government Australia has ever seen, with a very clear agenda to further inequality. This government wants to divide Australia when it comes to racial inequality, through offensive language and harmful immigration policies. They want to divide Australia when it comes to marriage equality, forcing a non-compulsory, non-binding postal plebiscite—that they have designed to fail—on same-sex marriage, and they want to divide Australia when it comes to economic equality. They have policies that benefit the rich and the powerful whilst harming the most vulnerable in society, the very people we, as politicians, are elected to protect. People like many of the constituents in my electorate of Longman. According to the recently released 2016 data, the average weekly personal income is $580 a week. That's the average. Now, whilst that means that there are people earning more than that, it also means there are a lot of people who have to struggle to get by with much, much less. And when I say that people are struggling to get by, I really mean it. The median rent has grown to $320 a week at the same time we have power prices skyrocketing. The cost of living seems to be growing higher every day. People really are struggling to get by.

This government could be doing something to really help people, like the people of Longman, but they are not. Instead, they are cutting the take-home pay of over 10,000 people in the electorate. They are cutting energy supplements. They are demonising anybody who goes to seek support from Centrelink. Prime Minister Turnbull makes no attempt at all to hide his campaign against people who need our help the most. He makes no attempt to hide his campaign for the rich. He is actually fighting for the rich.

Labor will fight for those who need it the most. While this government's policies are continuing to ensure the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, while they are continuing to grow inequality in Australia, as I said, we will fight them. We will fight for families. We will fight for the families in Caboolture, we will fight for the families in Burpengary, we will fight for the families and seniors that live over on Bribie Island. We will fight for workers in Dakabin, we will fight for workers in Woodford, and we will make sure that we fight for workers in Narangba as well. And we will make sure that when this government gives tax cuts to millionaires—they are over $16,000—we will fight them on that as well. And when the government throws billions and billions of dollars in tax cuts to big businesses, guess what? We will fight them as well.

Taxpayers' money should not end up as bonuses for wealthy CEOs. It should be used to ensure that we are making Australia better. Now, this is no easy fight, of course. We have acknowledged this repeatedly. This is not an easy fight. Complex tax reforms have been considered by many, many governments before, but they always get shelved. They are particularly difficult and they get shelved. But we won't be shelving them—they won't be shelved by our leader, Bill Shorten. They won't be shelved by the Labor Party. We've scrutinised the complicated trust law, which is being exploited by the rich to avoid paying their fair share. We have made some sensible proposals to close these loopholes.

While Prime Minister Turnbull is fighting for the rich, the Labor Party is, like I said, fighting for the poor. We are fighting for equality. The member for Bowman said recently, 'Equality does not mean I have a jet ski and my neighbour has a jet ski.' That's what he sees as equality—that we both have jet skis. What we will fight for is making sure that the students in my electorate have the same educational opportunities as the students in his electorate. That's what equality is. We make sure people have access to the health care that they need, not what they can afford. That's what equality is. And we will make sure women are paid for the work they do. We will make sure that the women working in female-dominated industries, like early childhood education and care, are paid the same as a man in a similarly qualified position in a male-dominated industry. That is what we will do. We in the Labor Party will never stop standing up and fighting against inequality in whatever form it takes.