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

Mr Speaker, it is lovely that you are in the chair for a change and I'm not addressing the Deputy Speaker. It's nice to have you in here while I'm giving a speech!

I rise in support of my colleagues who are opposing the Treasury Laws Amendment (Enterprise Tax Plan No. 2) Bill 2017. We have just spent an hour in this House debating something that is absolutely trivial and ridiculous—playing politics rather than spending an hour addressing one of the key issues affecting the hardworking men and women of Australia.

This bill we are talking about now will deliver companies with a turnover of more than $50 million a progressive tax cut to 25 per cent. This follows the Turnbull government's tax cuts to 25 per cent for businesses with a turnover of up to $50 million and a tax cut bonanza for individuals, if they are millionaires, in the order of a $16,000 bonus. That's a $16,000 bonus for some of our wealthiest Australians. That's nice for them. I take nothing away from them; that's fine. But there are real stories and real people who actually need that and who could do with having access to tax cuts. We know that the OECD has already said that, when you give tax cuts to low- and middle-income earners, the rest of the nation benefits.

The forward estimates provided for this bill show that the Turnbull government will suck $600 million out of the bottom line over the forward estimates and $36.5 billion over the medium term from hardworking Australians. Let that just sink in: $36.5 billion over the medium term. For a government, a party and an outfit that ran around during the election and cried, 'Debt and deficit!' to anybody who would listen, to increase that kind of debt to our nation's bottom line is crazy. We've heard the figure: $36.5 billion. I actually still can't believe the numbers that have passed my lips, given the opportunities in our community where that money would be better spent and invested—and not just in my community but in the nation as a whole. This is $600 million that won't help all Australians. A trickle-down world just doesn't work.

Whatever happened to fairness? On budget night, we heard it was all going to be fair, but I don't know how stripping $600 million out of the budget for the forward estimates is actually going to be fair to anybody other than the people who are beneficiaries of it. And there are not too many beneficiaries of those cuts in my electorate, for example.

Whatever happened to ensuring we leave in this place in a better state than we found it in? As the member for Rankin pointed out in his speech, which was an hour ago—before the comedy hour that we just had—the Turnbull government's record stinks after four years. To suggest anything else is absolutely fanciful. They keep coming in here, and their favourite topic of the day is Labor, the unions and Bill Shorten, the opposition leader. They never talk about what they've done. They never talk about what they've invested in. They never talk about the opportunities that they're providing, or particularly the opportunities that they're not providing, to people in Western Sydney. Just take a look at the budget and you might see why.

The Turnbull government will deliver new record net debt for the next three years. That's a deficit for the 2017-18 years which is 10 times bigger than predicted in the Liberals' first budget—10 times!—and gross debt equivalent to $20,000 for every man, woman and child in this country. That is absolutely at the end of extremes. It's another gift from the Abbott-Turnbull outfit that the community is going to have to swallow.

Given what we know and what we already see, why would the people I represent in Lindsay think the Turnbull government could possibly understand the issues they face in Western Sydney? Those opposite have failed them abysmally, time and time again. When you consider the legislation before the House, you get an insight into how useless they actually are.

Yesterday we witnessed the embarrassing scene of a government gagging a debate over cuts to university funding and burdening students with more debt. These are cuts to education and universities—the future-proofing assets we should be investing in. The government is scalping universities with $4 billion worth of cuts, and ripping off another section of Australia and exposing more underfunding.

The Turnbull government thought it could slash funding the easiest in Western Sydney, with the largest university funding cut in New South Wales and the second-largest in Australia—just another kick in the guts for Western Sydney. The first and the second come from my electorate. The Turnbull government believes you have no right to a decent education and certainly not to a degree. The member for Banks over there told me about all the great warehousing opportunities that Western Sydney was allowed to have. Well, thanks very much. I've got enough warehouses now. What I'd really like is a few degree-qualified kids who can go into the jobs of the future. The government does want you to have a job, because it needs to raid your pockets. It's happy for us to work in warehouses; it's just not happy for us to get qualified. All this, just so that it can keep supporting the big end of town.

Western Sydney University is an unfortunate example of how this bill before us attacks the very fabric of what is right and what is decent. Western Sydney uni has been a leader in addressing educational inequality facing our community. It's a university where 60 per cent of the students are the first in their families to attend university—an amazing figure, and one that only goes to highlight what educational opportunity is actually about. Those in the government want to give these tax cuts to the big end of town on the backs of universities in Western Sydney. Western Sydney uni is home to 20 per cent of students who are considered of low economic status and 37 per cent of students who speak a language other than English at home. These are more than just statistics. These are realities that are changing Western Sydney. We are not one-dimensional stereotypes that wear high-vis vests and work in warehouses, thank you very much. Western Sydney is an area that is transitioning from a traditional jobs base to a more diverse and broad base. It is an area that wants to create and keep those jobs local. We can't rely on those people opposite to support them.

If this government is not cutting university funding and burdening students with debt, it is going to the other extreme and ruining apprenticeships and vocational training. We've had a 37 per cent drop in the number of apprentices in training in Lindsay. What does this government want Western Sydney to think? Do you want new jobs for the future? It appears not. There is nothing agile and innovative about making cuts to education to low socio-economic communities. Do you want more tradies? It also appears not. It's just a confused rabble of noise coming from the other side, and that last hour that we spent in here highlights that more than anything. Let me give you guys opposite some professional advice—

Steve Irons (Swan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Remember you are addressing the chair when you use the term 'you'.

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

Sure. Mr Deputy Speaker, let me give you some professional advice from the OECD, and you can pass it on to the Turnbull government if you like. The March OECD economic surveys: Australia notes the increasing concerns about inequality. It said:

Developing innovation-related skills will be important for the underprivileged and those displaced by economic restructuring and can help reduce gender wage gaps.

How about we talk about that? Let me remind those opposite: Western Sydney University has 20 per cent of its student body coming from low socio-economic backgrounds. Their female student body comprises 57 per cent of the student population. But wait—the OECD said more. The recommendations went on to say that growth could be bolstered through strong collaboration between business and research. Moreover, it recommended that Australia:

Put a greater weight … on collaboration in university funding and develop a more coordinated approach to industry placements for research students to strengthen the linkages between research and business sectors.

How does the Turnbull government deal with that recommendation? The Turnbull government will attempt to put an end to UWS's ability to partner with industry and government in proven job-creation programs. Really, in the face of such strong recommendations from such an esteemed organisation like the OECD, why is it that Western Sydney University will be jeopardised in the delivery of key collaborations and partnerships for start-ups, small to medium enterprises and future jobs and growth? It makes no sense to make these cuts at the expense of funding the university.

But that's not the end of it. The Turnbull government continues to make the wrong choices across all parts of Australia, robbing from the hardworking workers of Australia and giving to the rich and to the big end of town. Those in the government continue to tell themselves and us that they are the greatest economic managers this country has ever seen. But, taken as a whole, far from helping our communities this government has wreaked havoc on and terrified them as it continues, hell-bent, on its right-wing, trickle-down economic strategy. But we all know it doesn't work. By the time it trickles down to my community and electorate, all it will be is thin air.

Let's just have a look at Lindsay. I'm sad to say that the member for Banks has scuttled out of here, because he tried to tell me that there were so many businesses in my electorate that were going to benefit from these cuts to big multinational tax companies. Now, according to the ABS, Lindsay has 10,313 businesses operating right now. The vast majority of those businesses have a turnover of less than $2 million. A quarter turn over less than $50,000. So, when you look at businesses with $10 million or more of turnover, you'll find just 119 businesses out of 10,313 across Lindsay that may actually get something out of this. This is just over one per cent of businesses. They're not the businesses that are actually turning $50 million; they're just somewhere between $10 million and $50 million, and that is only a very, very small portion.

But the cuts that are coming as a result of this splash to big business actually affect more people in my electorate. The biggest factor in the trickle-down strategy is that they have to rob the workers—the penalty rates of all those young people; women, predominantly; students; pensioners and welfare recipients who want to get back on their feet—just to pay for it and to give handouts to big businesses. Every day here in parliament we are faced with legislation that just creates more and more disparity in our society. The people of Western Sydney want a government they can trust—a government that will invest in them and their futures. They do not want to be milked at every opportunity so that those opposite can pay for the bottomless pit that is corporate profit and corporate greed.

It is fanciful to think these changes are going to trickle down, when all we see is the reinforcement of inequality and the things that drive it. Economic and social disadvantage will be entrenched by this government, robbing people of opportunity. That is the legacy of this government, and I'm sad to say that it affects the people in my area—the community that I love and represent, and one of the hardest hit by these tax cuts, with disadvantages in schools and the university. It gives a tax break to the wealthy on the backs of every single student cohort across my electorate. And we haven't even got to the Nepean Hospital yet! We have a health system in distress and an underfunded Nepean Hospital that could do with some of the money that they are cutting just to give these corporate tax handouts to big businesses.

They have made affordable housing an impossible dream for more and more people because they refuse to take any action on it, and they have killed off any chance of saving when the cost of living just keeps rising but wages don't. But I suppose we can all just wait for the big end of town to open up their wallets. I'm sure those big banks and mining companies who are going to be the beneficiaries of these tax cuts are on the edge of their seats, they are waiting so much just to distribute their profits to the community! Well, let me tell you, Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I cannot see a time, or a world or an age in which we will live where the people who are being hurt by these tax cuts are actually going to be benefitted by any of them.

Try as I might to see what could possibly be a win for the people in Lindsay on this bill, I can only conclude that they get nothing out of this. Nothing—not one thing. And on the point of equality and disadvantage in Western Sydney, we know it all too well—all too well. I see the member for Parramatta here. She will know this, and when she speaks I'm sure that she will get up and talk about how unequally the people in Western Sydney get treated.

I'm going to point out to those opposite again, and again and again, the rip-offs and the rorts that are happening to the people of Western Sydney. This government has dudded us on education in Lindsay, with $23 million snatched from primary and secondary schools—schools that are at capacity and over capacity. We have university students slugged with higher fees, paying back their HELP debts at a much lower income threshold in the name of reducing debt. That is forgetting that these young men and women will now have the burden of paying off $50,000 debts while trying to enter the workforce and coming into that workforce at the ground level, whilst also seeking an independent lifestyle.

We see more and more focus on the casualisation of the workforce and more and more attacks on penalty rates. They're looking like they're going to come after a couple more awards yet, before they're actually finished having a go at people who earn penalty rates. We've got a housing crisis, and we've got an energy crisis. What we've just seen from the government is that they would rather spend an hour in here playing politics with energy than actually addressing it. It would have been nice to have that last hour actually debating some of the things that we could fix and we could change, but instead we saw an absolutely hopeless government playing politics.

Pensioners in Western Sydney have had their energy supplements scrapped. We've got energy prices out of control, and now they're scrapping the pensioners' energy supplement to pay for these big corporate tax cuts. From cradle to grave, under Malcolm Turnbull, you can expect to be having your pockets raided. The Turnbull government seem to only understand the value of a corporate dividend, which is no surprise given that he came out of Goldman Sachs, not from a hardworking western suburbs community.

How about those opposite start to try and understand the value of the society that they are actually meant to represent? We need investment in people and investment in services. How will this Prime Minister ever be able to have his 30-minute utopian villages that he crowed about last week in Erskine Park by cutting the services that those people out there rely on? The government claim they want to help people with the cost-of-living pressures. We just don't see that reflected in here. Young people are entitled, absolutely, to say: 'Yeah, right. Absolutely. Whatever.'

The government are increasing the cost of living and making everything harder to attain, not easier. With this bill, we see them giving more and more money to corporates, giving them a tax handout from this magic cash cow, increasing the country's debt to a whole new level that we've not seen before in this country on the backs of every single student group; the Nepean Hospital, in my electorate; the community legal centres that they helped defund; and children's education. They won't put any more money into stopping the national scourge that is domestic violence. They can't fund the universities. They certainly cannot find the money to support the people who need to be supported.

Debate interrupted.