Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from the honourable member for Jagajaga proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The failures of the government to tackle poverty and inequality in Australia.

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Families and Payments) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have to say that it is very disappointing, in this Anti-Poverty Week, that the Prime Minister is leaving the parliament. It is a week for all Australians, including all of those opposite, to actually focus on the needs of the far too many people in Australia who are living in poverty. In fact, according to the Australian Council of Social Service, there are around three million Australians, including 730,000 children, living in poverty.

Unemployment and underemployment, of course, are the greatest drivers. They remain persistently high, and all of us know that without a decent job it is very hard to make ends meet. There's only one job available for every 10 people who are out of paid work or who want to work more hours. That is what is happening under this government. We saw earlier this month—and the member for Gellibrand, I know, will talk about this later—the closure of the Toyota factory in Altona. Six thousand workers lost their jobs. Of course, as the member for Wakefield knows only too well, this week we will see the closure of Holden in Elizabeth, in South Australia, leaving thousands more people out of work in a part of Adelaide that already has very high unemployment. We're going to see the end of car manufacturing in Australia, after 70 years, on this government's watch, and we will see so many families driven into poverty as a result of this government's inaction.

On this side of the parliament our goal is to make sure that everybody who is able to work can find work and is able to get a decent job. We actually believe in making sure that our economic policy delivers full employment, that people get a stable job with decent pay and conditions. We know it's that decent job with decent pay and conditions that leads to a good life. By contrast, what we see from those opposite is not only this huge loss of skilled manufacturing jobs but the abolition of weekend penalty rates for many thousands of low-income workers across this country. We have company profits skyrocketing, which those opposite are the cheerleaders for, while wages for workers are stagnant. That's the reality for thousands of people in this country.

Young people in Australia are being driven into insecure work, into casual work, and are finding it very difficult to earn enough money each week to pay their bills. They're finding it even more difficult to get into the housing market. For the people who are dependent on income support, being able to afford housing is at crisis level. In most of our capital cities, rental vacancy rates are below two per cent. All of us know—particularly those of us who care so much about those who are struggling the hardest—that the social housing system is no longer providing an adequate safety net for the people who really need it. One of the biggest issues driving poverty in this country is, of course, that Newstart is too low. We on this side of the House acknowledge and understand that. It is leaving people in poverty. As the Business Council of Australia has said, it is acting as a barrier to employment. That's why at the last election Labor said that we would do a detailed, in-depth review about the adequacy of Newstart.

Amidst all these signs of increasing inequality and worsening poverty, what's been the response from those opposite? What is this out-of-touch Prime Minister actually doing to address these serious issues? One of the worst things that he's doing is continuing to push to get the age pension age up to 70.

Mr Hawke interjecting—

I want to go through a few very important facts about how this is a demonstration of increasing inequality, which obviously the Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection at the table has no understanding about. Between the years 2001 and 2014, the life expectancy of the richest five per cent of Americans increased by roughly three years—so the rich people got to live longer. For the poorest five per cent there was no increase whatsoever. If ever you wanted a demonstration of inequality, there it is.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That's America; it's not Australia.

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Families and Payments) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In Australia—in Australia!—we know that this change to the age pension age unfairly hurts in particular those people in rural and remote Australia. I know the member for Mallee, who I'm glad to see is in the chamber, understands this issue. He's the only member of the National Party that's actually spoken out on this matter, although, like all members of the National Party, he did actually vote to increase the age pension age to 70. The median age at death for people living in remote Australia is around 73, compared to 82.3 years for Australians living in the major cities—so around 10 years difference. Once again I reinforce that if ever you wanted an indication of inequality it would be inequality in living a decent, long life.

What else is this Prime Minister so out of touch about? Of course, we know he wants to axe the energy supplement that goes to 1.7 million Australians, including carers.

Government members interjecting—

You've all voted for it: $365 a year out of the pockets of pensioners and carers. They want to cut payments to families. And—can you believe it?—they actually want to cut the bereavement allowance. When a pensioner's husband dies and they're finding it very hard to pay all the bills, that pensioner will be $1,300 worse off. Are you proud of that, government members? That is exactly what this government are doing. At the same time, they want to give massive tax cuts to big business—$65 billion to big business. Of course, they've already delivered tax cuts to millionaires and high-income earners. Once again, this is the story of this government: cut the payments to families, cut the payments to pensioners and carers, and at the same time give $65 billion to big business.

We know the government have tried over the last four years to rip up the social contract that exists between Australians. Remember how they wanted to say to young people who are unemployed, 'You'll be on nothing, absolutely nothing, for six months if you don't have a job'? We managed to defeat those horrific cuts, but all of us on this side know we cannot be complacent. We are not 'a nation of lifters and leaners'; Australians actually believe in a fair go. What Australians know is that we need to pursue full employment. We need social investment in our people and in health and education, inclusive growth—

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What does that even mean?

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Families and Payments) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

'What does that mean?' he says! What does it actually mean to invest in our people? What does it mean to actually invest in our little children? What does it mean to invest in our schools? What does it mean to make sure young people can go to university? Of course, not surprisingly, these people opposite have no idea. All they want to do is demonise the unemployed, demonise those people who can't find a job and demonise those people who find it so difficult to get out of poverty. No Australian wants to live in poverty. We're about making sure we do everything to help them. All those opposite want to do is demonise them.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well, the member for Jagajaga certainly knows how to bring a room down, doesn't she? With the member for Jagajaga, the glass is always half empty. It's as if Australia doesn't already redistribute more wealth than almost any other country on earth. It's as if Australia doesn't already have an enviable record amongst nations of sharing more wealth amongst more people than almost any other society constructed in human history. And the facts bear this out in government policy. To the member for Jagajaga, everything in Australia is terrible. The Labor Party need to wake up to some real realities about the economics of opportunity versus the economics of socialism, which the member opposite has just put forward. Eighty per cent of income tax in this country already goes to paying the welfare bill. For those members opposite who don't care enough about budgeting, 80 per cent of all income taxes pay the welfare bill at the moment.

Linda Burney (Barton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Your point?

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the member for Barton does not know, the No. 1 item that the federal government spends money on before we spend a dollar on anything else is the welfare budget. It is the No. 1 largest item of the Commonwealth budget. So to say that this is not a fair society, to say that we don't take account of those who can't do things for themselves and that we don't look after people is completely false. We already have one of the highest rates of personal income tax in the world. The only formula that the member for Jagajaga and the Labor Party put forward to this parliament—the constant refrain—is to increase taxes, increase spending and send out more welfare, and somehow that will lift people out of poverty.

The Turnbull coalition government knows that the economics of opportunity relies on getting people off welfare. It relies on the enterprise of Australians, of our citizens, of our small and medium businesses, of our families and of those corporations that the member for Jagajaga wants to demonise—those Australian corporations started here, founded here, by Australians, for Australians. That's the only pathway for the government and for our society to get people out of welfare and into jobs. It's the only avenue that will work. That's why this government, the Turnbull coalition government, has cut tax—not for the big corporations, as the member for Jagajaga would have you believe, not for the big end of town. We have cut the company tax rate for every single small and medium business, every family run and owned and operated business in Australia. The member for Jagajaga, as she's famous for, would want to claw back that tax from Australian small and medium businesses.

So how would the Labor Party ever get someone off welfare and into a job? We don't need more government jobs, Member for Jagajaga. We already have debt and deficit thanks to the Labor government. We have a debt and deficit that they never help us recover from. How are we going to get people into work? Well, it's by cutting company tax for Australian businesses, for those people that can employ more people. And it is working. You don't have to take my word for it. You don't have to take the word of the government for it. You just have to look at the facts in the real world right now: 245,000 jobs created in a single year—the highest job creation on record since the global financial crisis. The vast majority of those—80 per cent—are full-time jobs. The member for Jagajaga says inequality is rising. Well, inequality is not rising when we create 245,000 jobs in a year, 80 per cent of which are full time, getting those people off welfare.

The member for Jagajaga put forward a list of welfare items that we have cut, saying that she would somehow restore them. Well, that's not what her Labor Party budget policy figures say, by the way. That's not what she said at the election. It's not what the Labor Party said at the election either, as we heard in question time today. So they come in here and say, 'We're going to restore all those cuts,' but in the budget line items of the Labor Party's financial costings they've agreed with us on so many of those costings.

We in this government know from the recent budget update that we are making progress on reducing welfare in this country, and that is good for people—a $5 billion reduction in the welfare bill in Australia. It is still the No. 1 item that we spend money on, but our goal is to get people off welfare and into work. We're committed to doing it.

Every time we propose a genuine policy here to get young people into jobs we're opposed by the Labor Party. Remember when we said that we would say to young people aged 18 to 30—people who don't have a disability, or don't have other issues in their life, excluding virtually half of those young people in the Australian population, but everyone else—we will pay you to study. We will pay you to earn, we'll pay you to get out there and get a job, but we won't pay you welfare. Of course, the Labor Party opposed us on that measure and said we were being cruel and unusual to young people, cruel and unusual to say that you should be in study, you should be in work, or you should be looking for work. These are sensible principles that most Australians would absolutely back us on.

The alternative from the Labor Party to these sorts of policies for getting people out into either training or work is more and more welfare. I ask the member for Jagajaga, I ask the Labor Party here in this MPI debate: how can it be fair? How can it be equitable to condemn people to intergenerational welfare? That is the thing that didn't touch the member for Jagajaga's lips in her presentation. What is happening now when the Labor Party gives up on people, when they don't recognise that the priority of a government must be getting people off welfare and into work? It is condemning generation after generation to real poverty, and real poverty starts with intergenerational welfare. It is something the Labor Party will never acknowledge and never tackle. It is something on which they will never come to this parliament and say, 'We want to get people off welfare and into work.'

The best the member for Jagajaga can come up with is, 'Labor policies will look to get people towards full employment in this country.' How, Member for Jagajaga? If you've never thought about the how, you don't have a plan. This is one thing we know about the Labor Party, and the Leader of the Opposition admits this in his interviews when he is asked, 'What are your policies for job creation?' As the Prime Minister has said, the Leader of the Opposition answers, 'Well, we've got a plan for public transport in Melbourne,'—or something along those lines.

The Labor Party has no plan for jobs or for growth. Instead, they should acknowledge that this government is cutting company tax for Australian companies, Australian businesses—not big businesses and not large multinational corporations. We're taxing them more than you ever did. We are cutting the tax rate for small Australian family businesses, and it is working. More jobs are being created. More full-time jobs are being created. More people are getting work. More people are getting off welfare. Getting off welfare is the best chance for someone to escape poverty in this country. And it's this government that is doing it. But then we hear from the member for Jagajaga that the glass isn't half empty; it's completely empty—it's not as if we have great growth in this economy and the biggest and strongest record of job creation since the global financial crisis. Her only refrain, her only policy that she is prepared to put forward, is putting more welfare on the table. I don't believe that that will get people out of the poverty that she is talking about.

The real people who face the challenges of poverty need to be given every support to get off welfare. They need to be given training, skills and real opportunity. The economics of opportunity is what the Treasurer talks about all the time; it is what this government brings forward. We recognise the need to reduce welfare, to give people the skills and training they need, to give them the opportunity to go and get that job, and to give employers the incentives to employ people. Our Try, Test and Learn policy was opposed by the Labor Party. Why would you oppose any policy that says, 'Let's get young people into jobs, let's get them off welfare, let's assist employers to take them off welfare and put them on a pathway through into jobs'? Let's take those policies and support them in a bipartisan fashion, because there shouldn't be opposition to governments when they say, 'Let's do what we can to get young people off welfare, because we know if we don't get young people off welfare early they have a high chance of staying longer and longer on welfare and higher poverty outcomes in their lives.' It's a vital concern of this government. It's the policy pursuit of this government.

The economics of opportunity are what we are about. We reject this MPI. We reject the Labor Party's approach, because it is the ultimate poverty trap to condemn generation after generation to stay on welfare, with no hope of a job and with no hope of training. And it's the Turnbull coalition government that is growing the economy, putting the incentives in place for Australian businesses—that golden seam of commerce in this country of small and medium family owned businesses—to create the jobs and give young people the opportunity. We're doing the real work for it. It's paying the dividends. It is the largest job-creation year on record since the GFC. We're seeing the dividends. We thank those enterprises for doing it. We know the economics of opportunity and the economics of hope are the way forward for this country.

Linda Burney (Barton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This morning, in this Anti-Poverty Week, the member for Jagajaga and I, and a number of other Labor members of parliament, attended a forum put on by Catholic Social Services Australia. It was about the economy, and they spoke very clearly. I'm very glad the minister's in the House to hear that. I thought he would have been there, but he wasn't. If I'd been the minister I would have been there, because it's crucial to that portfolio. The forum spoke primarily of people who are desperately poor. It spoke about this government. It said the government is demonising people in its desperate search for a narrative. It also spoke about people who should be lifted up by government, which is not what this government is doing; this government is using punitive measures, scaring and scandalising people into submission. It spoke about providing people who are poor—and the gap is getting wider—with a frugal and dignified life. It spoke about a robust safety net.

This minister and this government are doing everything they can to undermine these things. Growing inequality is a reality in this country and it would be helpful if the government would come to understand that. Instead, there are $65 billion in tax cuts to big business, while they are privatising Centrelink jobs and putting people on rubbish wages to do it. In Centrelink, Minister, there are 42 million missed calls a year, and who knows what it has been over the last 12 months. And there are false accusations of fraud. But let's be clear: poverty is a reality in this country and this government would do well to have a look at what it actually means for people.

Foodbank in the ACT made a statement this week that the rising cost of living means parents are having to make the choice about eating and putting food on the table. How can this be, in a first-world country like Australia? It is because this government does not care about poor people and it certainly has no idea what inequality means. The Turnbull government's policy response to all of these signs, rising inequality and worsening poverty, is to make people work longer. It is, as the member for Jagajaga said, removing the energy supplement. It is cutting family payments. It is refusing to support people who have lost a partner. Households are praying about ever-increasing power prices. The fact is that there are people in this country who cannot afford to pay power bills, who cannot afford to have a home—and we know that many families are one or two pay cheques between homelessness and having a home. But this government says that everything's fine and, somehow or other, it's not its responsibility.

For any decent government, the first priority should be the poor and inequality. It should absolutely be about lifting people up, not putting people under their heel and pushing them down. We also know that the energy debate that's been going on is a falsity. They are going to provide people with a cheaper energy bill in three years time by 50c. What is that going to mean for people today who don't know where their dinner is coming from? What is that going to mean for people today who have no idea how they're going to put food into their schoolkids' bags tomorrow so those children can go to school?

The last speaker from the government said something about entrenched inequality, intergenerational inequality. Education is the way in which you deal with that, and we know that we will be investing in school funding. We know that proper investments in infrastructure and a fair tax system are the ways to deal with intergenerational poverty. It is not by scaring people, Minister; it is not by telling people they owe money that they don't owe; it is not by privatising and outsourcing government jobs. It is not by putting people so far behind that they have lost hope. How can it be that you are overseeing a system where people cannot even imagine a future? That is a shocking thing and a shocking indictment of this government.

Craig Laundy (Reid, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yet again I find it amazing that those opposite that sit there and talk—whilst they were in power unemployment benefits were growing at 13.5 per cent per annum. Since we have come to power, they are now growing at 3.7 per cent per annum. Why? Because people are getting jobs. That's the best answer to inequality. It's often been said that the best form of welfare is a job. Under this government, since it came to power, some 750,000 jobs have been created; in the last 12 months, 327,000—80 per cent of those being full-time jobs. Why? Because business is doing what it does: it increases profitability and employs more people.

I note—I suspect he may even follow me—the member for Wakefield, who so eloquently described me as a 'big gun'. He may talk about the closure of Holden. I find it interesting that those opposite stand at any forum you can get and want to death write Australian manufacturing, when the facts fly in the face of everything they say. In the last 12 months in this country there has been a net increase of 15,100 jobs in manufacturing. Of those jobs, 6,300 have been in Victoria and 3,700 in South Australia. I have said this often: where is the equality embedded in our way of life in this country as it should be? It is in our progressive taxation system. The top three per cent of taxpayers pay 30 per cent of the revenue—as they should. We are now fast approaching 50 per cent of households in this country that will be net recipients of taxation revenue—as they should be. That's fair. A millionaire will pay $444,000 in tax, an effective rate of 44c in the dollar. Someone on $18,250 will pay nothing. I note too that the member for Jagajaga wanted to talk about penalty rates but very effectively left out EBAs. There is my favourite union, the SDA—what a wonderful bunch they are—whose EBA has now been struck out for 2014 and 2011, for those working for Coles. Why? Because some 54 per cent of the workers—

Mr Champion interjecting—

The member for Wakefield says I don't know anything about it. Yes, I do. I know Penny Vickers very well, who led the claim, who signed a form telling her that those who were signing up would be better off, when 54 per cent—the SDA's recipient that signed the form signed it fraudulently and admitted under oath that he signed a stat dec that he knew was false. In itself that is something that can be prosecuted.

Mr Champion interjecting—

The member for Wakefield says, 'Do you want the end of EBAs?' EBAs are not bad as long as they pass the BOOT test—the BOOT test that you put in. Not us—you! This is the hypocrisy of those opposite. Yes, we want equality; we want increased levels of equality. It comes through progressive taxation.

And then there is the last point, about South Australia. The member for Durack, who was interjecting somewhat in the last speech, mentioned a report in yesterday's paper, or two days ago, in South Australia about 102,000 people taking food parcels because they can't afford to pay their electricity bills. Why? Because the experiment has gone wrong. Everything this government has done has been aimed at delivering jobs. Why? Because jobs are the best form of welfare. The member for Grey, up the back there, came in and fought hard for Arrium. Why? It is because it means jobs. Mr Gupta has come in and worked with my department to secure a deal that will ensure the livelihood of some 10,000 people both directly and indirectly in his electorate alone—let alone those simple deals with government on pre-ordering rail lines moving forward where we can help with procurement. I've said it three times but I'll say it again: the best form of welfare is a job. This government has created 750,000 jobs in the past four years—327,000 in the past 12 months, and 80 per cent of those are full time. That's the part that those opposite don't get. Inequality is best handled with our progressive taxation system—the way it has always been handled since this country was formed.

Tim Watts (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This week is Anti-Poverty Week. It should be a week for all Australians to focus on the three million of us, including 730,000 children, who currently live in poverty. I want to talk today about the most important bulwark we have against poverty, as the previous speaker was harping on about: high-quality, secure work. It's something that's been on the minds of my constituents recently as 2,500 high-quality, secure jobs have been lost at the Toyota Altona plant this month as a result of the actions of the Abbott-Turnbull government. Unfortunately, this is just one example of how secure work is currently being challenged by the policies of the Abbott-Turnbull government. In recent times, we have begun to see the emergence of an insidious new form of poverty, which was previously alien to the Australian way of work—the emergence of the working poor in our society.

My electorate in Melbourne's west is home to the gates of the old Sunshine Harvester factory. It is a physical monument not only to the labour of the thousands of people who passed through their gates before the factory gave its name to the surrounding suburb but also to the landmark 1907 Harvester judgement that marked the beginning of a universal minimum employment standard in Australia and an international beacon for workplace rights for decades to come. The IPA once labelled the Harvester judgement as the second-worst decision in Australian history, so that should tell you a little bit about the merits of this policy intervention. The Harvester judgement was founded on a concept of a 'civilised community' and the notion that workers needed to be treated as a human beings, not simply as commodities in a system. It's the spirit that we need to recapture in this building at a time of record low wages growth and skyrocketing underemployment.

The symptoms of the emergence of the working poor in Australia are everywhere you look. One in five Australian households currently lives on less than the age pension and less than the single minimum wage. There are 2.3 million Australians who earn the lowest legal rate of pay for the work that they perform, including 450,000 more people than two years ago. Those are the jobs that the previous speaker was talking about. The Productivity Commission has found that between 10 and 15 per cent of Australians—2.3 million to 2.8 million Australians—are income poor. That is, they are living in households earning less than half the median income or, to put it in practical terms, living in households that are unable to get a car loan, to get a home loan, to plan ahead financially for their children's needs and to deal with the ordinary financial vicissitudes of life of accidents, illness or a car crash. There are now 1.1 million unemployed Australians—people who are capable of working more and who want to work more but who don't have the opportunity. That's up from 170,000 in the 1970s. There are currently 750,000 Australians working second or third jobs as a result of this. It's unsurprising in this context that inequality is at a 75-year high. Too many of our fellow Australians can no longer see the link between hard work and a fair reward.

There are a number of causes of this phenomenon but the key cause lies in the rules of our workplaces. As the member for Gorton told the National Press Club today, 'We cannot tackle inequality or build a system of inclusive prosperity unless Australia has a workplace relations system that is both productive and fair.' Essential to that task is striking the right balance of power between workers and employers, and the tilt of bargaining power away from workers and to employers has gone too far. In Australia, workers' bargaining power has been undermined by the enormous growth of what the Chief Economist of the Bank of England recently called 'divisible work'. Non-standard employment, casual jobs, fixed-term contracts, self-employment, labour hire, internships and temporary visa holders—these are forms of employment that undermine workers' ability to negotiate collectively and that circumvent many of the conditions of formal full-time work. This is a big reason why, despite productivity having grown by 20 per cent in Australian workplaces over the past decade, wages have grown by only six per cent. Thinking that a $65 billion corporate unfunded tax cut will help fix this is not neo-liberalism; it's neo-Martianism. The ministers of this government might as well be on another planet if they think this is going to work.

What we need to fix this is for government to stand up for workers: to change the rules to put an end to sham contracts; to stop phoenixing of companies that cut wages and conditions; to ensure labour hire firms comply with basic employment conditions; to end the rorting of casual work definitions to avoid providing basic workplace standards; and to crack down on the exploitation of temporary migrant workers, an epidemic and a moral stain on our country at the moment. We need a government that will make Australian workplaces work for Australian workers. Thankfully, my constituents and the Australian people have that option. A Shorten Labor government will deliver this. We will fight poverty with the greatest bulwark we have against poverty: secure work at fair wages.

Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Jagajaga for bringing this subject matter to the House's attention today: poverty and inequality. It brings me to question some of the driving motives of those of us who are brought to this place, and the differences between the government and the Labor Party. I listened to the last speaker's words with interest, and I suspect that while he parrots the word 'jobs' he lacks the policy detail to actually understand what generates jobs in the economy.

In the coalition, we recognise that a job is the best form of equality. Labor governments entrench inequality. They support positive welfare measures which, in the end, damage individuals and communities. In South Australia I'm responsible for all of the remote Indigenous communities. If you want to see what passive and entrenched welfare does to a community, you should come with me for a drive—you, Mr Deputy Speaker Coulton, and perhaps the members of the Labor Party as well. I can tell you that the answer to equality is not eternal welfare; it is to get people a job. The coalition government works to support people to stand on their own two feet. Labor governments prefer their constituents to be dependent on them. The coalition believes that people's lives are better when they strive for independence. Labor are delighted when constituents cannot survive without their largesse. They're delighted when they keep them on the drip, so the Labor nannies can tell them how to live their lives and put stipulations on their lives. That's what keeps people poor. That's what keeps people in poverty.

In the Liberal Party, we believe that those who are unable to manage their own affairs should be assisted to do so. We should do everything to help those people who aren't able to help themselves, which is why we moved to fully fund the NDIS. To put it beyond doubt, we will move to help those people who cannot provide for themselves. But we also believe that those who have the ability to manage their own lives should be allowed to do so, and the less interference the better.

On jobs and inequality, if we look at jobs alone and look at the way the Turnbull government is managing the economy, the economy that the Turnbull government has provided has produced an extra 240,000 jobs in the last year. These are the best figures in eight years—the best figures since the GFC. If we turn to the discussion point of the week—electricity—this is the figure we heard just a few moments ago: 102,000 people in South Australia are on food parcels. What is the main cause of that? It is the price of electricity. I can take you through the foibles of the South Australian government and how we have ended up with the most unreliable and expensive electricity in the country and, possibly, in the civilised world. But when we bring solutions to this place, as we did yesterday, at the behest of an industry body of experts recommended by Finkel, we are opposed by those on the other side, who prefer to see higher electricity prices for people. Today we couldn't get one of them to stick their hand up and say $115 a year would actually be an important saving to people who are in poverty. So while you parrot all this rubbish, all this rubbish about your care for inequality, we on this side of the parliament work to deliver the most equal Australia we can. We reduce taxation so people can afford to pay for themselves. We support the NDIS to the extent that has never been done before. We provide an economy that is generating more jobs.

Then we have aspiration. Once there was a Labor leader, who those opposite now despise, who talked about the ladder of opportunity. He was right on that issue—the ladder of opportunity, where we help those at the bottom to get started. My colleague a few minutes ago took us through Australia's progressive taxation system. It works out that, as you climb higher up that ladder, you provide more back into the system for those who can't provide for themselves. (Time expired)

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

I thank the member for Jagajaga for bringing this important MPI to the House. She probably knows more about the interaction between the social security system and the wages system and about combatting poverty than any other member of this House. The government should listen to what she has to say and think about what she has to say, instead of going on ideological meandering efforts like we heard from the member for Grey. I heard many times that a job is the best form of welfare, but I think the ACOSS report Poverty in Australia 2016says it's the inverse:

Being unemployed is the strongest overall predictor of poverty, with higher rates of poverty amongst this group than any other group.

We hear time and time again that the best form of welfare is a job. In fact, unemployment is the sole cause of poverty. It is the cause of poverty and we should think about it that way, not this other way, because frankly it affects—

Alan Tudge (Aston, Liberal Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's not a tricky concept—we want to get them into work.

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

I hear the minister saying it's not a tricky concept, but this is an important fact: right as we speak the car industry, with the last car slowly moving through the line of GM Elizabeth—

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Families and Payments) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Creating unemployment.

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

They are creating unemployment. The government set out to violently and deliberately shut down the car industry. And guess what? They have done the same thing in shipbuilding in South Australia because they have sent—

Alan Tudge (Aston, Liberal Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is misleading, Mr Deputy Speaker. It is offensive.

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

I don't know what the minister finds offensive. You had a Prime Minister and a Treasurer brag about shutting down the car industry, so I don't know why you're shrugging your shoulders and asking the Deputy Speaker for protection. I remember the Phil Coorey article saying that they were bragging in cabinet about who put the torpedo in the water. That is an actual quote—they were bragging about shutting down the car industry, just like they were tough guys on the shipbuilding industry when they were going to send submarines to Japan and supply ships to Spain. What does that cause? It causes unemployment, with 1,000 jobs lost out of ASC—1,000, with another 200 or 300 to go. It is not just a great cost to those individuals; it is a great cost to the manufacturing base and a great cost to future building. Guess what—those tradesmen will lose their skills and abilities and then we'll have to put that workforce all back together again. Guess what's going to happen to car industry workers come Friday. Many of them will be out in the labour market seeking work. Some of them will get work but some of them won't. So unemployment, this cause of poverty, is what this government has set out to create in the car industry; it's what they have set out to create in shipbuilding. And we've seen what they have set out to do with wages growth. They are against wages growth.

They have only ever had one idea—feed the donkey less and whip him harder. That's the sole reason to be conservative in this country. It is the only idea they've ever had. We've seen it in the penalty rates cuts; we've seen it in their dealings with unions. We know what they're all about—they're about tearing up wages agreements, they're about tearing up enterprise bargaining that generates higher wages and they're about tearing up penalty rates. That is what they set out to do on Work Choices and now they're applying the onion cutter—bit, by bit, by bit, by bit. Guess what happens when you set out to have a low-wage economy. It causes unemployment, it causes underemployment and it creates desperation at that working level because if you're unemployed or you're seeking work or you're underemployed, guess what? Employers have got the whip hand and you don't ask for a pay rise in that sort of economy, you don't get a pay rise in that sort of economy and you don't enter the middle class in that sort of economy.

And look at what else they're doing. They turn a blind eye to sham contracting. They turn a blind eye to shams in the visa system. They create a housing affordability crisis. They create an energy crisis through their division on carbon emissions, through their division on renewable energy. They cut energy supplements. They create a low-wage, high-poverty, high-unemployment system. Then they come into this House and say, 'Oh, well, the best form of welfare is a job.' Well, congratulations! You've just created a system where people can't get jobs, can't get wage rises, can't get a fair go, can't join the middle class. And then you have the temerity to come in here and ask for the Speaker's protection. Well, you're not going to get it, and you're not going to get it at the next election, either. What you're going to get is a kick in the pants.

Melissa Price (Durack, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak against, once again, a ridiculous motion moved by the member for Jagajaga. If there's one thing the last 100 years have shown us here in Australia it is that the greatest creator of poverty and inequality is socialism—that is, the guiding principle of those opposite. So their motion today on poverty and inequality is once again laughably hypocritical. In contrast, what do we on this side stand for? We stand for free trade, economic liberalism and democracy, which have led to unprecedented levels of growth, wealth and unemployment. That is what we on this side stand for, every minute of every day of every year. Employment is a key point here, because—and we've heard it here many times today, but it's worth saying one more time—the best form of welfare is a job.

The hypocrisy of the member for Jagajaga is galling, considering Labor's policies and the decisions made while she was a minister in the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd governments, which would have led to homelessness services being defunded—just one example. Labor's heartless contribution to inequality was to not leave one single cent in the budget for the National Partnership Agreement on Homelessness. They had the chance to fund the expiring national partnership agreement in their last budget, and they chose to leave not one single cent. They left only uncertainty. Labor not only left this program without a penny but also created an affordable housing program with no way of measuring whether any affordable houses were actually delivered—typical, but still very disappointing.

On this side, we're redesigning this program so that for the first time it actually has some measurable outcomes. This government believes in a welfare system that tackles poverty and inequality, principally by helping individuals achieve independence and move off welfare. Our welfare reforms, including the cashless welfare card—and it's good to see the minister here today—which we're trialling in my state, in the Kimberley, and also in the eastern goldfields, as well as our drug testing trials, all contribute to this goal. They will help to reduce poverty and inequality in this country. Already in the last financial year the Turnbull government has created some 240,000 jobs, the largest increase in job creation since the GFC.

The Leader of the Opposition talks a lot about inequality but doesn't have any policies to create jobs, to help people move into jobs or to reduce the cost of living for Australians. The policies of those opposite will lead to job losses, reduced investment and increased energy costs. This obstructionism regarding power policy will delay, and deny Australians, a reliable and affordable energy supply and will deny Australians a reduction of, on average, $115 in their energy bill at the end of the year. We have seen Western Australian Labor go a step further, with an ideological thought bubble of an independent RET. This thought bubble will place Western Australia at a huge comparative disadvantage. What about the 120-odd food parcels in South Australia we've been hearing about today, due only to a reckless power policy of the South Australian Labor government?

I spoke earlier about how Labor failed to fund the National Partnership Agreement on Homelessness. But a few weeks ago they were given the opportunity to vote on an increase to the level of Newstart. The member for Jagajaga even mentioned that today. Despite making numerous vague statements about the adequacy of this payment, they did not vote to increase the rate; no, they did not. We're aware that many in the community feel that things are not getting better. We are acutely aware of that as the government. Wages are stagnant and many people haven't seen a significant pay rise in a long time. We on this side understand that, and we are working hard to improve the lives of all Australians. That's what you do when you're in government. All the Leader of the Opposition can do is make speeches, voice platitudes and talk of raising taxes. He and his colleagues employ the economics of envy and the economics of politics. Our approach is different. We want to create more jobs. We don't just want to talk about it. It's not just words. We actually want to create more jobs. We want to support people to get the skills they need to move into a job. It was this government that made the $100 million investment in the Try, Test and Learn Fund, which found new ways to help disadvantaged individuals. Of course, we have fully committed to the NDIS. We are exempting low-income earners from the Medicare levy, while higher income earners will contribute the most.

Those opposite love to make statements like they have today, despite history and despite our record. We are tackling poverty and inequality and I am very proud of our record. (Time expired)

Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Anti-Poverty Week is a good time to reflect on how this country and this government is tackling the growing number of people living in poverty and the increasing inequality in Australia. The Australian Council of Social Services states that around three million Australians are living in poverty, including about three-quarters of a million children. Australia is fast losing its egalitarian roots, which made this country the home of the fair go. We are for the first time seeing a generation who will be worse off than their parents. We're seeing one-third of Australian pensioners living in abject poverty. We are seeing consistently high unemployment and underemployment rates, increasing casualisation and decreasing job security. We're seeing increases in the cost of living, including skyrocketing power bills. We are seeing Australians have increasing difficulty in accessing the health care they need. And we're seeing this government make it consistently harder for the most disadvantaged in our society to get ahead—to get one step ahead.

The reason I decided to enter politics was that, after working as a paediatrician in my electorate of Macarthur for 35 years, I was increasingly confronted with issues now more commonly described as the social determinants of health. As the world has changed over that time there have been many people left behind, and increasingly governments have had to adopt policies to prevent societal polarisation. In order to deal with this division into haves and have-nots, politicians must understand the issue, and it's clear to me that the Turnbull-Joyce-Abbott government has little understanding of the difficulties housing, health, education and employment cause for people of limited means. It almost seems to me that this government would be happy to have a class based society with a hereditary peerage, perhaps bringing in Prince Philip as Governor-General.

In health I'm often asked to organise specialist appointments for my constituents, as they cannot afford the increasing gap payments or large up-front fees to see specialists. Many people avoid appointments with specialists because of cost. It's estimated that in my electorate around a third of referrals to specialists are not taken up, because of cost.

Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Back to the fifties; what an achievement!

Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes. For example, people with intractable heart failure, who need to see a cardiologist, or people with multiple sclerosis, who need to see a neurologist, do not go to their appointments, because they can't afford it. And that's a fact; that's occurring every day in Australia. Certainly in our medical visits around the countryside, from places as far south as Devonport in Tasmania to Rockhampton in Queensland, we see similar things occurring time and time again. This is a real difference in Australia now compared to the Australia I grew up in and it's something that we need to address. This government has shown absolutely no inclination to do so.

Some newer treatments that are world's best practice and some investigations, such as MRIs for prostate cancer, which are much less invasive, safer and better investigations for men suspected of having prostate cancer, have been waiting to get a Medicare rebate for years and nothing has happened. That leaves men—in particular older men, who often are of very limited means—having to pay an up-front fee of around $600. This is happening every day in Australia.

In health, the future is all about health data. Data collection is a major part of our health system now and will be increasingly so in the future, yet this government has sold off the Australian cancer registry, the first database in Australian health care of national significance and importance. They sold it to private enterprise, meaning that there will be fees involved in accessing that data in the future. It's another discriminatory health practice that this government persists in.

In housing, many people of retirement age still have large mortgages and many young people see themselves as permanent renters, yet investors are given enormous tax advantages by this government. It's terrible, and it needs to change, yet this government has shown no understanding and no willingness to do this.

If I can mention, very quickly, one last thing—our foreign aid budget has been cut, leading to significant changes in some of the most disadvantaged countries in our neighbourhood, yet this government has shown no inclination to improve it. (Time expired)

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

Deputy Speaker, I hardly need to tell you that ours is a great egalitarian nation. This place should be a great parliament, but sometimes it can be a depressing place, and it becomes all the more depressing when I walk into this chamber, sit down and listen to the lazy politics of envy—when I hear those opposite simply pull the drawer open, pull out the class card and put it on the table. It's not the parliament that those who've taken the time to listen to debate in this place want to hear. They want the battle of big ideas. Bring the big ideas forward; don't simply find the lazy class card and lay it on the table. Ours is a great egalitarian nation.

For those people who come in here and use their favourite word—equality—and misappropriate it, let me say: this nation wasn't built on equality of outcome; this national was built on equality of opportunity. We need to do everything we can every day to make sure that every Australian citizen has the same opportunities. My father came here in 1961 as an 18-year-old lad with nothing more than the clothes on his back and an education in a foreign place. He didn't even have the language of English to his name, but this nation gave him opportunities. He took up those opportunities, and he's lived a very fruitful life—and I hope he lives it for much longer. But there were similar people in my father's cohort who came to Australia and who were presented with the same opportunities that he was but who didn't take advantage of them. Those opposite would say that our nation has failed those people and that what we need to do is, in some way, create an equality between the outcomes my father has achieved and the outcomes of those who haven't been so positive, because otherwise this nation has failed. Quite frankly, that's rubbish, and those opposite know it. It's about equality of opportunity, not equality of outcome.

In the time I have left, I do want to address poverty. Quite obviously I'm a South Australian member of parliament, and I think one of the single largest drivers of people into poverty are cost-of-living pressures. As a South Australian, I will go immediately to energy costs because South Australia—I won't say 'enjoys'—is currently experiencing the highest electricity prices of anywhere in the world. It doesn't take a nuclear physicist to work out that that is going to drive people into poverty. It's going to drive people into poverty quicker than anything those opposite raise.

In a week when this place—particularly those on this side—is trying to do something serious about meeting the energy security challenge this nation faces, in a week when those of us on this side are trying to do something to confront the failed experiment that is the South Australian energy market, I would have thought that those opposite wouldn't want to be talking about poverty, particularly less than five hours after the Premier of South Australia was out there, loud and proud, saying: 'I don't want to be part of your solution. I've created the problem, but I'm having none of your solution.'

Those opposite need to come with me into the homes of those on fixed incomes in my electorate, those who have had their electricity switched off because they can't meet the cost of it, and tell them they're pontificating in this place about poverty. What those opposite should do is spend less time worrying about MPIs of this nature, where they are playing cheap politics, and get on the phone to Labor state premiers and first ministers and say, 'Get on board. Get on board a plan that is all about affordability, that drives reliability into the marketplace and that will meet our international obligations.' Do that, not for the Prime Minister's sake, not for the member for Barker's sake and not for their own sake but for the very people they propose this MPI to address: those who are either suffering or being driven below the poverty line. Please, pick up the phone and ring the premiers and tell them to get on board.

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time for this discussion has concluded.