Ian Goodenough (Moore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Whitlam has moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. If it suits the House, I will state the question in the form 'That the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the original question'.

Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I was saying earlier, the government is allowing 11 million Australians to keep more of what they earn through new tax cuts brought forward into this year. This is going to support consumer spending for 89,600 people in the electorate of Fisher, keeping money flowing in the economy, keeping the region's businesses open and keeping locals employed. In 2021 these low- and middle-income earners in Fisher will receive tax relief of up to $2,745 for singles and up to $5,490 for dual-income families, compared with the 2017-18 settings. The majority of the benefit for 2020-21 will go to those on the Sunshine Coast with incomes below $90,000. Treasury estimates that letting working Australians keep more of their own money through this measure will boost GDP by around $3½ billion this financial year and $9 billion next year. This measure alone will help to create an additional 50,000 jobs by the end of 2021-22.

However, alongside consumer spending we need to see strong businesses on the Sunshine Coast which are incentivised to invest and grow their workforce. There are of course already many businesses on the Sunshine Coast whose fundamentals are sound and who would in normal circumstances be ready and able to drive our economic recovery. However, many of them are currently struggling with losses which, through no fault of their own, could restrict their ability to take advantage of improving circumstances to drive new job creation on the coast. The 2020 federal budget allows companies with a turnover of up to $5 billion to offset tax losses against previous profits, on which they've already paid tax, to generate a refund. Losses incurred last financial year, this year and next year can be carried back against profits made in or after 2018-19. Eligible companies can get a tax refund when they lodge their tax returns for this year. By allowing them to get a cash refund against their losses earlier, this measure will provide hardworking business owners on the Sunshine Coast to reset, keep their businesses running, retain their workers and invest with confidence in the future.

The budget also provides record incentives to make it easier for Sunshine Coast businesses to make investments and offer new or improved products and services. Growing businesses with new products and services to offer, of course, need more employees. Under the Morrison government's budget, from 6 October 2020 until 30 June 2022 as many as 30,000 businesses with a turnover of up to $5 billion in Fisher will be able to deduct the full cost of eligible assets of any value in the year they are first used or installed. Businesses are telling me right across my electorate that this is absolutely fantastic news. It includes improvements to existing assets made during this period. This will significantly reduce the cost of new equipment and new software, and businesses will be able to grow. Critically, it will encourage them to buy that equipment now, before the measure expires, at the time when the Sunshine Coast economy needs it most.

Members opposite have claimed this budget leaves the responsibility for economy-boosting investment like this solely with the private sector, but this could not be further from the truth. The budget includes a record $110 billion over the next 10 years to build new transport infrastructure, as well as a further $3.5 billion to build new water infrastructure. The 2020 federal budget's funding for new projects will support over 30,000 direct and indirect jobs, while in total our infrastructure package will support over 100,000 jobs across 10 years.

In my own electorate of Fisher, this package included funding for $95.2 million, committed for variations to the Bruce Highway upgrades currently underway between Caloundra Road and the Sunshine Motorway. This will ensure these upgrades are completed on time and in full. This project is already supporting 680 jobs on the Sunshine Coast. It's going to see locals able to move more quickly around our region and improve the experience for tourists, which will boost our local economy.

The budget invested an extra $1 billion for the Local Roads and Community Infrastructure Program, including more than $11 million in Fisher. This is in addition to the existing $3.6 million allocated to our council in the last round. This will deliver money to the Sunshine Coast Council to spend on smaller civil construction projects for local infrastructure at a community level. I've already been in touch with the Sunshine Coast mayor to highlight some of the projects which I believe should be local priorities for this funding in our community. I'm hoping to meet with the mayor soon to discuss with him the possibility of investing this money in upgrades to the Mooloolaba Foreshore and pathways at Bokarina Beach, as well as the opportunities provided by new rounds funded in this budget of the Building Better Regions Fund, the Stronger Communities Program, the volunteers grants program and the Safer Communities Fund. Before I move on, let us not forget that all of this is on top of the more than $3 billion the coalition government is already investing in upgrades to the Bruce Highway between the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane, and the $390 million we're contributing to the duplication of the North Coast Line railway.

Despite the government's extensive support, we know that this COVID recession has been particularly hard on young people in my electorate. We need to get young people back to work as soon as possible. One of the budget's most important measures will make it much easier over the coming 12 months to give young Australians a start in the workplace. The government's $4½ billion JobMaker Hiring Credit will help to create 450,000 new jobs, including in the critical Sunshine Coast tourism and construction sectors. Almost all Sunshine Coast employers will be able to claim $200 a week for each additional eligible employee they hire aged 16- to 29-years-old and $100 a week for each additional eligible employee aged 30- to 35-years-old for 12 months. As long as the job is in addition to a business's existing payroll and the individual employed was previously on JobSeeker, then it is very likely that the role will be supported with up to $10,400 from the government. I expect this measure to make a huge difference to the rate of youth unemployment in my electorate, and to give Sunshine Coast locals the start in a fulfilling career that they need very soon.

For those young people on the coast still needing extra training to enter the world of work, the budget is delivering for them too. As part of our COVID response, the government invested $1½ billion in expanding our supporting apprenticeships and trainees wage subsidy, paying 50 per cent of the wages of around 180,000 apprentices nationwide in small and medium-size businesses. Last week's federal budget allocated a further $1.2 billion for an expanded scheme called the Boosting Apprenticeship Commencements wage subsidy. This grows coverage of our 50 per cent wage subsidies to include 100,000 new apprentices taken on between now and the end of September 2021. There is no maximum cap for the size of the company. The only requirement is that the apprentice is not already receiving any other type of government support.

For those who want to go to university instead, the budget provided an extra $550.3 million for an additional 12,000 university places and 50,000 short course places to deal with the demand created by this recession. That is on top of the budget's record base funding of $19.8 billion for universities.

To make sure that the jobs of the future are available in Fisher, the government is creating the $1.5 billion Modern Manufacturing Strategy. This is going to help grow our manufacturing industry in six key areas where Australia is already strong: food and beverages, resources technology, medical products, recycling and clean energy, defence and the space industry. I believe the Sunshine Coast has a terrific opportunity to take advantage of this investment to help grow our industry base in defence, medical products and high-tech manufacturing.

Last week's budget was a sensational budget for all Australians and great news for people on the Sunshine Coast. So many people on the Sunshine Coast have said to me that this was the best budget they have ever seen, and who could argue with that?

Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

[by video link] In my contribution to the debate on Appropriation Bill (No.1) 2020-21 and associated bills I want to speak about the failure of the government's budget to recognise and address the very serious social and economic problem of social housing and homelessness in Australia, a crisis of which we're yet to see the full extent because it's expected to get worse as the COVID-19 income protection measures and other rental support and eviction moratorium measures are scaled back.

As more and more people are pushed to the edge of or into homelessness, there has never been a more urgent time for a federal government response. The 2020 Australian Homelessness Monitor found a significant gap between the number of homeless people seeking permanent housing and the availability of permanent housing. The COVID-19 pandemic has created a situation where homelessness will continue to be a problem in the long term, but this problem will be exacerbated further because of the decline in investment, especially by the Commonwealth, in social housing. The state governments are becoming very much aware of this looming crisis, with my own state of Victoria already indicating that the Victorian government will invest in social housing. The question at hand is: why didn't last week's federal budget respond to this crisis?

Such is the gravity of the problem that the 2020 Australian Homelessness Monitor's lead researcher, Professor Hal Pawson, is calling for a revival of the social housing program and saying that the Commonwealth must play a far more active role in tackling the problem. Professor Pawson clearly states that, although the contribution of the states is encouraging, the scale of the investment needed to seriously expand Australia's social housing stock is such that it can only happen with the Commonwealth government's commitment and leadership. Professor Pawson also made the point that last week's federal budget was indeed a wasted opportunity. With the current national shortfall of social housing being more than 433,000 properties, with over a million people losing their jobs and unable to afford their rent in the private rental market, a large number of Australians will be pushed into homelessness, thereby putting more pressure on the existing stock.

The federal government has squibbed the opportunity to show leadership on this issue largely because it seems to believe, as the Prime Minister said today in question time, that it has already done the heavy lifting and it's now up to the states. Australia's homelessness and housing crisis is a complex, multifaceted, looming national crisis and the Commonwealth has a lot more to do.

I want to commend the Minister for Families AND Social Services for her announcement in the weeks prior to the budget of some money at least to build affordable houses for women fleeing violence. Women and children affected by family violence are certainly one group of people who are increasingly affected by the crisis in affordable housing in this country, and any measure to support them is welcome. However, as I have said, the housing crisis is much broader than this, and a much more concerted effort by the federal government is needed. Data shows that women over the age of 55 are the fastest-growing demographic facing homelessness. Many of them are facing homelessness as a result of the death of their partner or divorce. These are women who gave up opportunities for a career, who did not participate in the workforce, in order to raise families and to look after their household. They don't have superannuation. Alone and with their children—for those that have them—now grown, they often find themselves destitute, struggling to make ends meet and, in many cases, homeless.

Two-thirds of primary social housing tenants are women on low incomes. It's extremely disappointing that the government has not seized the opportunity in this budget to seriously tackle the housing crisis and, in particular, to invest in social housing. I recently had the opportunity to speak via Zoom—as we all do these days—with members of the Northern and Western Homelessness Networks. This group represents 28 specialist homelessness and family violence organisations managing 100 homelessness programs operating in Melbourne's northern suburbs. One of the programs, Everybody's Home, conducted research in my local constituency and found that there are over 900 people experiencing homelessness in Calwell at this moment. The number is probably much higher given that many people are sleeping on the couches and floors of friends. Not all of them contact housing services. They suffer in silence until everything in their life falls apart. Many are women from non-English backgrounds who are fearful and totally powerless to leave violent marriages because they have nowhere to go. The lack of options in the private rental market and the intense shortage of public and social housing means a shortage of some 3,000 social housing properties in my electorate alone. As a result, the housing services in my electorate are forced to place people in motels just to get them out of sleeping in their cars or in parks for a few nights. It seems that these people will have very little chance of ever securing permanent housing because of the shortfall.

The Northern and Western Homelessness Networks research supports the anecdotal evidence my electorate office is approached about constantly. We've seen and continue to speak to people who are desperate for stable, safe and functional accommodation. We get calls on a regular basis from people who have been on emergency public housing waiting lists for years. Compounding the problem of a lack of affordable social housing is also the fact that Calwell has settled the lion's share of the refugee and humanitarian program. Almost all who have come from Iraq and Syria in recent times have settled in my electorate, where there is a growing community of people who seek to belong and to prosper. Affordable housing and a job are the two most important things that enable newly arrived migrants and refugees to begin their lives in Australia. Without either, they face the real risk of being unable to move forward.

Public housing has been the great enabler of migrant settlement in this country. It's a no-brainer, then, that investment in affordable housing makes for a stronger community both socially and economically. A lack of housing goes hand-in-hand with major barriers to employment and with disruption to education for children and young people, compounding the stress of those with major physical and mental health problems. A lack of affordable housing impacts workforce participation and stifles economic growth and our health and wellbeing as a nation. If this doesn't make it a national priority, I don't know what does.

If this budget is really about jobs, jobs and more jobs, as this government has framed it to be, then why not prioritise and put some money into social housing as a national policy response to a social and economic crisis? For every dollar invested in building a house, you create $3 in the economy. If you put aside all the pertinent arguments about the need to tackle housing insecurity and homelessness, what about the importance of construction to the economy? Why wouldn't you adopt the Leader of the Opposition's plan to invest in social housing, both repairing and renovating existing stock and building new stock, to help our builders and tradies back into immediate and productive work? Every housing organisation in the country called on the government to put more money into social housing in this budget. The Master Builders Association, the Property Council and the Housing Industry Association all called for more government money for social housing. They called for it because it would mean keeping their members in work, and this 'jobs, jobs and more jobs' budget has let them down. The budget has also let the people in my electorate down. My electorate, as well as experiencing a shortage of social and affordable housing, has large numbers of residents who have lost their jobs or small businesses, particularly in the construction industry. There are tradies of all varieties, support staff and small manufacturers on the construction supply chain who are desperate for work. We need to stimulate the sector to get them back into meaningful work.

In February this year, 1.2 million people were employed in the construction industry. As a result of COVID-19, the construction industry is forecast to decline by 13 per cent during 2020, compared to a six per cent drop in GDP more generally. Surely it makes sense to directly stimulate this sector by investing in a program such as the Community Housing Industry Association has proposed. The Social Housing Acceleration and Renovation Program aims to develop 30,000 additional social housing units through not-for-profit community organisations, but using private builders. Such a program has the potential to create up to 18,000 jobs as well as much needed social housing. These homes could be built in both metropolitan and regional areas, with the potential to boost local economies, increase social revitalisation and provide housing security for many Australians.

Building affordable houses in regional areas would go a long way in addressing one of the significant impediments to encouraging people to move into regional Australia and take up jobs there. This would help revitalise regional Australia and simultaneously take pressure off the urban cities. This government has been particularly keen to revitalise and grow regional Australia and to address the demand for workers in the farming and tourism sectors. Success in encouraging Australians and new migrants to move out into the regions depends on the availability of jobs, but it also depends on affordable housing. With imagination and foresight in this critical policy area, an astute federal government should be showing leadership and leading the way in a coordinated national response, not looking away in the hope that the states will pick up the slack. Last week's budget failed to do this. Contrast this with Labor's budget in response and the difference couldn't be clearer.

Labor has a plan to address our social housing crisis, and it comes with a jobs plan. We can start with fast-tracking urgent repairs to existing social housing. Labor is calling on the Morrison government to create work for thousands of tradies in almost every suburb and town across Australia, including suburbs in the federal seat of Calwell, by investing half a billion dollars to fast-track urgent repairs to social housing. Twenty-five per cent of Australia's social housing needs repair and maintenance. That's some 100,000 homes. Some of these homes have problems such as mould, leaking roofs and water damage, while others are simply unfit for people to live in. People shouldn't have to wait for the Leader of the Opposition to draw attention to the disrepair and unlivable state of social housing before action is taken, though I'm sure that Nathan Anderson from South Australia was relieved that the Leader of the Opposition visited his mould ridden apartment recently. Action has now been taken, and the family has been given a new home.

Much needed repairs in social housing across the country could start immediately and could provide work for local plumbers, carpenters, electricians, plasterers and painters as well as companies that manufacture building supplies and materials. This would also provide opportunities for apprentices. We're already hearing of tradies losing their jobs—28,000 carpenters, 15,000 concreters and 9,000 electricians in the last year alone. They are fast becoming the middle-class poor, and many live in my electorate.

The people of my electorate, I'm certain, will welcome Labor's plan to prioritise and address social housing and homelessness. Ahead of the next election, Labor will bring forward a comprehensive plan for the repair and construction of social housing. This will involve an immediate $500 million contribution from the Commonwealth and a partnership with the states with the expectation they will contribute up to the same amount in new funding. This is what a Commonwealth government doing heavy lifting looks like. I call on the government to act immediately to address the crisis in social housing and homelessness in Australia.

Kate Thwaites (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

[by video link] I'm pleased to have the opportunity to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2020-2021, because it is so important. This has been the most difficult of years, and here in Melbourne we have done it harder than people in other states, with our community putting in the effort to see off the second wave. I know that people in my community are tired and anxious after that effort. At the same time, they want to know what comes next. They want to know that the federal government has a plan to support them and their recovery. They want to feel good about their children's future. Unfortunately, this budget does not deliver on that need. It leaves too many people out, particularly the people hardest hit by this recession, and it leaves too many people behind. It doesn't take up the opportunity to tackle climate change and put us on course to being a renewable superpower. And it certainly does not fix our broken aged-care system, which this pandemic has revealed to be too unsafe and too uncaring for our oldest community members.

Instead, the Morrison government's 2020-21 budget figures bring to an end three decades of economic growth, with a million people unemployed, with an expected 160,000 more by Christmas, and a trillion dollars worth of debt, debt which had already doubled under this government and which is now four times that which the coalition inherited when it came to office. It doesn't have to be this way. As the Leader of the Opposition outlined in his budget reply, we can and should have a recovery that delivers a stronger, fairer and more secure future for all Australians. Scott Morrison's budget leaves people behind. It does nothing for the million Australians unemployed, for the people in my community who, through no fault of their own, find themselves in vastly different circumstances than they expected to at the start of the year. They still have mortgages to pay, kids to get to school and lives to get on with. But if they have lost their job this budget reduces their support back to $40 a day.

We know that in this pandemic the first people to be laid off and to be in positions of hardship were the people with insecure work, those with low wages and few entitlements. In many cases, these are the people with little to fall back on. Yet these are not the people being targeted for support in Scott Morrison's budget. Instead, the government has put in place a wage subsidy for young workers that actually risks discouraging employers from hiring older workers, in particular women over 35. We know these are the people suffering in this recession. We know it's harder for older workers to find employment during and coming out of a recession. It is inexplicable that, instead of recognising this, the government has instead put together an ill-conceived policy that will be a further disincentive for businesses to employ mature-aged people. As the shadow Treasurer has rightly pointed out, never before has a government spent so much to achieve so little.

Since being elected to parliament last year, I've been fighting for Australia to have a childcare system that is more affordable and more accessible, providing local families with the support they need and children with the best start in life. I've had too many conversations in the playground with mums who tell me they just can't afford to go back to work for more than a couple of days a week because, after that, the cost of child care outstrips what they earn. Childcare fees in Australia are currently some of the highest in the world. During a recession where more women than men have lost jobs, it makes absolutely no sense that we would leave in place these high childcare fees as a barrier that stops women from being able to get back to work.

That's why I'm so proud that the Leader of the Opposition announced in his budget reply that a future Labor government would cut childcare fees and help support women get back to work. We've got a plan for affordable childcare that means 97 per cent of all families in the system will save between $600 and $2,900 a year. That is significant for so many families. No family will be worse off. Labor's policy has been welcomed by business, economists, business groups and the early learning sector, and, most importantly, it's been welcomed by families. That's because this childcare policy makes sense. It makes sense that we view childcare as a universal service. It has benefits for all of us, instead of being an expensive privilege that locks too many women out of the workforce and denies too many children the best start in life.

The lack of support for childcare in this budget—and during this pandemic—really highlights how the Morrison government just has not considered women in its budget. During this pandemic, despite women having to pick up the bulk of the childcare and the bulk of the housework, and despite them losing employment at a greater rate than men, we do not see a focus on women and their needs in this budget. When called on this, what did the Prime Minister's office say? They said no-one credible thought that women had been left out of this budget. I assume they didn't plan to unleash the torrent of women on social media who called them out on this—credible women, all of them—furious that, in the middle of a pandemic and a recession that have turned their lives upside down, this government couldn't find the support they needed and couldn't even comprehend that they needed targeted support in this budget.

At this crucial turning point in our history, amongst all this destruction, it's incomprehensible that the Morrison government's budget does not chart a clean energy future for our country. We all know that Australia should be a renewable energy superpower. I hear this loud and clear from the people I represent. They want a clean energy future. When they talk to me about the future they want to create for their children and their grandchildren after this pandemic, this is the No. 1 issue they bring up. I can tell you that, for me, appearing via video link like this while seven months pregnant in the middle of a pandemic, it is something I think about a lot. But, clearly, it is not something that the Morrison government is thinking about—because we risk missing our window for change. As the rest of the world transitions to a clean energy future, we risk Australian jobs.

That's why I'm proud that in his budget reply the Leader of the Opposition committed a future Labor government to modernising Australia's energy grid, allowing us to unlock our renewable energy potential. Australia's current energy grid is not fit for purpose. As the Leader of the Opposition said, it was designed for a time when solar panels ran pocket calculators, not the one in four households who have rooftop solar. The current network takes no account of the rise of renewables as the cheapest new energy source and it doesn't help link these new sources up to the national grid. So a Labor government will set up a new Rewiring the Nation Corporation to rebuild and modernise the grid, to drive down power prices and to give our economy a boost of up to $40 billion and create thousands of new jobs. The energy grid will be built by Australian workers using Australian suppliers, through mandating local supply and local labour. What a contrast with the Morrison government's budget. What a contrast with the Morrison government's refusal to deliver the modern energy network we need to unlock our renewable energy potential, and the investment we need to cut electricity prices and grow the jobs in our renewable energy sector and other areas. This government has had 22 energy policies in the last eight years, and all it has to show for it are high electricity prices and higher emissions. We must do so much better than this. My community is counting on us to do so much better than this when it comes to renewable energy and a clean energy future.

As we just heard from the member for Calwell, one of the big areas missed in this budget was social housing. We know that one of the things the government could do right now to create jobs and lift productivity is invest in social housing. There are 100,000 social housing dwellings around the country that are in urgent need of repair. Some of those are in my electorate of Jagajaga. They are crying out for federal government investment. We have too many people still waiting for a roof over their head. We have women in vulnerable situations trying to get away from family violence, long-term unemployed people who struggle without a roof over their head, families who are worried about where they'll bring up their kids.

Having a decent house is the foundation for a decent life. It allows for so much more to come together. It is a no-brainer that we should be investing in social housing at this time and, yet again, this is a missed opportunity from the Morrison government in this budget. There is not a mention of social housing, not the investment that could drive transformation in people's lives in my community and in other communities around the country. Again, what a contrast with Labor's plans. If we were in government right now, we'd be creating jobs for thousands of tradies in almost every suburb and town across Australia to fast-track urgent repairs to social housing. This could involve an immediate $500 million contribution from the Commonwealth and a partnership with the states—how about that, a partnership with the states instead of taking pot shots at them—with the expectation that they would contribute up to the same amount in new funding.

We know that housing construction is expected to plummet this financial year, from 170,000 to as few as 125,000 new home builds. What an opportunity to invest in the future our country. Investing in social housing would be a win-win. It would provide work for local tradies and it would fix the homes that need to be fixed. It would mean that so many more Australian families, including people in my community, have the possibility of waking up in a decent home, the possibility of feeding their kids without a leaking roof over the top of them, the possibility of knowing that they had a more secure future for the coming years of their life. What a missed opportunity.

Another area where we fail to see the government deliver in this budget is manufacturing. Through this pandemic, I've heard from people in my community about how disappointed they are about how little Australia manufactures now. We know that there's potential for us to do so much more here. We know that we could have an industry supported by federal government in this country. I have manufacturers in my community who have told me how difficult it's been for them since this government allowed the car industry to leave, that the work they used to have that flowed from that has gone. They're not getting the contracts they should in defence manufacturing because the government stitches them up for large providers. There was an opportunity here, an opportunity in all our communities, in communities like mine, for us to rebuild local manufacturing, creating jobs, creating know-how and creating innovation. But we need to see the investment and we need to see the follow-through from this government, and, unfortunately, it just was not contained in this budget.

So, for all the debt and deficit, for all the big talk in the announcements, what we're left with is a poorly targeted budget that doesn't support those people who need it most. It's left out women. It didn't have anything for child care—the one thing that could really support women getting back into work. It's left out social housing—a huge need across our country. And it's left out the chance to transition us to a renewable energy future, to make sure that we are actually securing a better country for all of us—for our children, for our grandchildren—to take this opportunity in this time of disruption to build a stronger, fairer and cleaner Australia. It's a missed opportunity. It's clear that Labor has a different plan. We've shown that we can step up, that we are ready to take the opportunity of this time and to deliver in these important areas. I think the contrast is clear. I think the Australian people will see that contrast is clear and will endorse Labor's policies for the future.

Debate adjourned.