Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2020-2021 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2020-2021, and to make some points about how on earth we in this place can be taken seriously in terms of any bills while the debate about the culture in this place, the culture that is owned by the government of the day, rages around the country. There can be no shirking of that responsibility at all. The way this parliament operates, as a parliament and as a workplace, rests on the shoulders of those opposite. They fought to fill those benches. They wanted to form government. The Prime Minister wanted to be elected Prime Minister of this country. They must take responsibility for the culture in this place, but not just in this place; when you form government you take responsibility for the country, for the culture in our schools, for the culture in our workplaces, for the delivery of health and education across our nation—yes, for Treasury, and, yes, for appropriation, but also for everything else that happens across this country. After eight years this government must be held responsible for the culture, for the misogyny and for the sexual harassment and sexual assault of people working in this building.

I know that my colleagues will not walk away from this. We will stand and remind this government and the rest of the country every day that misogyny has no place in this chamber, in this building, in any town or suburb in this country and in Australia. We will not be the country we were destined to be until we reach gender equality, and what we have seen in the past week is an incredible pull-up—a reminder to every man, woman and child in this country that we are so far from reaching that goal.

If you check the things the government determine they're going to legislate in this place, you will see that culture writ large. It doesn't take much to dig through it. I come into this chamber today and see sitting on the frontbench ministers who were sacked or who resigned as ministers but returned to the ministry. As a schoolteacher and as a parent, let me tell you: if you pull the detention or withdraw the punishment, you have condoned the behaviour. When ministers resign in disgrace or are asked to leave because they have breached ministerial standards and then return to the frontbench after allowing an amount of time to pass, it's a very strong message that ministerial standards don't matter in this place. That's the culture this government has set. That is the absolute culture of this place.

The reports last night of the behaviour of some people in this place are not a surprise to me. Of that behaviour, I would say one thing: we have come across the last month. Every woman and man in this building is dealing with the fact that an alleged rape occurred in this building, that it was not the first time the accused had been reported and that no action was taken. We're all coming to terms with that having happened in our workplace. We're coming to terms with the fact that people who are employed in this building feel that they have a right to rape a colleague. Last night we saw absolute disregard for the dignity of this place and this building in the reports we heard about staff members' behaviour. Let's make no mistake rape is about power. Everyone has been twisting their words about what the video supposedly showed last night in terms of that lewd act. It has been described a millions ways. It was an act of absolute misogyny is what it was. It was a put down of a female MP in this place. It was a male staff member saying, 'I'm the boss around here' that's what it was. Don't kid yourself it was anything else. That's what it was. That is what rape is.

We are at an absolutely critical point in the Australian parliament, in every state parliament around the country, in every classroom around the country. What culture do we want to create? What culture do we want to sustain? How do we go about improving that culture? The Prime Minister talked for 40 minutes today and my takeaway was: 'It's all too hard. It's not my job. Please somebody—it happens everywhere. It is not my responsibility.' Prime Minister, when you raised your hand to be Prime Minister you took on that responsibility.

I want to go back in time. I want to say to the women opposite who sit on those chambers: please, we are your colleagues. We will support you. Critical mass is the secret to this. Getting more women on your benches is the way through this—a critical mass of women. As the shadow minister for women said this morning: 'We women in this place are not here to police men's behaviour but it's amazing how men's behaviour changes when you put women in the place.'

On this side we're very proud of our feminist tradition in the Labor Party. We're very proud of it. I've been haunted today by a speech made by my predecessor Julia Gillard where she warned that if we installed a Liberal government women's voices would be taken out of the centre of government and replaced by men in blue ties. Gillard is a warrior for me. She's someone that I look up to. She's somebody who took this place seriously. She's someone who managed to put through more pieces of legislation than we've seen since. She's someone who managed to lead a minority government, someone who managed to ensure that the members of the government were in their seats when a vote was to be taken every day and never lost a vote. She was a warrior. She is a woman very proud to have taken her place in this chamber and her place as Prime Minister.

I say to those opposite, particularly the women opposite, whoever is your warrior—be it Xena, be it Thatcher, be it Cowan—channel her this week in this place. Stand firm. Let Australia know that you will not be leaving this building. In fact you will be planning to bring more women into this building because we need you to bring more women into this building. We need you to do the work that my predecessors in the Labor Party did. We need you to dig deep to challenge the men in your party, to stand for pre-selection, to get yourselves to this place because we will not change the culture here until that happens. We will not change the culture while we have a government that says, 'You've crossed a line. Ministerial standards have been breached here. Off you go to the back bench', but then brings them back and puts them back on the front bench.

We will not change the culture while we have scandals like sports rorts going on. We won't change the culture while the public think that if you're in a Liberal or a National electorate you're likely to get a bigger cut of the pie—and I'm sorry but that's what the public think. They think that because this government has demonstrated to them that that's what they think, not just in those sports grants but also in the community grants.

Let's not forget, when I first came to this place there was a stronger regions grant, that a Labor government had introduced, that was available to every region in the country. One of the first acts of this government was to reduce that to only—let's be blunt—National seats. A region like mine—a growth corridor that is growing at a rate of knots—was completely locked out of that program. People who live in my community understand what that means. The people in my community sent me here. They sent a woman to this parliament. Men and women voted to send a woman here, and everyone in my community that votes for me knows they're sending someone to this parliament who's going to stand up and call the rubbish out. That's what I'm doing today; I'm going to call the rubbish out. I watched the Prime Minister's press conference and I was appalled.

On Friday, I sat with students in my electorate, in my SRC forums—in the morning with primary school student leaders and in the afternoon with high school student leaders. I lost sleep about doing this forum on Friday after the month we'd had, after the whole world was looking at this place and wondering what on earth we do up here. I reminded myself that these young people are student leaders from schools in the electorate and every year, when I do this work with them, they can all tell me that their schools have stated values and that they're asked to live those values. When they shared them on Friday, no surprise, what's the No. 1 value that schools in my electorate choose to list and state in their foyers and around their playgrounds? The No. 1value is respect. Those young people, as young as grade 4, know that they're part of building a culture. They know what culture it is that they're expected to uphold in their school. They know that, as leaders in that school, they should have a plan to sustain that culture, build on that culture and improve that culture.

If they understand it, Prime Minister, why can't you understand it? Leadership means that you take responsibility for the culture. As Prime Minister, you take responsibility for the culture of our nation. So if you don't intend to make this country more equal, if you don't intend to pursue gender equity, come inside here and say so. Be honest with the Australian public. If it's not your work, whose is it? Everybody who sits on the government bench has to take responsibility as well. You're leaders in your own communities. What have you had to say about what we've learnt in this place in the last month? What did you have to say about ministers removing themselves, or being removed, because of breaches of ministerial standards? What did you have to say when they were publicly brought back onto the front bench? What did you have to say about sports rorts? You are the culture. We are leaders in this place of this country, and school children around the nation are looking at us now. They understand it. You should understand it.

As a government, you are failing Australia now. Be honest. Set out your agenda. If your agenda doesn't include gender equity, if it doesn't include action on ensuring women's safety, say so. I can assure you that, in my electorate, men, women and children want to know that that is your objective. They want to know that you have the highest aspirations for this country—and those aspirations start with equity, those aspirations start with making sure that every Australian counts. As a woman, I need to know that you value me as much as you do my colleague the member for Bruce. I need to know that you value all of us; that's what I need to know. With only a minute left in my contribution on the appropriation bills, I say to the Prime Minister: if you show leadership in this, you will be amazed at the response you receive. If you can demonstrate that you care about equity, if you demonstrate that you care about women's safety in this building—let's face it, Prime Minister, the journey to make every woman safe in every work place, in every place, in every street and in every home starts in this place. We can't rely on 'ground up' here, Prime Minister. Do your job.

Madeleine King (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—It is 10 years since a group of Liberal MPs, including the then Liberal Leader of the Opposition and now senior minister and another MP who has just been appointed to the Fair Work Commission, stood in front of unmissable placards and banners that were clearly misogynistic and sexist in nature and directed against the first woman to be Prime Minister of this country, Julia Gillard. It was a low watermark in politics in the country that senior members of the Liberal Party and their leader could not be aware of the violent and sexist language they were endorsing 10 years ago today. These were not signs opportunistically propped up behind unaware elected members. It was a set-up for those Liberal members to stand up in front of and to endorse. Even if you disagree that it was a set-up, there was nothing stopping members walking away and distancing themselves from such vile sentiments.

The sexualised and violent attacks on former Prime Minister Julia Gillard continued for her entire term as Prime Minister and beyond. All Prime Ministers of this country should rightly be subject to scrutiny and criticism but not the extraordinary treatment that was levelled at the first Prime Minister who was a woman. A popular commentator, indeed, called for our Prime Minister to be put in a chaff bag and thrown into the sea—such violent words to suggest a Prime Minister be drowned in the ocean. What we do here sets a tone for the nation. What happened that day 10 years ago out the front of this place set a tone for the nation.

It is two years ago to the day that Brittany Higgins was allegedly raped in the office of the defence minister of the Commonwealth of Australia. I acknowledge the courage of Ms Higgins in coming forward so publicly. What happened to her two years ago in this place will affect her life forever. Because of her brave choices since, that traumatic event—and events since—should change this place forever. It was staggering to hear on Four Corners last night that a security guard who witnessed the events two years ago has not been spoken to by police or anyone else, besides an investigative journalist. How can that be?

Last night we heard of the latest degrading of this place and the women who work here by male staff. This is behaviour designed to humiliate, embarrass and degrade women—the elected members and their staff and all the other women who work here. It has been filmed and shared among male staff of the Liberal Party. What do these men think of the women here, women everywhere and women who employ them? What led to this kind of behaviour?

We all know culture starts from the top. It's all about a culture of entitlement, that it's acceptable to stand in front of signs and endorse sexism, misogyny and violence. It's a culture of entitlement that sees a young woman lured to allegedly be raped in a minister's office and demonstrations of entitlement and warped power that see a group of men share videos of themselves masturbating on a woman's desk. I haven't even got to the degradation of the prayer and meditation room in this place.

I pay tribute to the staff that today took a stand and reclaimed the meditation room. It reminds me of my time at uni when we went on marches to 'reclaim the night' because women didn't feel safe walking alone at night. So I congratulate those staff that went up to the prayer and meditation room today and took back that room for what it should be used for: peaceful reflection on the events of the day. There was bipartisan support among the staff and press gallery in this place for the action of solidarity with all women that feel assaulted by the latest vile revelations of behaviour designed to humiliate and threaten women. I fully support the action of my staff member Ms Georgia Tree and other staff members who brought together this group in solidarity to reclaim their workplace and demand that it be safe and women be free from such ongoing humiliation. It is important to note that it is an act of solidarity for people to gather in support of the women in this place, given what we have heard.

As the Prime Minister has said, it's been more focused over the last five weeks, but people in this place have been talking about violence against women, sexism and misogyny in this place for many years. I acknowledge the work of the member for Newcastle, who every year lists the names of women who have been killed by partners or former partners. Every single year, the member for Newcastle does this; it's a heart-wrenching thing to watch.

These things have been talked about in this place for many years but, clearly, no-one has been listening—or not listening enough. I call on the government to actually take action to make sure that this kind of thing is never seen again. It is humiliating to women, it must end and it must end now.

George Christensen (Dawson, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It brings me no great pleasure to have to correct the member for Brand on one of the allegations that was made just then. As someone who was actually there at the protest rally against the carbon tax, I saw what happened with that sign that was erected. It did have a slur against then Prime Minister Gillard on it. I witnessed, and was one of, the coalition members in attendance who asked the person who was holding it to remove it. We asked repeatedly, and the only way we could have removed it was if we tried to do that forcibly. That would have been breaking the law, which is also an inappropriate act for a member of parliament.

More than that, the people who had that sign held up behind them were unaware that the sign was being held up until it was broadcast. Now, the member for Brand wasn't there but I was there, and I saw with my own eyes exactly what occurred that day. So, please, there is such a thing as sexism and sexual harassment but let's not—

Ms Wells interjecting—

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Lilley!

George Christensen (Dawson, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

look for it under every rock for political purposes—please. It does the issue no favours. What I want to talk about is the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2021-2021, at a time when the country is still recovering from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has effectively—

Ms Wells interjecting—

I'm going to take these interjections. I will take them. This person who is yelling across the chamber inappropriately was not there at that event and did not ask for that sign to be removed. I asked for it to be removed and many other people asked for it to be removed. They weren't here in the chamber when a person, a coalition woman sitting in the chair that you're in, Mr Deputy Speaker Mitchell, was repeatedly called a witch. So let's not throw stones.

Ms Wells interjecting—

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Lilley—enough, please!

George Christensen (Dawson, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Again, I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2021-2021 at a time when the country is still recovering from the impacts of the pandemic, which has effectively reversed a lot of the good work that the government had done to properly manage national expenditure. It must be acknowledged, however, that the government's excellent fiscal management has put us in a recoverable position, rather than sending this country broke. A range of relief packages and incentives were rolled out for both workers and businesses to prevent job losses and business closures, and to enable our economy to recover quickly with minimal long-term impacts.

Further to these emergency measures, the Morrison Liberal-National government has been proactively investing in job-creating areas, such as manufacturing, upgrading our infrastructure, brokering new trade deals and upskilling the nation's workforce to encourage growth and to have a strong and prosperous future. Over the last few years, the federal government has invested more than $3 billion into the Dawson electorate and the surrounding regions. That has gone into the Bruce Highway and other critical roads, key infrastructure projects and local roads—

Mr Hill interjecting—

The member for Bruce loves that highway's name! He would love to know that around 390 kilometres of the Bruce Highway run straight through the heart of my electorate, from Mackay to Townsville. It's the most essential piece of infrastructure in North Queensland. This is recognised by the Morrison Liberal-National government through major investments in upgrades and projects on that highway.

There are projects such as the Horton River Floodplain Upgrade, a complete restructure of a 13½-kilometre section of the highway between Ayr and Townsville, including the raising of both lanes and the construction of a new bridge at a cost of just over half a billion dollars. This project will help to flood-proof the Bruce Highway and ensure that commuters, travellers and freight can all keep moving throughout heavy downpours, which are part and parcel of living in North Queensland—and part and parcel of what's happening in New South Wales at the moment too, sadly. It was also a great pleasure to attend the opening of the $497 million Mackay Ring Road stage 1 project in September of last year. That project has made huge improvements to safety in Mackay for local commuters. It has improved freight efficiency on the Bruce Highway, and it has reduced traffic congestion for local motorists throughout the centre of Mackay. We've seen $280 million of federal funding go to ring road stage 2, or the Mackay Port Access Road—a purpose-built road linking the Bruce Highway to the Mackay Harbour, maximising Mackay's import-export potential and taking all of the heavy vehicles off the smaller suburban roads. The $120 million Mackay Northern Access Upgrade Project is in full swing. That is another project which will significantly improve safety for locals and ease congestion through one of our busiest intersections by adding additional lanes as well as making important safety improvements. These are all significant road infrastructure projects throughout Dawson which will equip North Queensland with the tools to grow and give our communities the infrastructure they need, and deserve, to cope with that growth.

The Local Roads and Community Infrastructure Program has provided over $5.8 million to four local councils in the electorate of Dawson which enabled them to deliver some necessary upgrades to local roads as well as to community infrastructure, such as playgrounds and parks. As well, $29.6 million from the Roads of Strategic Importance program has gone towards important upgrades on the Shute Harbour Road, which is the only road into the tourist haven of Airlie Beach. Airlie is the gateway to the beautiful Whitsundays. Most tourists who visit the island arrive via the Proserpine Airport or the Bruce Highway, and they have to go down Shute Harbour Road to get to Airlie Beach and the Whitsundays. This road is a key access road for tourists visiting the Whitsundays. As our regional tourism industry bounces back and grows, we'll see this road being put under increasing demand, so I would call on the Queensland government, which has delayed and delayed and delayed accessing and using that funding, to get going because we want to see Shute Harbour Road improved and we particularly want to see that improved before we have tourism back in full swing. Now is the time to do it. Now is the time to get going. Please, state government, get going.

The Cannon Valley reservoir will deliver water to Airlie Beach, Cannonvale, Jubilee Pocket and Shute Harbour thanks to a $3.75 million upgrade project through the Building Better Regions Fund that the Morrison Liberal-National government has awarded to the Whitsunday Regional Council. A 12.5 megalitre bit of water infrastructure will ensure water security for the fastest-growing area of the Whitsundays well into the future. We are also getting big water security projects off the ground. Ten million dollars in funding was awarded to get the Urannah Dam project going. That is a one million megalitre water storage project. This dam will transform North Queensland. It will open up huge tracts of agricultural land and provide long-term water security for the region. The federal government's Supporting Reliable Energy Infrastructure Program has also provided an additional $2 million for planning work into the pumped hydro capabilities of Urannah Dam. Power generation is also going to enable the dam to tackle two of the biggest issues facing farmers today—water costs and power costs. Speaking of power costs, the Collinsville power station will bring down power prices in the north. Four million dollars was provided through the Supporting Reliable Energy Infrastructure Program to assess the case for a clean high-efficiency, low-emissions coal-fired power station in North Queensland. That Collinsville power station will allow us to dig and burn our own beautiful coal and reduce household power prices, business power prices, industry power prices, agriculture power prices, and manufacturing industry power prices in the north.

It's interesting that we have this ethical dilemma, apparently, on the Left, where we can dig up the coal here in Australia and ship it overseas for places like Japan, China and other countries to burn in their ultra-supercritical HELE 'clean' coal-fired power stations. But, when we try to do it ourselves, it's crazy, it's unethical and it's harming the environment. That view, my friends, is nuts. We have to use our own coal to actually get cheaper power in this country. We can do that through the Collinsville Power Station.

We have also allocated over $10 million to the Great Barrier Reef Arena which will be built in Harrup Park, making Mackay the regional cricketing capital of the country. The state government did delay by about 18 months before matching funding, conveniently just before the last state election, for that project but that project is now going full steam ahead. There's going to be a lot of great matches held there. But before the matches are held, we have 18 months' worth of jobs and work—90 construction jobs, 90 ongoing jobs. That is what the Morrison Liberal-National government has delivered in community and sporting infrastructure in Mackay that is creating jobs. As I said, Mackay is now going to be the regional cricketing capital of the nation. We are going to have all sorts of events—big bashs, international events. It's going to be international broadcast standard. With all of those matches are going to come more tourists to our region, stimulating the local economy.

More than $5.8 million in Roads to Recovery funding, almost $200,000 in Black Spot funding, over $420,00 in Bridges Renewal funding, over $5.8 million in Building Better Regions funding has gone into the electorate of Dawson. There is Stronger Communities funding of $150,000 coming to a range of different local groups. Over $3.1 million in Community Development Grants Program funds and over $3 million in Regional Growth Fund is being delivered. Over $4,000,000 in Regional Jobs and Investment Packages funding is being delivered in the electorate. Financial assistance grants helping councils and defraying costs for ratepayers by almost $22.5 million is a substantial investment by this government in the electorate of Dawson.

I'm very proud to have overseen that as the local member but there are more matters than local that need to be fought for in this place. To that end, I have ummed and ahed about whether or not I was going to renominate as the member for Dawson and I have decided this very week that I will be doing that. I'm doing that for a very good reason. There are several things.

An opposition member: Shame.

On the left, I'm sure that they will say 'shame' because it will hopefully mean that I will be back here after the next election. But we need to deal with some serious issues in this place. I want voices here that are going to be fighting on those issues. I want to be one of those voices who are standing up on issues like the threat that big tech social media platforms and giants pose to free speech and democracy in this country; the existential threat that is posed to our nation, to our sovereignty, to our democracy, by The People's Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party; the threat that they pose to humanity through their persecution of Uighurs; their persecution of pro-democracy activists; their persecution of Hong Kong sovereignty activists; their threats towards Taiwan; their threats and persecution of people of faith. They all need to be dealt with. I want to be here to push our government and our side to legislate a Magnitsky act. That is something that is going to be important for protecting our democracy and sending a signal to these monsters in other countries that are not only undermining global law but are undermining human rights, and the CCP has got to be targeted.

It's a big call but I fear in the next decade that there is conflict coming in our part of the world. That is a serious, serious thing for any member of parliament to say but you only have to look at the geopolitical situation, read the tea leaves, to expect that that is probably going to happen. So I want to be part of the push to ensure that our critical supplies in this country—fuel, manufacturing of critical supplies—are sacrosanct, that we have that ability in this country before there is a substantial issue with shipping lanes because of international conflict. It is coming, and we need to be prepared in this place for that. I also want to continue to push on measures that are about the issue that I hold above every other issue—that is, protecting human life, including in the womb. That's why I'm going to continue to push for my Human Rights (Children Born Alive Protection) Bill 2021, coming to this place as a private member's bill.

I also want to push against the new, woke, globalist, corporate push for the so called great reset. It has been called many names before. There are a lot of people who are going to be asking us to adopt these things. It's just socialism by any other name. What we need free enterprise again in this country to pick up, after the pandemic, for small business to go out there and create the jobs, create the investment and recreate this nation to make it great once again.

David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

With the previous speaker, the member for Dawson, I can see Donald Trump has emerged in Australia!

I would like to start with a little history. It's 10 years to the day that there was an infamous, disgraceful rally outside this place. It was the most appalling misogyny on display and, given what's going on in this place over the last few weeks and months, it can't go unremarked. It's been 10 years to the day. You'd have thought this place would have learnt more. Here's hoping that it won't take another 10 years before the real change that's needed occurs.

I would like to start with some other history. A little more than a decade ago, the then Labor government needed to stimulate the Australian economy to keep the global recession at bay. One of the measures implemented was to provide every school in the country with a new building. As well as to provide a useful long-term asset for schools, it would keep tradies in jobs. That sounds familiar. The Building the Education Revolution program was supposed to cost $16 billion, but ended up costing $17.5 billion. 'A $1.5 billion major cost blow out' is how The Australian newspaper reported it. That blow out was big news for a long time. It was splashed across the front pages of newspapers across the nation. Columnists and talkback shock jocks said it was evidence Labor could not be trusted with money. Liberals lined up on TV shows to say the same thing.

Let's fast forward to 2020. The Liberal government needs to stimulate the Australian economy to keep a pandemic-induced recession at bay. One of the measures implemented is to provide eligible businesses with a temporary wage subsidy to keep on employees who might otherwise get sacked, causing mass unemployment. Businesses need to predict or prove a significant drop in sales to be eligible. JobKeeper cost $100 billion and it had Labor's support. In fact, it had Labor's support before it had the Prime Minister's support. To get the money out quickly, we voted for what was, admittedly, pretty rushed legislation. Speed was of the essence; the money had to get out. Critically, Labor gave the Treasurer the authority to amend the program and patch any loopholes as he saw fit without having to return to the parliament. That's important, as it soon emerged that some businesses were getting the wage subsidy despite not being in distress and, in fact, some were having their best year ever. For those companies, staff wages were being paid by taxpayers while the owners and the executives pocketed big profits, big dividends and big bonuses. It's not right. It's not how it's meant to work.

Income support in Australia has always been predicated on need. We make old aged pensioners, people with disabilities, the unemployed and young people meet stringent, unyielding criteria in order to qualify for benefits of less than $300 to $400 a week. Yet here were companies dining out on the taxpayer dollar to the tune of not millions but billions. Every cent of it was borrowed as part of the nation's ballooning debt. The Treasurer could have fixed this. He chose not to. He also chose to keep secret, from Australian taxpayers, the details of which companies received JobKeeper and how much. That's information that would have been helpful in identifying how much of JobKeeper has been misdirected.

Smarter people than me—the member for Fenner being one of them—estimates that of the $100 billion JobKeeper program, at least $10 billion and perhaps as much as $20 billion has gone to companies that did not need it. And there has hardly been a peep in the media. Remember, a $1.5 billion blowout of the BER, which provided buildings to every school in the country—which are still in daily use—was front-page news for months, while a $10 billion to $20 billion blowout of JobKeeper has gone relatively unremarked upon. That is 10 times the blowout and not even a tenth of the media coverage.

But it's not the expenditure that upsets me; it's the lost possibilities. If we take even the lower end of the scale—the $10 billion, rather than the $20 billion—what else could that amount of money have achieved if it had not gone into the pockets of those who demonstrably did not need it? That $10 billion could have built 40,000 affordable homes across the country; $10 billion could have provided one million pensioners with a $10,000 grant each, to make their kitchens and their bathrooms safer, or could have built 2,000 bridges across regional Australia. The better ways that $10 billion could have been used are countless. Instead, it's gone into the pockets of those who simply did not need it—and all with the blessing of the Treasurer and the Prime Minister. They head a government that threatens pensioners with prison for overclaiming Centrelink but they do nothing about trying to get this money back.

This scandalous waste of JobKeeper goes to the wider issue of the Liberals' startling economic incompetence. The MYEFO for 2020-21 forecasts a $197.7 billion deficit this financial year and $456 billion of cumulative deficits over the forwards. We have seen net debt triple this year, to $692 billion. In four years it will be $950 billion, and it will be well over a trillion dollars within a decade. Gross debt will be more than a trillion dollars within four years. These are huge numbers—absolutely huge. For context, the Liberals screamed blue murder about a $200 million debt under Labor's recession-busting measures, calling it a 'budget emergency' and a 'debt and deficit disaster'; they screamed economic Armageddon in the Murdoch tabloids. There was no free pass for Labor about saving the place from recession, but that's what they expect from us. The constant wall-to-wall criticism set a tone in the community that Labor could not be trusted with the economy. Funnily enough, the papers—predominantly the Murdoch papers—are silent now that debt and deficit under the Liberals is slated to be five times as high as it was under Labor. What was a 'disaster' under Labor is apparently manageable and appropriate when it's five times as high under the Liberals.

It's a disgraceful double standard. The Liberals have jealously guarded their reputation as the supposed better economic managers. It is a reputation that they never earned. It is a reputation that is completely false. It is Labor governments that have been the big economic game changers in this country, from Chifley's postwar reconstruction and Snowy Hydro to Whitlam's education revolution that paved the way for the Hawke-Keating microeconomic reforms of the 1980s—which continue to be directly responsible for 30 years of near-uninterrupted economic growth, broken only last year under a Liberal government. What has been the Liberals' big contributor to the nation's economy? They introduced the goods and services tax—a tax increase. That's their legacy. In fact, nothing tells the tale of the Liberals in government better than the fact that Holden started making cars in this country under a Labor government and were chased out of the country under a Liberal government, taking our components and manufacturing capabilities with them.

Under this Liberal government the Australian economy was struggling long before anyone had heard of coronavirus. In 2019 real wages in Australia were 0.7 per cent lower than when the Liberals came to office six years earlier; they've dropped. In 2019 Australia was in third-last place among 35 OECD countries for wages growth, well behind comparable economies like Germany, Sweden, Denmark and the US. But the Liberals are happy with this, because low wages for Australian workers are, as former finance minister Mathias Cormann admitted on TV, a deliberate feature of the Liberal's economic architecture. Lower wages means workers struggling to survive. That keeps them compliant and less likely to make demands for higher pay and better conditions. And it means businesses can spend less on wages and more on investing in their business so they can employ more workers on low wages. And, if there aren't enough workers in Australia willing to work for low wages, they'll just bring in more workers from overseas on short-term visas to do the job instead. We see the disgraceful example this week of Liberal MPs pushing to have short-term visa applicants displace Australians overseas trying to get home. That's what they're doing. They'd rather see workers coming from overseas on short-term visas than see Australians come home on the limited places that are available on aeroplanes. That's the Liberal vision for Australia: low wages.

As for productivity, that all-important indicator of the nation's economic strength, it's been steadily falling under the Liberals not just in real terms but also in comparison to other nations. In 2013 Australian workers' productivity was growing at 1.7 per cent per year, ranking us the 10th highest amongst OECD nations. After five years of a Liberal government, Australia in 2018 ranked 5th last in the OECD, with productivity going backwards in real terms by 0.3 per cent. On every measure that matters to Australian workers and their families—wages, wages growth, productivity, debt and deficit—Australia is weaker under the Liberals and stronger under Labor.

'Look at the falling unemployment,' they will cry over there. On this side of the House we will always welcome news that more people are joining the workforce, especially if they're in well-paid full-time jobs. But it's a little early to be popping the champagne and breaking out the cigars. The grim fact is that under this Liberal government two million Australians remain unemployed or underemployed, and their prospects are bleak. For those who do get a job, this government wants them to earn less and have fewer protections at work. For those who do not get a job, this government wants to strip back payments and support. Just this week, the government gutted its own industrial relations bill, taking out measures the government had put in to protect workers from wage theft. The government had acknowledged that wage theft was a problem by including those measures in the bill but then it decided it would rather allow employers to keep stealing workers' wages than take steps to crack down. It's unfathomable. You know there's a problem with wage theft. You choose to do nothing about it. Under the Liberals, we've had penalty rates cut, we've had flat wages, we've had no increase to superannuation after eight years and now we have the Liberals doing nothing about stopping dodgy employers from stealing their own workers' pay.

In the short time remaining, I'd like to speak briefly about housing. Australia is the third most unaffordable housing market within the OECD. For a generation of young Australians—and I see there are some young people up in the gallery—the great Australian dream is becoming the great Australian fantasy. House prices have risen faster, much faster than Australians' incomes. The Real Estate Institute of Tasmania is warning that affordability for many to own their own home is fast becoming a distant pipedream. Housing stress in Tasmania has reached an all-time high. Across the market, demand is outstripping supply. Properties are selling in an average of nine days. Buyers are purchasing sight unseen, and multiple buyers are throwing offers at the same house. Great news for sellers but terrible for buyers. Recent data shows that housing affordability in Tasmania declined in the December quarter, where the amount of income required to meet repayments increased by 2.2 percentage points, up to 31.1 per cent, in one quarter.

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Sure, if your parents own property they can take out an equity loan and provide you with a deposit. But not every kid's parent has property. Not every kid's parent has the sort of equity required these days for a deposit, which can be $60,000 or more—even for a modest two-bedroom home. Since when did Australia become a country where kids had to rely on their parents' wealth to get ahead? It's getting harder and more expensive to buy a home unless you already have one, and it's also getting harder and more expensive to rent. The more expensive it is to rent, the harder it is to save for a deposit. Anyone living in a rental property today is going to find it next to impossible to buy tomorrow. On every indication this government is failing this country and failing the young people of this country, who are our future.

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

I rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2020-2021 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2020-2021. There are many important parts of the government's investment agenda, but perhaps none as long-awaited and much needed as the Morrison government's program of infrastructure on the Sunshine Coast. Under this coalition government the Sunshine Coast has seen more investment of federal government funds in transport infrastructure than ever before.

Sunshine Coast locals are well aware of the transformational change going on in our region, and most understand the pivotal role that this government's investment has played. Apparently the only person who has missed this investment in our community is Queensland state Labor minister for transport Mark Bailey. It is a sign of how little interest Minister Bailey has in the Sunshine Coast that he knows absolutely nothing about the federal government's $3½ billion worth of works underway or in the pipeline in our region right now. On a near weekly basis he appears in the Sunshine Coast media, parading his abject ignorance of all that the federal government is doing in our community. All he can do is call ever more for Commonwealth funds to bail him out on projects for which the state is wholly responsible and on which the state has wholly failed. Residents of the Sunshine Coast are rightly concerned about the competence of a state government minister who not only refuses to do his job in providing a fair share of state government infrastructure spending to our region but is apparently totally uninformed about the many major Commonwealth funded projects underway on the coast today—especially when you consider that it is his department which is responsible for the construction of most of them.

For the avoidance of doubt, and for the education of Minister Bailey, I will use my time today to review the unprecedented strategic investment the Morrison government is making in infrastructure on the Sunshine Coast and compare it to the meagre scraps tossed by the Queensland Labor government to our long-suffering region. Though you wouldn't know it from the number and range of projects we are undertaking on the coast, the Commonwealth government is responsible for only one piece of infrastructure in our region—the Bruce Highway. Unlike the state Labor government, we are not just living up to our responsibilities; we are far exceeding them. In my electorate of Fisher locals will be very familiar with the upgrades currently nearing completion on the Bruce Highway between Caloundra Road and the Sunshine Motorway. These upgrades are adding an extra lane each way between these two intersections, creating more than 100 kilometres of ancillary roads, and upgrading two dangerous interchanges to create capacity for more vehicles. The federal government is contributing $745.6 million to this project. The state government is just contributing $186.5 million.

Work has also begun on a major upgrade of Caboolture-Bribie Island Road to the southern Steve Irwin Way intersection. This section of the highway is getting an additional lane each way, with upgraded bridges along the entire stretch. The Morrison government is paying $530 million towards this upgrade. Mark Bailey and his colleagues in state Labor are paying just $132½ million.

It's the same story up and down the Bruce Highway between the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane. Upgrades which will directly benefit my constituents are underway or in the pipeline for the Deception Bay interchange, where the federal government is contributing $130 million compared to the state government's $32 million; between the Mons Road and Maroochydore Road interchanges, where the federal government is contributing $241 million compared to Labor's $60 million; and between Pine River and Caloundra Road, where the federal government is paying $84 million compared to the state's $21 million. In total the federal government is investing more than $3.2 billion in improvements to the Bruce Highway between the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane, which constitutes an unprecedented investment in my community and is four times the amount that Minister Bailey and state Labor have committed.

This is far from the end of the Morrison government's investment in our community. While the Bruce Highway has always been a shared responsibility between the Commonwealth and state governments, on a 80 to 20 split, rail in Queensland is the sole domain of the state government. After decades of neglect from successive Queensland Labor governments, however, the north coast rail is in a parlous state. Operating on a single track in parts, more than a century old and located nowhere near the coast's contemporary population centres this rail is in desperate need of upgrades.

In the face of continuing inaction from Labor something drastic had to be done. The coalition federal government has once again stepped up and offered to pay a full 50 per cent of the cost of the duplication of the north coat rail at a cost of $390 million to the federal government. Did Mark Bailey and state Labor accept this half price payment? Did they accept it gratefully? Not on your nelly. They simply demanded more. Minister Bailey offered a pathetic $161 million, just 20 per cent of the funds we need. As a result the project has had to be scaled back to a bare minimum, disappointing resident throughout my region.

However, Mark Bailey's rail fail does not end there. The existing north coast rail line is located some 20 kilometres inland from the major population centres of Caloundra, Kawana and Maroochydore. It's clear that transformative change for our community could be delivered by the construction of a new heavy rail line along the already reserved land corridor through these population centres and on to Brisbane via Beerwah.

Following my advocacy for the project, the Morrison government invested $6.75 million in a detailed business case for fast rail along the corridor, which has just been evaluated by Infrastructure Australia. However, despite its great value to our community, Infrastructure Australia has not named it on their priority project list. Why? I hear you ask. Why wouldn't they do this? Because so lazy, and contemptuous of our communities, is Minister Mark Bailey that the Queensland Labor government have refused to even agree in principle to build the project, even if funding had been arranged. It's the federal government that's doing the heavy lifting on the Bruce Highway in my community. On rail it's the federal government that's making a difference for Sunshine Coast residents. Most damming for this Queensland state Labor government, however, even on state government roads of our region it is the federal government that's having to take the lead.

Steve Irwin Way is one of the coast's most important state government roads. As I have seen on my 'tour de fisher' rides around the region, it's dangerous and getting older as we speak. We have committed $14.4 million to upgrading the Steve Irwin Way on a safety package. The state government, on its own road, just $3.6 million. In Kawana and Caloundra we have many extremely congested state government roads: Kawana Way, Nicklin Way, Caloundra Road. They're already at more than capacity during peak hour and the situation is only deteriorating. Minister Bailey's response to this dire situation has been a traffic light here, a traffic light there, an additional lane around a roundabout. It is not good enough. Sunshine Coast residents demand more from this Labor state government than what they are getting. I see this being repeated right across the great state of Queensland. Even with the smallest of our council and state government roads the state is doing very little, if anything, to assist.

You compare that to what we're doing in the federal government: providing $12 million for a brand new bridge over the Mayes Canal on Brisbane Road to assist the council with their Mooloolaba transport corridor upgrade. Between February 2020 and today the Morrison government has delivered $5.2 million in funding for safety upgrades of more local and state government roads across the region. Why are we doing this? Because the state is nowhere to be seen. Quite frankly, unfortunately, the more this federal government puts in and saves this hapless state government the more they demand. We have created a noose around our neck by continuing to help this state government, but we have got to do that because our Queensland residents demand more than what they are getting from the state. The problem with this, of course, is the more we do the more the state government just takes a back seat.

The Queensland government is very happy to create a top-down population plan in South-East Queensland. It wants to introduce another 170,000 people into my electorate but is not prepared to lift a finger to provide the funding we need for it. Enough is enough. It's time for Minister Bailey and the Queensland state Labor government to get on and help support the Sunshine Coast.

Llew O'Brien (Wide Bay, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may be resumed at a later hour. The member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed.