Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Sunshine Coast may indeed be the lifestyle capital of Australia, and indeed it's a beautiful, wonderful place to live, but the residents I serve here in this parliament are doing it as tough as any people are. Over the last two years, they've seen food prices and housing prices rise by over 10 per cent, insurance prises rise by well over 20 per cent, and electricity prices rise by well over 30 per cent. Things are biting, and they're biting really hard.

Recently I had three days at the Sunshine Coast Agricultural Show and, there, had the privilege of talking with hundreds of constituents. The key message that came from them to me was that they're doing it tough. I'm seeing it myself with people I know. As I mix with other parents at school and so forth, I hear that people are doing it tough. You've got families who have cancelled their holidays this year. They can't afford it. I'm talking to senior citizens who are not even turning on the heater this winter, because they can't afford to do it. I'm talking about small businesses closing the doors. They can't keep things afloat. They're doing it tough.

As a result, I've recently launched a community initiative asking my own local community if they have ideas for how government can ease their cost-of-living pressures. Please come forward; let's have a chat about it. Indeed, tedobrien.com.au, my website, is receiving a lot of input from constituents, and times like the sunny coast agricultural show and my own road trips around the electorate provide those opportunities. We cannot underestimate the importance of good ideas coming from local communities. Indeed, my own local community has already seen changes in Australian tax law because of ideas they put forward, especially with respect to men's sheds and women's sheds. Even how the then government dealt with JobKeeper through the COVID pandemic, especially facilitating payments to small businesses through the banks, came from ideas generated on the ground from Fairfax constituents on the Sunshine Coast.

Here we have a situation right now where Australians are feeling a lot poorer than they were feeling two years ago before the Albanese government came to power. There's a reason for that: they are poorer. But, if they can please reach out, make their concerns clear and put forward their ideas, they will be listened to and taken up where they can.