Henry Pike (Bowman, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It has been the great promise of this country that every generation could hand down to their children a nation that's more prosperous and has a higher standard of living than the one they inherited. We've had world wars, depressions and natural disasters, but each generation has been able to live up to that promise. But when I see our current trajectory across many measurements, I fear that Australia, under this Prime Minister, is heading in the wrong direction.

Our households are far worse off than they were three years ago. We've been stuck in the worst per capita recession in 50 years. We've had a homegrown inflation crisis pushing up the cost of living. With high interest rates and a rental crisis, we've seen disposable incomes fall dramatically. With excessive regulation, our industries are finding it impossible to compete with their hands tied behind their backs. Our way of life is under threat, not just from foreign actors but from those who want to curtail our freedoms at home. If we don't correct course, I fear that for the first time we will not be able to hand a stronger Australia to the next generation.

As a nation that prides itself on being a commonwealth with the common interest at heart, the key metric that we should be using to determine our progress is gross domestic product per capita—in other words, the amount of wealth that Australia is creating for every Australian. On this measure, we've seen six quarters of negative growth. Australians are getting poorer, and they're getting poorer at a rate that we haven't seen in half a century.

Since the Labor government was elected, we've seen the weakest economic growth since 1991. We've seen 23,600 business insolvencies, the worst number on record. We've seen productivity fall by 6.3 per cent. When faced with weak growth and falling productivity, the government has been determined to massively increase immigration to try to give the economy an artificial boost. Since the election, we've seen more than 1.5 million people invited to Australia by this government. That's more than the population of the city of Adelaide in less than three years. Is it any wonder Australians are feeling the pressure when they're in line-ups for rental properties or when they're trying to get home after a day of work?

Recently, Russell Field, the newly elected LNP member for Capalaba, and I presented flags to four wonderful student leaders of the Capalaba State College junior school. They're very bright kids with a big future ahead of them, but I couldn't help but feel that these kids, who probably don't have the support of wealthy parents, may never be able to afford their own homes in the city where they live.

If we continue like this, we'll be breaking that intergenerational promise of a brighter future that those children deserve. But that wouldn't be anything new from this Labor government, who've broken many promises. The Prime Minister promised that his government would deliver cheaper mortgages. While interest rates are coming down in the US, the UK, Canada and New Zealand, we've had 12 interest rate increases under this government. Labor promised a $275 reduction in our energy bills. When you take away the manipulation of the subsidies, the underlying price of electricity has risen by 30 per cent. Labor promised no new taxes, yet in this term we've seen the introduction of Labor's retirement wealth tax, changes that entrench income tax bracket creep, and franking credit clawbacks that will cost Australians $1.5 billion. This government promised us a million new homes. In reality, they're missing that target by 400,000, and building activity has reached its lowest point in over a decade.

Beyond all the talk, beyond all of the promises, beyond all those big statistics, there is a simple question that I'm asking the constituents within my electorate when I'm going door to door. I'm simply asking: are you better off today than you were three years ago? Of course, the resounding answer to that has been no. When I go door to door—my colleagues will know that I pride myself on the number of doors I've been knocking on across my electorate, speaking to Australian families, a lot of whom didn't vote for me at the last election—the resounding answer that they give me is that they're not happy with the progress that's been made under this government and that they're looking for real action to try to drive down inflation, drive down the cost of living and, more importantly for a lot of these households, give their children the opportunity to look forward and to think of a brighter Australia where they will be able to enjoy the same benefits and opportunities that their parents and, in my neck of the woods, where there are a lot of older Australians, their grandparents have been able to enjoy.

So, as we round out the final days, this could well be the penultimate week, or we could be back for a few days in the new year. When I look back at the progress that's been made in this term, I think that a lot of the constituents in my electorate will be very concerned with the direction in which we're heading and will be looking forward to getting Australia back on track.