Ursula Stephens (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Science and Water) Share this | Hansard source

I too would like to take note of the answers to questions today, particularly those answers to questions around the budget, and to reflect a little on the lack of any evidence or information about the impacts of this year’s budget on regional Australia. The question that was asked of Senator Vanstone about the Australian technical colleges was in fact a very interesting one, because, as Senator Hurley said earlier, the issue of regional skills development, regional training and regional opportunities for young people is something that is severely lacking in this budget.

Let me focus on a few of the things that were not in the budget. First of all, the Treasurer did not mention regional Australia once in his budget speech. It seems that regional Australians really are the losers from the budget speech the other night. Let us think about the increase in petrol taxes that are to be experienced by everyone in regional Australia when the Fuel Sales Grant Scheme is abolished on 1 July. Petrol prices in regional Australia will increase by an average of three per cent from 1 July. That is certainly not something that was factored into the budget the other evening. The Prime Minister and the Treasurer both say that the tax cuts will compensate for rising petrol prices, but of course that is not really going to be the case. In six weeks time, we are going to see a significant price hike for petrol in regional Australia.

We did not hear very much about regional universities in the budget. Even Senator Joyce is concerned about the meagre compensation for regional universities in this budget. Just think about the way student activities and student funding have been cut. Student services in regional universities across Australia get a meagre $10 million to try and compensate for the services that have disappeared under the VSU legislation.

They are two of the factors that are really bothering me, but the real issue for me in this budget is regional health services. When I looked very carefully at what is in the budget for regional Australia, I found that there is nothing to demonstrate a commitment to regional health. There is nothing for new doctors and nurses. The Southern Area Health Service where I live in regional New South Wales has experienced a shortage of nurses—of course, it is a global shortage—and that has required New South Wales Health to attract overseas nurses and pay them an extraordinary rate. They are all agency nurses. They have to be paid well above the award on a contract rate and the area health service has to pay additional costs to the agency. And, of course, when these nurses finish their short-term placements in the hospitals and with the area health services, the result is that we are seeing a huge turnover of staff. That really is not a very effective way of delivering health services.

We have seen that the government is planning to sell off Medibank Private. There will be fewer branches in regional towns, higher insurance premiums for people with private health insurance and no net gains for regional communities anywhere. Where is the investment anywhere in regional communities for a regional future? Where is the investment in regional infrastructure to provide a vision for the long term? Where is the investment in regional capacity? Absolutely nowhere. It is a disappointing budget all round. I think we will see that responded to this evening by the Leader of the Opposition, Kim Beazley.