Sue Boyce (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

What an interesting little exercise we have just had from Senator Hutchins in the fascinating Labor Party strategy of empathise and ignore: ‘Oh, it’s a terrible problem; oh, we know people are doing it tough; oh, yes; oh goodness; oh, gracious; there are all these rising prices; oh, dear, oh, dear; there are terrible problems; we’ve got all these problems but we’re going to inquire about how we may go about ignoring them!’ The empathise and ignore strategy goes on and on and on. Yes, as Senator Hutchins pointed out, there has been a drop in consumer confidence in Australia. The Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, has agreed. He has empathised that, yes, it is a terrible problem, that there has been a drop in consumer confidence and that Australians are worse off than they have been. But, according to the Prime Minister, this is not the fault of the Labor government; he is not to blame. It is the economic downturn, the global economic slowdown that has done it and nothing to do with the Labor government. The only problem with that line, of course, is that, according to the latest AC Nielsen index on the subject, consumer confidence in Australia has dropped 11 points. The average global drop was 5.5 points. So we have double the drop in the consumer confidence index in Australia compared with internationally. I am not sure who we are going to blame for that extra increase because it obviously cannot be Mr Rudd and his government; he has told us that it could not possibly be him.

Having looked at consumer confidence, let us look at business confidence. The Sensis business index, which Senator Coonan referred to so ably today, shows that small businesses believe they have come to the lowest view of a government in the past 28 years. Small business in Australia has no confidence. They have declared the Rudd government the worst in the country in terms of their confidence. They say that Mr Rudd and Mr Swan have set a new record for the quick drop in small business confidence in Australia. So we have this wonderful record where they empathise with the problems—’Tsk, tsk, yes, there are global problems; Australians are doing it tough’—and then they go about ignoring them. This is the way they continue to carry on. We have figures, in fact, showing that the working families of Australia are paying 5.7 per cent more, on average, for their household goods this year than they were last year. These are the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics figures. The CPI has gone from 2.1 to 4.5 and, most chillingly of the lot, self-funded retirees and pensioners have had a cost-of-living increase of 4.3 per cent over the past year. Now we have Minister Macklin and numerous senators sympathising and empathising with the pensioners. They say: ‘Yes, pensioners are doing it tough; yes, self-funded retirees are doing it tough.’ Then they think: ‘We’ve done the empathise bit; now let’s do the ignore bit,’ and say, ‘Well, we’re going to have a review and we’ll let you know in February what we might or might not do about this.’ Minister Macklin has, in her empathy, told pensioners that we need to get this right for 2028—for 20 years time. I am sure that will be a useful piece of information to pensioners who are doing it tough right now.

I will pass on to you some of the information about the costs-of-living pressures that Queenslanders—in my home state—are currently experiencing. Last month, in July, the insurance company AAMI found that three in five Australian drivers—that is, 58 per cent of Australian drivers—said that their overall standard of living had dropped because of higher petrol prices. Drivers in Brisbane were among the top three hardest hit, with 57 per cent of people in Brisbane saying that their overall standard of living had dropped. In Melbourne, it was 60 per cent; in Adelaide, 58 per cent. Rural drivers, with longer distances to drive, were even worse off. They were more likely to leave their car at home than any other drivers, with 63 per cent of them saying that they were more likely to stay at home. When we look at the effect this has on people in terms of their ability to socialise, particularly in remote areas, their ability to get involved in community events, their ability to volunteer and even their ability to undertake paid work, it is a very serious issue. Of course Australians are worse off than they were last year. They are experiencing huge difficulties with the cost-of-living pressures that have been meted out to them by this ‘empathise and then ignore’ government.

I would like to bring to your attention some of the 770 letters I have received recently from pensioners and self-funded retirees in the Brisbane area about their concerns and asking me to get Mr Rudd to give them a fair go. They listed as their top concerns petrol prices, grocery prices, healthcare bills and housing costs. Many of them went on in detail to explain what their problems were. One constituent from Mitchelton advised that he could no longer retain his private health insurance because of the costs he was experiencing at the age when he most needed it, yet we have the government proposing to create a situation where the premiums for private health insurance will increase dramatically when they attempt to push through their Medicare levy surcharge changes.

I had a letter from a pensioner constituent in Kelvin Grove who said that he did not have to worry about petrol prices any more because he had been forced to sell his car. He could not afford to put petrol in it. He could not afford to register it and he could not afford to insure it on the level of pension that is being empathised with by the government. A constituent in Spring Hill said that with increased rental costs they were not sure how much longer they would be able to keep a roof over their head. A constituent in Wilston wrote:

I cannot afford to eat properly due to the cost of fruit and vegetables.

I received a longer list from a constituent in Alderley:

I can’t afford to run a car. I always purchase old fruit and vegetables, and the rent is getting beyond me.

A constituent from Windsor wrote:

I can’t afford to buy new clothes or shoes that are badly needed. I do not have any superannuation or a car or a house, only a pension. I cannot even afford to die because I cannot afford a funeral.

I received a letter from Daisy Hill saying:

Thank you for caring about the problems.

Then we went onto the lists from people who wanted to speak directly to the Prime Minister, Mr Rudd. A constituent from Everton Park wrote:

I wonder if you—

meaning the Prime Minister—

know how tough it is or if you really care.

A constituent from New Farm wrote:

We can’t wait till 2009 for help. I’ve worked all my life paying taxes and I voted for you.

meaning the Prime Minister—

No more inquiries. Just do it.

So they are tired of the ‘empathise and ignore’ strategy of setting up an inquiry. The constituents of Brisbane and the voters of Queensland are tired of inquiries. A letter from Cornubia to the Prime Minister said:

I expected more from you.

Perhaps one of the most telling ones, from Mount Warren Park, said:

Are you hoping that we will die before February?

This was addressed to the Prime Minister. It would save money but the old ‘empathise and ignore’ strategy will not work with people like that. A constituent from Boronia Heights wrote:

I challenge you, Mr Rudd, to try and survive on $273 per week.

Following on from Senator Hutchins’ concerns about the voting patterns in the Sydney area, I would like to point out to him a comment from a constituent in Warren Park in Queensland:

I voted for you, Mr Rudd, in the federal election but never again.

From Edens Landing:

On $270 a week, can you do it, Mr Rudd?

From Slacks Creek:

Try living on a pension, Mr Rudd.

And from Spring Hill, perhaps the most succinct comment of the lot:

Stop posing, Mr Rudd. Get real.

From Loganlea:

I’m sorry I voted for you—100 per cent sorry, Mr Rudd.

So if you want to look at voter intentions I would suggest to the Labor government that that is a good place to start. Probably summing up most succinctly the feelings of the pensioners and self-funded retirees of Australia, one constituent from Stafford wrote, ‘Not only do I feel that Mr Rudd cheated the pensioners, I think he has cheated the whole country.’ I have received over 770 of these letters in the past few weeks. I think they give us a very strong indication of how the voters of Australia feel. As Senator Hutchins pointed out, the government changed in November last year, but there are a lot of people who are very concerned about how they changed it and cannot wait to change it back. I think we need to look further at the recalcitrant attitudes of this government and their ‘empathise and ignore’ strategy.

They were handed information by National Seniors Australia. They have had five months since the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs inquiry into the cost-of-living pressures on older Australians was brought down, but what have they done in five months? They have announced that they will have an inquiry. They may very well not last long enough to do much more than have an inquiry. By February next year the current government will have been in for 15 months. They claim to have known before they even came into government how bad it was. They have had the evidence of the cost-of-living pressures on older Australians, an inquiry established by the Howard government, to build on the—