Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Well, you have to act like an alternative government. I know when you first go into opposition there is a lot of hurt, there is a lot of pain, but the cheap, populist stuff does not work. I am sure you will come to that realisation, as we did. You might think it is winning you a few cheers now, but people understand it is complex, they understand it is expensive and I think they know that the government is committed to trying to do something for those living on pension payments. But it is complex and requires lot of good public policy work. The government is committed to doing that, having made a down payment, if you like, in its first budget. It was a reasonable question by Senator Brown—and I think Senator Fielding’s response was pretty close to the mark—but we are talking about billions of dollars being done on the run in the Senate chamber. The Liberal proposition was more modest, I suspect, because they knew how expensive this stuff was and they could not defend it publicly, because on the basis of their arguments you would give the payment to everybody. That is the logic of their position. There has been no argument advanced as to why one would exclude carers on the DSP et cetera. The opposition found that when they scrambled to throw vets in. They could not withstand the public pressure about ignoring the veterans, but they were still happy to ignore the carers and those on DSP.

Anyway, we all make our own choices, but the bottom line is that those figures do need to be on the table on the understanding that the costs involved are enormous. As I pointed out earlier, nobody has indicated yet whether they intend to discontinue the bonuses as part of their propositions. I have not heard anyone addressed that—I might have missed it. I would be interested, of course, whether or not the bonuses are to continue under the Liberal proposition. If that is the case, I have got their costings wrong. I would be interested if, before this debate ends, Senator Coonan could inform the Senate as to whether or not the Liberal Party intend for the bonuses to be paid next year—and the utilities allowance; whether these are on top of those payments or replacing those repayments, because obviously that will add enormously to the costs. As I said, with the carers, we have a $1,000 bonus and a $600 bonus. Some people get both. With the utilities allowance, some people will receive bonuses of up to $2,100, which actually puts them better off than with this proposition. I think it is important that we put that stuff on the table—that we hear from the minors and from the Liberal Party opposition whether or not their propositions are in addition to the bonuses and whether or not they have costed the bonuses into the figures they claim. We are just throwing cash around here willy-nilly. I think it is important we understand what people are actually advocating here. In any event, as I say, on the basis of Senator Fielding extending with his amendments the increases to about 3,690,000 people, which is way above the figure of 900,000 who would benefit from the original Liberal proposition, we end up with a figure, on a rough calculation, of about $5.7 billion per annum or $22 billion to $23 billion over the budget cycle.