Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Immigration and Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I apologise, Mr Deputy President—that put Prime Minister Rudd into the leadership and that is his key supporter base.

As I said, it is important to remember what this well-oiled, disciplined machine is. They put Nathan Rees in, they put Bob Carr in and they have been running New South Wales for years and mismanaging it shockingly. Look at New South Wales today and you will see what this country will become after this Labor government has finished with it. An incompetent, mismanaged, corrupt Labor Party machine that has catastrophically failed in New South Wales for more than a decade will now go and do the same thing at a federal level.

Look at the toxicity of what we have now become. Labor’s failures in New South Wales are the most spectacular but Labor failures are all around the country. The so-called stimulus package was the classic example. The schools program was the most spectacular example of classic Labor Party spin and politics. They said that they wanted to put a lot of money into the economy and give support to the construction industry and tradies. Yet we know that what is actually happening is that schools are having the Julia Gillard memorial assembly halls foisted upon them, whether they want it or not. We know that the neediest schools are missing out and we know that local tradesmen and women are not getting the jobs. They are going to the large firms chosen by the state Labor governments.

When we were in power and the coalition had the vision of re-plumbing rural Australia so that we could produce more food and fibre with less water, there was an opportunity to put money back to do all this work. Of course it would have created jobs. It would have created jobs in regional New South Wales. But that would not have afforded the Labor Party the ribbon-cutting opportunities. Senator Heffernan would very much agree with this, given his keen interest in rural New South Wales. They chose not to do it because with school halls it has really become all about politics.

The most cynical result of this is that these signs that have been forced on schools—that they have to put up and keep there until after the election—will, funnily enough, be there on polling day. This will be the so-called gentle reminder that people should vote Labor back into power. As we know, the Australian Electoral Commission has said that this is a breach of the electoral provisions, so now we are going to spend millions of more dollars to put little signs at the bottom to rectify what was clearly—and, I have to say, I think intentionally—done. But time will tell whether that was in fact the case.

When the coalition was in power we had a very successful Investing in Our Schools program where we went to the school communities and we said, ‘Okay, what is it that you most want? What is it that you actually need?’ That is not like this government, which has told them that they are going to have their Julia Gillard memorial hall. We actually asked schools what they needed the most and met those needs. I am sorry that Senator Arbib is not here because I wanted to tell him that on one occasion when I was attending with a minister from New South Wales—and I will not mention the minister’s name—she said, ‘Thank goodness for the federal government’s Investing in Our Schools program because we could not fund the inadequate facilities that we have in schools.’ For example, in the Illawarra, where my electorate office is, there are some schools that have been there for more than 50 years and are asking the state government in New South Wales to rectify their toilets and the government has not done it. Instead of getting their toilets fixed, which is so important, they are going to get the Julia Gillard memorial hall whether they like it or not.

In the end, we are borrowing all this money and we are going into debt. This debt that we are incurring is being spent and not properly targeted. Every dollar and every cent of that $350 billion—and the rest, because we are kidding ourselves if we honestly think that Labor is going to stop at $350 billion—that we are borrowing will have to be repaid. It will have to be repaid by the taxpayers of Australia. This is short-term gain—which has been spun very effectively—for long-term pain. I say to those of you sitting in the gallery that you may or may not have got moneys now but you will certainly be paying for it. And to those listening to this broadcast: get ready, because you are going to be paying for many years to come.

When we do look at New South Wales, it was once the driving force of the Australian economy—