John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I must comment on one of Senator Cameron’s remarks, where he talked about an ‘effective Labor government’. To me that is an oxymoron. We are talking about the New South Wales government, the ‘premier state’. That was what its title was, has been and hopefully will be after March 2011. The situation in New South Wales is that 500 people a week pack up and move out of the state. I suppose Senator Cameron is proud of the way his colleagues are running the state of New South Wales.

Prior to the last election we had 50 federal seats in New South Wales and just 28 in Queensland. Of course, one was taken off us, the seat of Gwydir. We went down to 49, and Queensland went up to 29 because people are moving out. They would not have a bar of Labor and the way they were managing the state of New South Wales. What happens now? The move keeps on and New South Wales is about to go down to 48 seats, while Queensland goes up to 30. The Rees government—and those of his predecessors, Mr Iemma and Mr Carr—have had a policy to drive people out of the state. That is a fact and the AEC can confirm that.

Let us go back to the Labor Party and Bob Carr. He will halve our elective surgery lists. Have a look at them now. He will lead the greenest government the state has ever seen. They have become the blackest government because of the way they have locked up national parks, have not managed them, have let the fuel levels increase, after lightning strikes they burn, the fire kills the trees, kills the animals and they call it conservation. I call it destruction and we are seeing more and more of it. Now it is going to continue because we have the Labor government in Canberra combined with the Labor government in New South Wales buying places like Toorale Station and locking it up for national parks—90,000 hectares, 225,000 acres. That will be the next fireball we will see in a few years time and you call it conservation.

I want to have a look at the history of what we have seen in the last 14 years of Labor in New South Wales. I mentioned Mr Carr; he knew when to jump off the ship, didn’t he? Then along came Mr Iemma. He did not change anything at all. He had been the health minister. New South Wales has had four ministers in the health portfolio in the last four years. They are just getting removed, sacked or resigning for whatever reason.

That is the way you are running your health system. It all started with the outrageous super health boards that you introduced. For 100 years local volunteers could run our health system, could run our hospitals, and then along came Mr Genius and did away with them. Look at the mess they are in now. We have just seen a situation in Gilgandra and Coonabarabran where meat could not be supplied to the hospitals because the bills were not being paid by the New South Wales Labor government. Small business finally said: ‘Enough is enough. We’re not giving you any more credit.’ I suppose some over there are proud of that management. I would be disgusted with it.

Only a couple of weeks ago I had the privilege to be with the current—hang on; I have got that wrong; I should say past—health minister, Mr John Della Bosca, when he opened the hospitals at Bingara and Warialda. He was cosying up very closely with his Independent colleagues Mr Torbay and Mr Windsor. A great coalition they are; one supports the other. Mr Torbay got given the Speaker’s position as a way of saying, ‘Thanks for the way you attack the National Party at each election.’ You notice the Independent Mr Torbay never goes after the Labor Party. He only campaigns against the National Party. But that is to be expected because he was a member of the Labor Party till 1997. He was warden of the Student Union at the University of New England, so we know what colour his politics are.

So we were standing there, opening the hospitals, and there was not a mention of John Anderson, the former member for Gwydir, who guaranteed the money to see that those hospitals were built. The situation at Warialda prior to that, 10 years ago, was that there was going to be a nine-to-five hospital. You call that running the health system? This is the Labor Party in charge of rural health. It was a disgrace. There were no thankyous to those who actually got the money for it.

So let us move along and look at the management of New South Wales. We have seen people jump ship. Mr Iemma called the troops together and said, ‘Behave yourselves or you’re gone.’ They replied, ‘Sorry, you’re gone.’ And off went Mr Iemma. Off went Reba Meagher. The next thing was that Treasurer Costa pulled up stumps and did the bolt. We could go back through the history of them all. There is a list of them. Mr Orkopoulos is looking at striped sunlight for his activities. Look at Matt Brown; he was sacked. Look at Tony Stewart—dumped from his position. On and on it goes. And these are the Labor Party people, from Sussex Street, Sydney, who are running the state of New South Wales. No doubt this will flow on through to Canberra.

We have a situation here where you are going on a spending spree of $16 billion to build buildings in schools. Who is responsible for buildings in schools? It is the state government’s responsibility. What do we have here? We have the federal government propping up the states for their failure to deliver proper infrastructure in education right throughout Australia.

In the meantime, there is one sector that has been neglected terribly, and that is aged care. Aged-care facilities are actually a federal responsibility. There is a little place at Bundarra, 40 kilometres south of Inverell, called the Grace Munro Centre. In only a few weeks time that aged-care facility will close. That is the way you are looking after aged-care facilities. What money did you put into your stimulus package to look after aged care? The answer is not a cent. It is your responsibility to look after the elderly. The Medicare rebate for the removal of cataracts is to be cut down to $300. I think a veterinary surgeon charges $2,000 to $3,000 to remove a cataract from a dog, and you expect an eye specialist to remove a human cataract for $300. It is outrageous! But this is your care for the elderly.

You go and pour the money into schools to prop up your failing states, especially New South Wales, and neglect the very thing we must address first, and that is looking after our elderly. They are the very people who gave us this nation in the condition it is in now. They are the ones who fought in the wars, the ones who worked hard. And what are we doing? Closing their facilities. Recently 8,000 beds were issued and there were only 5,000 take-ups because the providers know very well that the money they get for aged-care nursing does not cover the cost of running the facilities. This is a big part of your negligence in the Labor Party: you will not look after our elderly.

I could go on and on, but I would just like to say that the Labor government in New South Wales are a disgrace. They have neglected the people of New South Wales, especially those in regional areas. No doubt everyone in New South Wales is looking at them and saying, ‘Bring on March 2011.’ No doubt the policies will flow on to Canberra.