Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Education) Share this | Hansard source

Five years of the Labor government and this is what we have, colleagues. This is the contribution we have from the government on their record.

Senator Bilyk just said we are the envy of the developed world. If it was not so sad it would be laughable. When you look around this nation and see what the government has done to this country—when you walk down the main streets in regional towns or through the cities, talk to the businesses and see the complete lack of confidence in this government that is reverberating right around this nation—you know that it is this Labor government that has created the situation. There is no confidence. Small business out there has no confidence in this government whatsoever and money has stopped moving. People are not spending because they are so uncertain about what the future holds and it is all the fault of this Labor government. Five long, hard years—it is all about fives today; a five-year-old could do a better job of running the country than this current Labor government.

Senator Bilyk said we on this side should use some facts. Let us have a look at a few facts. This government has turned $70 billion in net assets into over $150 billion of net debt—fact. Only a government as bad as this Labor government could manage to do that. They have run up the four biggest deficits in Australian history following on from the Howard government's four biggest surpluses. This government sits in judgement on that side of the chamber and tries to tell us what a fabulous, terrific job they are doing. But—to go to what Senator Bilyk said—when you look at the facts it is simply not true.

Labor's failed border protection policies have blown out the immigration budget by around $6½ billion over the last four years. That is a fact. This government could not manage its way out of a tea party. They cannot manage money. They cannot make a decent policy decision to save themselves. We have seen the Home Insulation Program—$2½ billion mismanaged there. The computers in schools program had a $1½ billion blow-out. There were the Green Loans and Green Start programs—a $175 million Green Loans program was mismanaged and eventually dumped, then replaced with a $130 million Green Start program that—oh gosh, colleagues!—never started.

The list goes on and on. The solar homes program was cancelled with a blow-out of $850 million; the program was originally meant to cost $150 million. There were Labor's talkfests—colleagues, who can forget about all the talkfests we have seen? There was the 2020 Summit, the Henry tax review, the tax summit—a million dollars there—and the jobs summit, but there were hardly any outcomes. This government could not manage its way out of a paper bag. Billions of dollars were spent on the school halls program—the mismanagement there was just absolutely extraordinary. Forty-three billion dollars was spent on the NBN which is an absolute dog. Senator Conroy continually says in this place how fantastic and tremendous it is; it is absolute rubbish.

The list is endless. It goes on and on. Who can forget Fuelwatch and GROCERYchoice? Nearly $30 million spent setting them up—and then they were dumped. Every single example we look at of this waste, mismanagement and reckless spending is money that has not been spent on the things that needed to be done like things to improve the future in regional Australia. When it comes to things like health and education, there are around $3.9 billion in cuts to education funding in MYEFO.

The waste and mismanagement is breathtaking. My personal favourite is that the government sold the parliamentary billiard tables for around $5,000. Okay, fair enough. If they wanted to sell them, perhaps there was a need for it; go right ahead and sell them. What they then did was spend $102,000 determining whether or not they got value for money. That is extraordinary. With the waste, mismanagement and reckless spending we have seen from this government, it is no wonder people right across Australia do not trust this government or believe anything this government says. They know the only way forward for this nation is to support a coalition government in the future.

Question agreed to.