Matt Thistlethwaite (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The motion that we debate this afternoon is another waste of time—another exercise in futility by those opposite. I often wonder what Australians who watch Senate proceedings on television at home, or indeed those in the public gallery, think of motions such as this one that we debate this afternoon. Often you can see it on the faces of those present in the gallery when they are watching the proceedings. You can see that they are thinking that these proceedings are childish, a waste of time, and in some respects, egocentric. Every year when parliament begins we come in here hopeful that the standards of contribution from the opposition will improve; that they will realise the main game in this place is policy and policy development and who has the better plan for our nation; the contest of ideas; a better future for our country. But no, I read the MPI this morning and I see again another exercise in futility—what is, in essence, another high school debating topic that the parliament is going to waste the next hour on.

A couple weeks ago I had the great pleasure, or fortunate opportunity, to tour Coonabarabran with the Prime Minister in the wake of the devastating bushfires that ravaged that area. I toured the area with the mayor, Peter Shinton, and the member for Parkes, Mark Coulton. We met some great Australians: people like Bob Fenwick, a Rural Fire Service captain who, when his own house was burning down, was not present because he was up the road saving one of his neighbours' houses. I saw and met some of the families that are struggling to cope with the fact that they have lost it all—lost their home and their belongings, lost their stock, lost a lot of memories. They wanted support from government. They wanted support to help them get through and they got it. The Prime Minister was there, I was there, Mark Coulton was there. All levels of government were represented. Kevin Humphries was there, and Centrelink officers were there to meet with people every day to reassure them that they would have the support of government. We announced a national disaster recovery payment, immediately available for those families that needed help. We announced that donations to the mayor's appeal would be tax-deductible.

When Queensland was ravaged by floods once again over the last couple of weeks, they wanted support from government and they got it. When a couple years ago many people were left without insurance from the floods in Queensland they wanted action from the government and they got it when Bill Shorten banged the heads of the insurance companies together, sat them down and made them work out a definition of 'flood' to ensure that those people could enjoy insurance for what is unfortunately becoming an annual event in the north of Australia.

If those Australians could see what goes on in this parliament at times, some of the puerile issues that we debate, I think they would be horrified and, most importantly, unfortunately, I think they would feel let down. I am not opposed to having an argument, not at all. I am not opposed to having a debate. That is the great beauty of this place, but it should be about ideas. It should be about who has the better policy. Let us at least make those disagreements about who has a better future for our nation. The main game is policy and when you look at and analyse the policies of this government we have done a good job. We have made progress for Australia.

When we came to government our economy was the 15th largest in the world. Because of this government's economic management it is now the 12th largest economy in the world. We have gone past South Korea, we have gone past Mexico and we have gone past Spain. The Australian dollar is the fourth most traded currency in the world. Why? Because we have a stable democracy and we have a strong economy; people see value in trading the Australian dollar and they see it, most importantly, as safe. We have managed our economy in a manner that is fair.

The most important security you could provide a family is a job, and since we have come to government we have created 700,000 new jobs in this economy. In a time when most economies, particularly those of Europe and the United States, have lost jobs and have gone backwards, this has not happened in Australia. We have maintained our position as a strong economy and provided a means to support families through having a job. But we have not only been giving people jobs, we have made those jobs fairer because we introduced the Fair Work Act to ensure that people could not be forced onto individual contracts and have their conditions ripped away from them.

We have supported families in all that we have done through the taxation system to make it fairer through the process of introducing a carbon price. It has been about supporting families to ensure that as our economy progresses those on low to middle incomes have the opportunity to better themselves and provide a better education for their kids and a better healthcare system in their local community, and that is what we have fought for. We have provided tax cuts. Most recently we have provided about $300 a year in tax cuts for those who are on less than $80,000 a year. We have increased the tax-free threshold from $6,000 to $18,000, providing a massive tax break for those on low incomes. We have introduced a school kids bonus because we understand that parents struggle to meet the costs of sending kids to school each year. We have helped them with that.

We have rebuilt every single school in this country. We spent $16 billion in the best way you can spend government money—on education, on a better future and on a more productive economy through the Building the Education Revolution. We put new computers in nearly every school in this country. We have built trade training centres to ensure that kids who are not academically minded have the opportunity to begin a trade whilst they are at school.

Climate change is the most significant challenge of our time. This government has introduced a policy that has seen emissions in our economy reduce, ensuring that we provide a better future for our children. Importantly, we have done this in the most efficient and least costly way for our economy. Guess what? It is working in the manner in which the government modelled it—the cost is less than one per cent on the consumer price index and families have got support to make that transition to a clean energy future.

Our economy faces a major challenge with the ageing of our population. Over the next couple of decades there will be a dramatic reduction in the number of people who are working in our economy to support our retirees. We are planning for that. We have reformed our superannuation system, pushing compulsory superannuation contributions from nine per cent to 12 per cent over the next eight years, to ensure that people retire with an adequate savings bank so that there is less of an impost on our social security system, our healthcare system and our aged-care system.

For those on low incomes we have effectively wiped out tax on superannuation through the low-income superannuation contribution. Anyone who earns less than $37,000 in our economy pays no tax on their superannuation—none at all. That provides an incentive for those people to go to work rather than to go out of work and go on welfare. What is the coalition's approach to that policy? Last week at the National Press Club when Tony Abbott was asked by a journalist, 'Would an Abbott-led government scrap the low-income superannuation contribution?' his words were, 'Yes, that stands.' They will get rid of the low-income superannuation contribution, imposing a tax increase on 3.5 million workers in this country. The lowest paid, those earning less than $37,000, will pay more tax under a Liberal Abbott government. Unfortunately, most of those are women who work part time. As if they are not doing it tough enough, they will be kicked in the guts by an Abbott-led government. Just last night we saw Christopher Pyne on Q&A