Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this matter of public importance. For the coalition to talk about governing for all Australians is quite remarkable when we think that under a coalition government we would have the richest mining companies in this country paying less tax. We would have low-income earners certainly being worse off, let alone what to think about the working families of this country. We have form by the coalition in this area; that is why they are in opposition. The Australian people will never forget that the reason the coalition are in opposition is their attack on working men and women in this country from their policy on Work Choices—that is why they were voted out. They talk about governing for all Australians but we know that the pockets of those friends of the Liberal Party belong to the higher echelons of income earners. They are the ones the Liberal Party is going to answer to. It is cuts to their taxes that the Liberal Party will respond to. Forget the rest of the working people. We know this because of the form that they displayed while they were in government.

Senator Williams talks about the NBN. Coming from Tasmania, I have not met one person—not one person—in Tasmania who has said they do not want the NBN or that the NBN is a bad idea. In fact, it is to the contrary. It cannot be laid fast enough. Businesses are demanding it. The growth in small business is going to be phenomenal, when a business can be located in Tasmania, as opposed to being in a big city like Melbourne or Sydney, because it has that technological advantage. It is absolutely rubbish to say, 'Where is the money going into the NBN; where is it spent?' It is also rubbish to talk about where money is going and where it will be spent when we think about coalition policy and the big $70 billion black hole that they still have festering in a corner—the elephant in the room, shall we call it? It is the thing they do not want to talk about: 'We don't want to lift the lid on that one, do we? Oh no, what's going to happen?'

We had Mr Joe Hockey in Tasmania today. He certainly did not want to talk about the $70 billion black hole. No, not at all. Then Senator Williams spoke about division. Well, let us talk about division. When we look at the coalition's policy on GST distribution, we had Mr Hockey in Tasmania today saying that Tasmanians would not be worse off under the allocation of the GST under the coalition. Tasmania will not be worse off, said Mr Hockey. Yet only a week ago we had the Deputy Opposition Leader Julie Bishop claiming that Tasmania was 'getting handouts from Western Australia'. She said in an interview on Sky News on 10 February:

We agree that Western Australia should have a fair go and will certainly be looking at the GST in government.

Divided or united? Which way are you on GST distribution? We can go a bit further. Let us go to the Leader of the Opposition. Tony Abbott himself has flagged that Tasmania's GST allocation will be on the chopping block under a coalition government. He said:

I think that does seem quite unfair, that the people of Western Australia get so little back from the GST revenue that they provide to the rest of the country.

Well, well. There is absolutely no uniting on the issue of GST distribution, yet here is Mr Hockey coming to Tasmania, bells and whistles, pretending he is a friend to all Tasmanians and they will not be worse off. Joe Hockey repeatedly gave hollow assurances today that Tasmania would not be worse off. He failed. The answer is in the detail that he did not give. That answer is he failed to rule out that the introduction of a per capita distribution system, being demanded by the Liberal Premiers and Treasurers in all the states where there are Liberal governments, would be ruled out. On the one hand he says that Tasmania will not be worse off and, on the other hand, we have Ms Julie Bishop and the leader of the coalition saying exactly the opposite. I do not know if there is a better example of division in the coalition right now than on that issue of GST distribution.

We on this side of the chamber govern for all Australians. I am very proud to stand here as a member of the Gillard Labor government and to look at the record that we have in delivering for all Australians and especially for a number of disadvantaged Australians—particularly those who are waiting for the date when we have a national disability insurance scheme. The coalition did nothing on this issue while they were in government. They had 11 years to act and do something on this issue.