Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I also rise to speak on the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (2014 Budget Measures No. 6) Bill 2014. It has become very clear that the Abbott government is no friend of low-income families, the unemployed, the sick or Australians in times of trouble. Far from it: this government has shown it would prefer to see the most vulnerable Australians go without while it props up multinational companies and the well-to-do. This is a government that wants to sentence young unemployed people to six months without an income while at the same time handing out $50,000 cheques to millionaires to have babies.

From the beginning we have seen an ongoing parade of seriously twisted priorities from those opposite. They are determined to tear up the Australian tradition of the fair go and create a new Australian underclass. There is no greater illustration of this callous, cruel and, quite frankly, shameful attitude to Australians than in the area of social services. It is no overstatement to say that the policies in this area are amongst the harshest this country has ever seen. They tear up key elements of our social contract and launch a direct attack on Australia's national identity as a fair, supportive and egalitarian nation.

No-one will be more betrayed more than young Australians who are out of work. The Abbott government would sentence these people to live on absolutely nothing for six months—nothing to pay for food with, nothing to pay for shelter with and certainly nothing to support job-seeking activities with. I have said it before and I will say it again: unemployment is not a lifestyle choice. The vast majority of job seekers are genuinely seeking work, to break free from the dire impacts of an income that is far below the poverty line. The government's plan to rip away income from young unemployed people is nothing but a recipe for mass desperation, crime and destitution. We need to support our young people to achieve their potential, not toss them out in the cold with few prospects for food or shelter—let alone the money to tackle job searching. Given that youth unemployment hit its highest level since 2001 this month, under the Abbott government, this is a particularly senseless and ill-considered betrayal. Young people need jobs, not punishment.

Next in the crosshairs are pensioners. These people, who have contributed to the social and economic wealth of our great country, are now being treated as little more than a drain on the system. Despite solemnly promising before the election that there would be no cuts to pensions, the Abbott government has set about doing exactly that. They want to change the indexing arrangements so that pensioners will be $80 a week poorer within a decade. They want to change deeming thresholds so that fewer Australians will qualify for the pension and that those who do will receive less. They want to cut the seniors supplement that will see 300,000 pensioners close to $900 a year worse off. And they want to change the pension age, to force Australians to keep working until they are 70 years old. This is a despicable way to treat those who have contributed to this country for decades.

These measures and many others were contained in the original social services legislation that the government has so far failed to get through the Senate. From the beginning, Labor's position was clear: we were not going to support the cuts to the pension; we were not going to allow unemployed people to be plunged into serious and ongoing poverty; and we would never agree to kicking families off family tax benefit B when their youngest child turned six. We were, however, willing to look at sensible measures that would relieve some budgetary pressures, without placing massive burdens on the most vulnerable Australians. The bill before us today is a recognition by the government that they simply do not have the support for their other cruel attacks on vulnerable Australians.

The measures in this bill are the ones that Labor is willing to support. Included are more than $2 billion dollars' worth of savings that the government could have acted on five months ago. Labor was willing to support improved targeting of family tax benefit B by reducing the primary earner income limit from $150,000 a year to $100,000 a year four months ago. Labor was willing to support ceasing of indexation on the clean energy supplement five months ago. Labor was willing to support a two-year indexation pause on the assets value limits for working age allowances five months ago. Labor was willing to support the end of relocation scholarship assistance for students relocating between major cities five months ago. Labor was willing to support plans to limit the six-week overseas portability period for student payments five months ago. Instead, the government decided to forego the savings and bluster on with their harsh attacks on the most vulnerable Australians.

Thankfully, Labor has managed to hold off some of the worst attacks for the time being. However, we should not kid ourselves that the siege is over. We know the Abbott government remains committed to forcing the lowest-income Australians to do the heavy lifting while richer Australians escape relatively unscathed.

The ultimate test for Labor in what we would support is that of fairness. This is a test that the government has failed again and again and again. The Abbott government's vicious budget measures, which we heard nothing about before the election, place the vast majority of cuts on the shoulders of low-income Australians. This has been confirmed independently by Australia's premiere modelling outfit, NATSEM. In its analysis of the budget, NATSEM found that the poorest 20 per cent of Australians would pay $1.1 billion more into government coffers than the richest households. Over the next four years, the poorest 20 per cent of families, or those with $35,000 or less in disposable annual income, would lose $2.9 billion over four years as a result of the harsh changes to family benefits, payments and pensions. Contrast this with the wealthiest 20 per cent of families, who earn $88,000 or more after tax. These families will lose a total of $1.78 billion which is a full 40 per cent less than low-income families. Low- and middle-income single parents would suffer the most, losing between 10 and 15 per cent of family income of up to $60,000 by the time the full brunt of the budget comes into effect in 2017-2018.

But it is not just Labor and NATSEM that know how unfair this budget is. The government obviously knew full well what the dire impacts would be on low- and middle-income Australians. The proof of this is in their decision to end the longstanding practice of publishing detailed family outcomes tables in the budget papers. These tables, which have been included in the budget papers since 2005, show how the budget would impact on different types of families with varying incomes.

After a freedom of information request from Fairfax, Australians learnt that Treasury had in fact prepared a 56-page distributional analysis and a 21-page cameo analysis of the impacts of the budget measures for cabinet. At the same time, Treasury also released a shorter analysis which showed that the budget cuts would hit low-income families to the tune of $842 a year, while an average high-income family would lose only $71 a year. Clearly, cabinet knew of the massive inequity of the impacts of the budget but decided to hide these impacts from Australians. The Abbott government did not want us to see this information, because they knew very well what it revealed about the twisted priorities of this cruel budget.

As a last-minute ruse to try to cover up the rank unfairness of the budget, the Abbott government decided to bring in an extra levy for those earning above $180,000 a year. However, this levy cuts out after three years, while the burden on poorer Australians will continue indefinitely if the government gets its way. Not only that, but the levy includes a loophole that means people with high incomes can easily avoid the levy by employing a few clever tax arrangements and deductions. Make no mistake: despite what Mr Hockey tells us, the age of entitlement is not over. Corporate welfare continues; superannuation perks remain; and those opposite have done everything they can to stand against the global tide to make multinational companies pay their fair share of tax.

Labor has managed to hold back some of the most abhorrent measures in the government's attack on poor Australians, but the fight is not over. In an extraordinarily arrogant move, the government have also reintroduced their savage budget cuts into the parliament in a number of separate bills. The Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, still wants to slash pensions. He still wants to cut support for struggling families. He is committed to leaving young job seekers with no income for six months at a time. Make no mistake: Labor will continue to stand up for families, pensioners and young people and fight against Tony Abbott's savage budget cuts.