Jordon Steele-John (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I have had many a reason and opportunity to wonder whether the workings of this place are in any way in touch with the needs, desires and aspirations of the Australian people, but never so clearly has an example been given to me that we are so disconnected from the Australian community than this tax package. The Australian community that I know—that I love and that I have called my home for most of my life—the values that we hold are of community, are of coming together to get things done and are of fairness. What this means for our taxing contribution system is that we believe that if you are a bit better off you pay a little bit more and if you are less well-off you pay a little bit less. We pool our resources and we fund education, health and transformative programs such as the NDIS. We help our farmers, our young people and our older Australians. We lend a hand.

What this bill seeks to do—what this toxic, greedy package seeks to do—is rip apart the foundation of that fairness and take away from the Australian community the ability to make those changes in people's lives and to invest in the services that they need to live a good life.

You have heard this evening that the view of the Australian people is that everybody believes—the overwhelming majority of us believe—that it is the right of every Australian to live a good life, to have a job, to have a home, to have an education and to live in an environment that is safe, and yet this package systemically seeks to undermine this place's ability to provide those rights for people.

The Liberal government has spent the best part of the last 10 years telling the Australian electorate that there is simply not enough to go around; that we must slash, burn and cut essential services and advocacy groups, and tear down infrastructure spending simply to get a magical budget back into balance. Then overnight—the minute the opinion polls require it and you've got a sniff in the right direction—all of a sudden there's $144 billion sloshing around waiting to be spent. It's $144 billion over the next 10 years and the best this government can think to do with it is give it to the big end of town, not to health, not to education, not to the NDIS, not to ensure that young people have safe and secure work, not to ensure that young people can buy a house affordably, not to ensure that we can go to university, not to ensure that we can go to good-quality TAFE. No, Malcolm Turnbull says: 'Give it to the big end of town. Give it to Gina. Give it to Clive. Give it to Twiggy. They need it. God knows they need another yacht. God knows I need a second house. God knows I just can't take the burden of paying my share.'

It is a disgrace. I sit within this chamber, ashamed of it. There are thousands of people who this very night will go to sleep on the streets of this nation's capitals. There are thousands of farmers who do not know where the next month's pay will come from. There are thousands of women suffering in domestic violence situations. There are thousands of young people struggling with addiction. And yet this chamber is being asked to consider that its highest priority be that billions of dollars be given to billionaires. It is disgusting.

As a former Labor supporter, as a member of a former Labor household, I have to say how disappointed I am to have heard the contributions so far of the Labor Party and to have read in the newspapers today—and over the last couple of months—of their position. I come from a strongly Labor area. My local member is a Labor MP. I live, and proudly so, in the South Metropolitan area of Western Australia. If you want to know what unemployment looks like, what youth unemployment looks like, what lack of services looks like, come to my local community and my local area.

I will tell you now that what the people of my community need is not a double-the-size-because-we-can't-think-of-anything-better-to-do tax cut. They need an increase to Newstart. They need a mandated living wage. They need health. They need education services. They need addiction services. They do not need a tax cut. They need essential services and they need them now, and I am so disappointed to see the Labor Party join in with the government on the rhetoric around this tax auction: 'Who can one-up the other on offering this side or that side a bigger tax cut so we can win the next election, win the next by-election? Let's make sure that we can stay here, rather than thinking about those who need us.'

I have spent too long talking with people who do not know where their next meal will come from and I have spent too long talking with people who do not know if they will have a roof over their head to indulge either side of this chamber in its fantasy that what it is seeking to do will go anywhere near addressing the real needs of Australians who are vulnerable, Australians in need, Australians who should be the focus of the work of this place.

I sit here as the youngest person elected to the Australian Senate. Young people speak to me frequently about their desires and fears and aspirations for the future, and not one of them has ever said to me that the No. 1 priority of Australian politics should be giving billions of dollars to billionaires. Not one of them has said to me, 'What I would like to see is a more greedy society, a more selfish society, a society where we turn on each other and away from each other.' Universally, they say to me that they want to live in a community which cares for each other, which says no to poverty, which says no to fear, which is brave and inclusive and innovative, a community where they know that there will be a job for them when they graduate, a community where they know that their family will be safe.

Those things can only be ensured, those rights can only be safeguarded, when we have the resources to make it so. This package fundamentally undermines our ability to do that. It is greed. It is selfishness. It is political expediency above the needs of the people in its most grotesque form. It is a cold and absolutely atrocious attempt to buy an electorate.

I tell this government that the Australian people are far smarter and far kinder than we so often give them credit for. They see through this. They see through you. They will demand, when they are given the next opportunity, that all of those who participated in this horrendous exercise, which undercuts the community's ability to care for their most vulnerable and safeguard a good future, answer for their actions over the next two days. I take some solace in the knowledge that we in the Australian Greens are at least brave enough to argue that, if there is money to be invested, it go to those who need it, not to those who want it and are able to get the ear of this parliament the most. I thank the chamber for its time.