Pauline Hanson (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's quite interesting to listen to some of the debate here on the floor of the chamber today. Last Wednesday, 20 June, I set out the reasons I supported personal tax cuts. Let me repeat that: personal tax cuts. It was because I wanted to see all hardworking Australians receive tax relief into the future, and it's going to be a rebate for the next four years for them. It's quite interesting that Labor did not want to give their voters—their supporters—this tax cut. My colleague Senator Georgiou and I actually considered a number of issues. We looked carefully at different occupations and the number of individuals who would or would not benefit from each stage of the personal tax cuts. I reminded Labor that tens of thousands of electricians, plumbers, nurses, secondary school teachers, mechanics and welders earn more than $90,000 and would miss out on a permanent tax cut if Labor opposed stage 2. I don't know why they weren't advised properly about this. They did not want to give these people tax relief or tax cuts.

In today's MPI debate, Labor were once again twisting and changing this to justify their position. What they're putting across to the Australian people is wrong. They're saying that it's only going to be the big end of town, the investment bankers, that will benefit from this $7,000 tax cut. But they're not looking at those people who earn up to the $200,000 who are going to get tax relief. I say now: Australians need it. They are doing it tough, they really are. But they want to cut back on them getting any incentives whatsoever.

It was wonderful here: Senator O'Neill was saying that she doesn't want the $7,000 and that she's going to donate it to a hospital. I'd like to see that happen. I remember last year in the chamber here, when there was a vote that we do not accept our pay rises until the budget is in surplus. Guess what? On this side of the chamber, only six people voted for it. One Nation was there. Where was everyone else? Over there! Where was Labor? There, on the other side of the chamber. They weren't interested; they voted themselves pay rises. The hypocrisy of the whole lot of them makes me, and Australians, fed up. So don't deny other Australians tax relief or rebates when you want to take your own pay packets!

I've donated my $4,000 to the Young Veterans at Caboolture. I've actually donated money to on Meals on Wheels and I've donated to veterans' associations, and that's worth a lot more than the $7,000 that you say is the tax cut that I'm giving to myself. Those tax cuts, up to that amount of money, don't come in until 2024-25. The whole fact is, who's to say that I'm going to be here to get the tax cuts? It's all right for you to dish it out but you're not prepared to take it back.

What did Labor do? The day following my speech supporting personal tax cuts, Labor commenced a rabid campaign against me in an attempt to cover the massive blunder they had made by not supporting tax cuts for their heartland workers. Labor robocalled Longman voters with the message that I had voted for the big end of town, which was understood by callers to my office to mean that I had already voted in respect of the government's proposal to give all companies tax cuts. They did not tell the truth to the people. It was nothing to do with the company tax cuts, and I have made that quite clear. One Nation will not be supporting company tax cuts. So I haven't flip-flopped. I said no originally, then I said yes. Then I have said no, and I've stuck to it.

Do you know what's wrong, Mr Acting Deputy President Marshall? Bill Shorten wanted company tax cuts years ago. But Bill Shorten has changed his opinion now and said he won't give them, and so have a lot of the others on the other side. I have taken a well-managed approach to this. I will look at legislation and if I decide it's wrong I'm not going to apologise for backing down and saying it's wrong.