Jacqui Lambie (Tasmania, Jacqui Lambie Network) Share this | Hansard source

First of all, I just want to make it quite clear that this bill that I was doing this morning is very important to me and many veterans out there. I did not tell the Labor Party until about eight or 8:30 last night that I could not put this bill up. The reason I cannot put this bill up is that it will fail. It will fail the veterans and what they need for a royal commission, because I haven't got it right. I haven't got that right. I am close and I know you guys know I've been working on it. Senator Scarr is working on it with me. I just haven't been able to get it done in the time. I'm making phone calls and I'm doing everything I can because I know those royal commissioners need every document they can possibly order or want on the table to make those veterans' lives better. I would be standing up this morning and just grandstanding because I still do not have the answer. I will continue and I hope to God I have that by the next sitting and that we can make an agreement so that royal commissioners have every bit of evidence that they need to continue on with this royal commission and to make those recommendations for the future—that they have that in the next three or four weeks. But I apologise. I apologise to those veterans out there. I just don't have that answer this morning. I'm not going to sit here and waste an hour's time when I know I can find that bloody answer; it's there and I will find it. That's my first point.

My second point is this. We got houses built because I got a deal done with your party last time. Those houses have made a significant difference in Tasmania. I will give credit to Peter Gutwein and the Liberal Party in the state down there. They were a little bit slow to get started, but I understand that. That process takes about two years because you've got to get greenfield sites, you've got to get the materials and you've got to have the tradies. I know that and I understand. But we're doing a bloody good job taking the politics out of it. We are doing a good job in Tasmania and we're trying to build them as fast as we can; I know that. But I have to say to my colleagues from Tasmania: we are falling behind because, for every one we've built, we've got nearly bloody 50 more on that waiting list. We can't hold this back. I know this is not perfect, but people out there need roofs over their heads. So, for goodness sake, please, can we just get a starter on this? I really don't want to hold this back any further.

Nothing's ever perfect up here. It's never perfect. But as somebody who knows what it's like to move out of normal housing and know that we didn't have to live in a tent with my mum, which would have absolutely paralysed her—knowing that she couldn't keep a roof over her kids' heads is heartbreaking. We cannot hold this up. We need this to get through. We cannot hold this up another day. So, please, to you people over here who think you have a social conscience: do you really want to keep playing with people's lives? Do you really? Because all I hear about is all these women out there in domestic violence houses.

You have an opportunity to get it started. You have the biggest balance of power in this parliament this time around. You have that. You can keep chipping away. It's no different to what you do with your gas and coal and what you're doing there. You keep getting better at it. You keep reducing on having more gas and coal here and you're doing a great job. But we need a starter. This is something we can keep chipping away at and we can keep doing deals and adding to it. So, please, can we just use a base here and get started today. No more of the politics, no more of the rubbish—I just want roofs over people's heads. That's all I want.

I want to thank the Labor Party for being very constructive. I know that Senator Tyrrell's worked very hard with you guys. I know there have been a lot of hours put into this. We may not get this perfect, but we've got to start. What we do know is that every state has been promised 1,200 houses to get started. Let's get it started because it is going to take quite a few years to get them to start it and get them built. In the meantime we can chip away. We also know there'll be an election by the time they get started on building them. I can tell you now, if people are crying out for houses, they're going to be offered a lot more. But at least get the program started so we can get moving and so I don't have as many people out there, especially our children, without houses. For that next generation, I don't want to see them starting their lives living in a tent, because that's really unfair. We're not acting like adults by doing that to our children of the future. It is as simple as that today.