James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

'Crisis'—thank you, Senator Brockman. It's a cost-of-living crisis. It's almost like a focus group told him: 'By the way, Prime Minister, we're in a cost-of-living crisis. You should do something about it.' You know what that focus group was? It was the Australian people, on the weekend. They told him to focus on the issues that impact upon all Australians. Australian families, whether you live in Cairns, Cunnamulla, Brisbane—I'm a Queensland senator; all I care about is Queensland—or wherever you live in Queensland, you've got a Labor government who don't care about you. They care about chasing your vote, but they don't care about how you live your lives and they don't care about how tough your life is at the moment.

During the recent referendum, I spent a fair bit of time driving around Queensland, going into prepolls, talking to voters. In fact, I do that all the time, even when elections aren't on. The No. 1 issue in Queensland is cost of living, followed by the crime crisis, followed by the hospital ramping crisis, followed by the infrastructure crisis. Queenslanders have lost out. We've won reverse lotto. We've got a Labor state government and now we've got a Labor federal government, and both governments aren't helping Australian families and are continuing to break their promises.

What is interesting is the top 10—or is it the bottom 10?—things that are really hitting Queensland families. If you look at inflation since August last year, education is up 5½ per cent—that's No. 10. If you want to go on a holiday and rent a motel somewhere—you don't want to get on a Qantas flight because you can't afford those, thanks to the cartel—that has gone up 6.6 per cent. Manufactured food products, No. 8, went up 6.9 per cent. Rents have gone up 7.8 per cent. Insurance and financial services, No. 6 on my top-10 list, have gone up 8.8 per cent. Dairy and related products have gone up 10.1 per cent. But guess what? I bet the dairy farmers aren't getting the money that they need for their work. Then you've got No. 4. Bread and cereal products have gone up 10.4 per cent. In the last year, electricity has gone up at least 12.7 per cent.

What you're going to find is that, despite this government promising 97 times before the last election that they would reduce your bills by $275, you'll be lucky if your bills only go up by 12.7 per cent. You're looking at between 20 and 30 per cent. If you've got gas—and that hasn't been banned yet by the Labor Party—that's gone up 12.9 per cent. Heaven forbid, if you happen to be lucky enough to drive a car and own a car, how much fuel is costing at the moment. When you go there and you look at the price, you actually think the bowser has made a mistake and that someone needs to give it a kick or go in and speak to the attendant and say, 'I think there's a problem here.' Clearly, petrol cannot cost this much.

Australians and Queenslanders are living in this cost-of-living crisis, and we have a prime minister who does not understand. He talks the words, but he does not walk in the boots of working Queenslanders and working Australians.