Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to rise today to put on the record some facts about the tax cuts that are underway for more Australians. As Senator Wong said in her response to questions to her today from Senator Hume and as we've just had materialise in that contribution by our fellow senator, this is an opposition that's complaining about a change that they're now actually going to vote for. They're coming grumbling, whingeing and whining in their questions and their commentary about a tax cut for no fewer than 13.6 million Australians. That's 13.6 million Australians who stand to benefit from the decisions of a responsible Labor government led by Anthony Albanese and defended here in this first question today by the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Wong, and they are whingeing and whining on the opposite side. Finally, after saying they were never going to agree to the changes that we proposed, finally, under pressure from the Australian people themselves, they've changed their position in the last 24 hours and they accept that maybe they shouldn't stand between 13.6 million Australians and a tax cut they desperately, desperately need.

You've got a couple of choices when you're a government. You can either stand deaf to the Australian people, wring your hands, say, 'Oh, I'm so sorry it's a bit hard for you at the moment,' and do nothing, which is what we saw under the opposition when they were in government, or you can actually listen to the Australian people, actually care, invest energy and emotion in responding to the concerns that they raise and then carefully design a response to the pain and suffering that they're articulating to you. We did it when we put in Medicare 40 years ago. We've been talking about the anniversary of 40 years of Medicare. People should know that the major cause of bankruptcy before Labor instituted Medicare was medical debt. We heard, we designed policy and we responded, and that is what's going on with the tax cuts for 13.6 million Australians.

I want to speak to the duty seats that I represent across the great state of New South Wales. If you're in Oberon, Orange or Bathurst in the seat of Calare, a beautiful part of the state of New South Wales, there will be 71,000 local people who will be getting an average tax cut of $1,532. That's 85 per cent of the people of Calare under Labor's tax plan where you keep more of the money that you earn. That's what we will be supporting, and, belatedly, after a huge whinge and a continuing dummy spit, the opposition now say that they're on board. If you're from Farrer and live in Albury or Coleambally, 76,000 taxpayers are going to get the benefit of Labor's policy which is responding to the pressure that Australians are telling us that they're under from cost of living. The average tax cut for 66,000 people in the seat of Farrer is $1,359. In Hume, if you're in Narellan or Picton or anywhere around that seat, 79,000 taxpayers will benefit to the tune of $1,585. That's 68,000 taxpayers who are going to get a bigger cut than they would have under the Liberal-National coalition's plan. In Lyne, if you live in Manning Point or Kew, 57,000 of your fellow citizens will get a $1,325 cut. If you're in the seat Riverina around Wagga Wagga, 67,000 of the people that you live around in that community will get an average tax cut of $1,425. In Parkes, Coonabarabran, Broken Hill, Dubbo and Wilcannia, 62,000 people will receive a tax cut, with an average of $1,465 going back to individual taxpayers. These are the facts. They're a Labor investment in the people of Australia—allowing you to keep more of your tax for your own benefit and for the benefit of your local economy.