Linda Reynolds (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I can't help but reflect on the word of the year by the Macquarie Dictionary, listening to those opposite here today. The word of the year is an:

… Anglo-Saxon term wrapped in affixes which elevate it to being almost formal; almost respectable. This word captures what many of us feel is happening to the world and to so many aspects of our lives at the moment.

This is the word of the year.

Everywhere I go in Western Australia, I hear from locals that Western Australia and Australia is now heading in the wrong direction. Nobody has ever said to me that they feel that the nation under Labor, after the last 2½ years, is going in the right direction. While we've just heard from those opposite, 'We believe in all of these things,' the facts demonstrate that they cannot deliver it. In fact, everything they do makes everything that impacts on Australians worse, particularly their financial situation.

What are the facts? Under Labor we've had 12 interest rate rises which have been caused by Labor's deliberate policies. The $315 billion, so far, that they've pump primed into the economy has resulted in interest rate rises and also inflation which, as everybody knows in every household across Australia and Western Australia, makes it even harder to live. Whether it's a weekly grocery shop, the monthly bills or the cost of doing business for so many small businesses, everybody is hurting. The reality is that, under Prime Minister Albanese, every Western Australian is worse off. While interest rates are well and truly falling in New Zealand, Canada, the United States and the UK, there is no sign of relief in the upcoming months—not even one interest rate drop here in Australia.

A recent report by the Financial Wellbeing Collective, collated from its 12 partners, including Anglicare in Western Australia and Uniting WA, shows that financial hardship is now being experienced by families and individuals it has never touched before, even those earning two incomes. We see that at Foodbank in Western Australia—record support for double-income families who cannot meet their mortgage and feed their families. There has been a 111 per cent increase in employed clients accessing emergency relief in the past three years. There's been an 85 per cent increase in financial counselling in Western Australia. There's been a 27 per cent increase in couple households where at least one person is employed but they are still seeking financial support because those opposite have made it impossible for them to afford to live. In Western Australia, those opposite's housing policies—despite all of their rhetoric over the last two-and-a-half years, including today—have not built a single home yet.

Perth is now, sadly, the most unaffordable city for renters, with rents climbing by 80 per cent since those opposite came to government.

Today's national news, which those opposite were desperate to try and hide—if there was any doubt, absolutely, it bells the cat—shows that, under this Albanese government, Labor is presiding over the longest household recession, with GDP per capita going backwards in the last six quarters. This is a trend that is not only the worst in the recession or in the pandemic but the worst in our lifetime. Economists are warning us that this will extend with the possibility that Labor may record two years of continuous negative GDP growth. It is time for Western Australians to say, 'Enough is enough,' and vote out Anthony Albanese and his government.

This brings me back to the word of the year by Macquarie Dictionary Online, which so captures what those opposite have done.