Maria Kovacic (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I can't think that there are many people who think they are better off today than they were three years ago, so it stuns me to hear Senator Sheldon say that everybody will be worse off under a Dutton government. I don't think that's actually possible. I think that the government have done an excellent job of creating a cost-of-living crisis that most Australians cannot navigate. They are finding it really hard to navigate.

Senator Cadell asked some really important questions around the mining sector, particularly that of my home state of New South Wales. The Prime Minister, on his website, has a statement that says, 'A Labor government and a better future.' I challenge him on that because Australians have not had a better future under this government since they elected it—three years ago.

That's specifically a problem in our regional areas, particularly in mining communities. The Prime Minister is going to be at a dinner tonight, according to the Australian, where he is going to talk to the Australian Industry Group. He's going to say to them that he has always valued their constructive engagement, saying:

… even if we sometimes bring different perspectives to the public debate, we all share the same objective, founded on the same understanding …

I contest that that's not true. I think the reason that they've changed their mind in relation to the nature positive laws is because of something called some marginal seats, including Hunter, Paterson and Shortland. The Labor government is set to lose those seats if they don't change and pivot what they're doing. The reality is that it has nothing to do with consultation. It has nothing to do with what they think is right. It's because they want to ensure that they keep those seats—those seats that have some 20,000 mining workers and almost 2½ thousand mining suppliers. Instead of giving them lip service and telling them what they want to hear before an election, despite egregiously not giving proper disclosure or transparency around what happened at McPhillamys, they now pretend that they matter.

The people in those communities need certainty, and they can't get certainty from this government because there is no clarity on what they will and won't do because they themselves often don't know what they're going to do until after they've done it, which is a real problem for our country.

Question agreed to.