Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by Opposition senators today.

That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by opposition senators today.

Before I start, I want to touch on one part of today's question time, when Minister Scullion was asked questions by Senator Canavan about the beef industry. I think it should be noted that, I think, about $100 million or $120 million is going into beef roads for upgrades. That is very, very important—I admit that—but I find it the height of hypocrisy for it to be coming from the government, because not long ago the hardworking Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport References Committee ably supported me as the chair and my good mate Senator Bullock as an ongoing—

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Sterle, the motion before—

Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am going to get there, Mr Deputy President, but I have to clarify some misleading from the government.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is not actually the question before the chair, so, as cooperative as I am, please come back to the question before us.

Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Okay, let's talk about some of the measures in the budget—and I did refer to $100 million in the budget to beef roads. If you listened to that mob over there, you would think that they gave a damn about the beef industry. With the greatest of respect, the red meat industry would love to have some answers from the minister. Minister Joyce has gone missing in action, through you, Mr Deputy President. If he did give a fat rat's backside about the industry, he would at least have the decency to come back and address their concerns. They have asked for a lousy $4 million of assistance to keep this great industry afloat and they want to talk about best returns to the farm gate. Senator Canavan knows where I am coming from. Senator Canavan has absolutely no doubt where I am coming from. If they did care about the beef industry, which is worth $8.6 billion, they would talk about the real issues of how the industry have put forward a proposal to save themselves, with not a mention of it in the budget.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Sterle, I do need to bring you back to the motion before the chair.

Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is not a mention in the budget about that.

Mr Deputy President, regarding the budget, what a calamitous issue we have here. It was only 18 months ago when we had Mr Abbott and Mr Hockey, ably backed up by all the now government senators and members, telling us about some fiscal crisis we had and how they were the only ones who could fix it. They said they would fix this budget emergency not only by toughening up on, in their terms, too much spending or wastage but by making absolutely no cuts anywhere. We even had Minister Cormann, when asked a question by Senator Wong today about how many new taxes there would be, blatantly sit there and say, 'Absolutely none.' I cannot believe that the Australian people think that that mob over there can be believed. How do they think that they can fool the Australian public for another year?

With their big, tough talk and all the action and what they were going to do, we do not have a fiscal crisis; we have a spending crisis. We have a crisis from that mob over there, who have absolutely no idea. They went to the election and the now Prime Minister, Mr Abbott, clearly stated there would be no cuts to certain areas. He clearly stated on more than one occasion—through every media outlet he could get his face on—that there would be no cuts to spending, no cuts to education, no cuts to the ABC and no cuts to pensions. What a disaster. We are at budget No. 2 for Mr Hockey.

The commentators are clearly saying this is not a budget about what is in the best interests of the nation, this is not a budget about what is in the best interests of the Australian people or the future for Australia's kids, this is about two people. I will quote from some media sources who I would not call raving-mad lefties. One is none other than Mr van Onselen. I do respect and enjoy listening to Mr van Onselen, but he is not one of my mob. He is not a leftie, I can tell you. When I say 'leftie' I mean left of centre. In today's The Australian, on page 13—and this is friendly fire—he said: 'Hockey is delusional that reform is underway; however, I saw him utter the following words last night ….' He quotes Mr Hockey:

… the economic plan laid down by this government more than a year ago, is in place and it is helping us to deal with these challenges.

Mr Van Onselen goes on to say: 'How? By osmosis? That plan included the shelved Medicare co-payment, dumped changes to pension indexation, a higher-education package twice blocked by the Senate and family tax benefit cutbacks yet to be passed.' He went on to say: 'An economic plan already in place? He must be joking.'

This is not Labor people saying this, these are right-wing media people. He goes on to say—and I agree with every single word—'No wonder Costello thinks they have become a morbid joke.' He is talking about the opposition. The sad part is that there are two jobs on the line: Mr Abbott's, the Prime Minister, and Mr Hockey's, the Treasurer. How long will they last? God help us, but hopefully we will find out sooner rather than later.

Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am a bit confused, because I do not think the opposition know where they are heading with this budget. They do not particularly want to talk about last month's budget, they want to talk about last year's budget. That is fine, if they want to do that, because we absolutely recognise and stand behind the fact that we did need to make tough decisions last year. We did need to make some difficult and necessary choices for the Australian people because the path we were on was completely unsustainable. Those decisions were made.

They want to talk about last year's budget because that is in their political interest. There were very few questions today in question time about last night's budget, because last night's budget builds on those tough decisions we made last year and allows the Australian people to start reaping the dividends of those tough choices. You are never able to deliver success in life before you do hard work. The only place in the world where success comes before work is in the dictionary. We had to do the hard work last year before we delivered success to the Australian people.

I am confident that last night's budget will build confidence in our economy, particularly among small businesses and farmers. They will then have the confidence to invest and create the jobs and opportunity that only they can create. We cannot do that here, unfortunately. As much power as we think we have, we cannot wave a magic wand and make people have a job and opportunity. We must rely on the individual enterprise of all Australians to bring that about. Last night's budget will help achieve that.

Last night's budget enshrines the fact that taxes will be lower under a coalition government, and that will create more opportunity and confidence in our business sector. Under the previous government revenue as a percentage of GDP was escalating, going through the roof. You will not hear them talk about it. What you need to look at is not the Labor Party's last budget but the pre-election forecasts done by Treasury and Finance. When you look at the independent numbers that were done before the election, our revenue to GDP was going through the roof, because they came to government when our taxes or revenue to GDP were just 23.3 per cent of GDP. By the election, it had escalated or had gone down and then back up. Under the pre-election forecasts our taxes to GDP were going to raise to 23.9 per cent of GDP, then to 24.6 per cent of GDP and then finally, in the last year of those forward estimates, 2015-16, to 24.8 per cent of GDP.

Every one of those numbers is now lower. In that final year, the revenue to GDP was 24.2 per cent of GDP, then 24 the previous year and then 23.5.

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

You've killed off confidence; it's gone through the floor. You're going to 25.8!

Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What they do not quite understand on the other side is that when your economy grows you get higher taxes to GDP. We had a weak economy under the former government, and that is why taxes to GDP fell precipitously in their first years of government. They had plans, in similar years to us, to increase taxes to GDP. If you compare year to year, and that is the appropriate comparison, taxes are now lower under a coalition government than they would have been under a Labor government. They wanted to hit our wealth-producing industries with a carbon tax and a mining tax and put jobs at risk across the whole economy. We are serious in this government.

I want to take up some of the points that Senator Sterle raised. It is about last year's budget—which they continue to want to talk about. We are serious about achieving serious reform of our spending system. So much of our spending goes towards health and education, but we are on an unsustainable path in growth of those particular spending initiatives. I do not know if the Labor Party reads the budget papers, but on page five of 23 the budget paper states that we spend around $18 billion a year on public hospitals. It is growing at somewhere between six and seven per cent a year at the moment. If that rate of growth continues for 40 years, hospital spending alone will take a third to 50 per cent, depending on how you measure it, of our Commonwealth budget. We cannot do that; it would be absurd.

Somebody has to be serious here. Some serious people have to sit down and work out how we can deliver the great hospital services we have in this nation affordably. We are the party that is about serious discussions in our nation, about how we can grow jobs and opportunity and a sustainable Public Service. The other side simply wants to oppose. We cannot return to that path.

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

I am pleased to speak on this day after the disastrous budget this government has brought down. What a budget of deception, continuing the terrible form that we saw from them last year. While promising less tax and fewer taxes they have delivered 17 new taxes. Minister Cormann had the gall to stand up in this place today and bald-facedly say zero. I will mention just two, because I do not want to spend too much time on it

There is a new import tax—cost-recovery for licensing import processing. There is a new citizenship tax—cost-recovery for citizenship and increased visa application charges. Those are just two of the 17 that it seems the Minister for Finance has forgotten he okayed in the new budget. They promised less debt and what they delivered in this budget is $12.5 billion of new debt. They have done so much damage to economic and business confidence since they got into government. They have driven confidence through the floor, they have driven unemployment through the roof and they have managed in one year to double the deficit, from $17 billion to $35 billion, yet they continue to stand there and pretend they are great economic managers.

Senator Canavan says we want to talk about last year's budget. We do, because they want everybody to forget that they have still got those savings that they wanted to bank from last year. One-hundred-thousand-dollar degrees remain in their budget calculations; $57 billion in cuts from last year remain in their budget; $30 billion in cuts to education remain. The budget this year retains the very same stench of unfairness that every Australian detected when the government put their budget out last year as well. It is clear that Mr Abbott has simply not learnt from last year's budget. This is the same style. It oozes unfairness. It operates like this government: on a platform of unfairness and misrepresentation.

With regard to health and the appalling attempt at not answering the question that we saw from the minister today, we are seeing a government that simply does not understand the investment in health that is the right of Australians. Last night, in addition to the $57 billion that they cut out last year, they added another $2 billion. Just last weekend, the health minister was promising Australia that the Abbott government would sink its teeth into dental reform, promising $200 million in spending, but the only thing that we can see in this budget that the minister has sunk her teeth into is Australian kids—stealing $125.6 million out of the next four years from Labor's scheme that provided millions of children with dental care through Medicare. That is what is wrong with this government. Look at the policy that they choose to inflict on the nation. They take to children's dental health and they take $125 million out of it. It is a budget that is short-sighted in so many ways. It threatens the future of Australia's health system and it entrenches the fundamental unfairness of this government's very first disastrous budget.

Close to $1 billion is going to be cut from programs that fund preventative health care, drug and alcohol rehabilitation, and mental health and other crucial health programs. Literally thousands of organisations around the country that do vital work, caring for Australia's most at risk and vulnerable people, will be left reeling from this further assault on their core funding. What have they cut overnight that they want to run away from and hide from? I mentioned the $125 million from the Child Dental Benefits Schedule. There is $144.6 million from the MBS. There is the appalling response we had from the Minister for Veterans' Affairs. He did not even seem to know that he had cut $70 million from the Department of Veterans' Affairs dental and allied health payments. There is $214 million from e-health and not a single dollar is allocated beyond 2018. There is a bit of a pattern. This government seems to have funded a few things for two years. The science that underpins the policymaking that leads to preventative health does not end in two years. Programs that deserve funding should be funded into the long term. They have cut $252 million from PBS listed drugs. They have cut $72.5 million from health workforce scholarships, wrecking the very fabric of prevention and good health. This Abbott government has gutted Medicare since coming to office. The budget that we saw last night inflicts further damage. The GP tax, no matter what they say, remains. It is just thinly veiled in a freeze on indexation. As every day passes, the people of Australia are seeing more and more. This government cannot be trusted and they have slashed the opportunities for Australia with this budget. (Time expired)

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I probably should remind the Labor Party that we inherited a deficit of $48 billion and the deficit for this budget year is going to be $35 billion, and it is forecast to reduce each year to below $7 billion over the next four years. This is because the coalition—the Liberal Party and the National Party—are careful economic managers. But on the other side we have the Labor Party, led by Bill Shorten. We are almost halfway through Bill Shorten's year of big ideas. So far his only big ideas have been taxes. Bill Shorten should be careful about Tanya Plibersek's big idea, and that is that she is going to become the leader. So I would suggest to the Leader of the Opposition that the Labor Party response to this budget has been all about saving Bill Shorten's job, because Bill Shorten is on thin ice because the Deputy Leader of the Labor Party is circling. She is circling. She is like one of those—

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McGrath, I generally do let a few instances of referring to people by their incorrect titles go if it is in the run, but—

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Okay. The Leader of the Opposition is being circled by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition. I do apologise, Mr Deputy President. If I were the Leader of the Opposition, I would be certainly locking the Leader of the Opposition's office because the deputy leader is certainly on the war path. This is a great budget for Australia and it is particularly a great budget for small business. I should remind the Labor Party about small businesses, because they do not know what a BAS is. They think BAS is something on the radio dial in their cars. This is a budget for small businesses across Australia, because small businesses are the engine of the Australian economy, and this budget has done fantastic things to grow the small business economy. We should support that.

Senator Conroy interjecting—

I am being shouted down by the Deputy Leader of the Labor Party in the Senate who has no experience with small businesses. He is probably very good at turning large businesses into small businesses, in terms of when Labor are in power. Through you, Mr Deputy President: that is his experience of small businesses.

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Why did you leave the UK? Why did Boris sack you?

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would love to talk about the UK. Let's talk about the UK. Let's look at what happened to Labour in the UK. Let's talk about a Conservative party that had a strong deputy leader and a strong leader. I am happy to talk about the UK until the cows come home and they are milked by the dairy farmers of the Sunshine Coast. I am more than happy to do that.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator McGrath, just resume your seat for a moment. I think there has been enough interjection, and I will ask for that to cease. Senator McGrath, please come back to the question before the chair.

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will certainly come back to talking about the budget and talking about some of the wonderful measures that will help small businesses in Australia recover from six years of Labor government. In particular, I want to talk about the tax cut that small businesses are going to receive—a 1½ percent tax cut. I think that is fantastic for small businesses. I hope that those opposite in the Labor Party do not oppose this wonderful tax cut. The Liberal Party and the National Party are the parties of lower taxes, and we should be proud of that. Through you, Mr Deputy President, I would love the Labor Party senators to come across and support the lowering of taxes for small businesses.

Also, I want to talk about the ability to deduct assets up to $20,000 from 7.30pm last night. I have a lot of friends in small business and I know that already, last night and today, they have been out looking at what they are going to buy. I think that is a wonderful boost for the economy—in terms of what small businesses can buy, products up to $20,000, to push and grow the economy. I hope that those opposite will also support that. It is a wonderful measure for small businesses in terms of what small businesses can do to grow Australia.

The other thing the budget will do is help everyday Australians to access jobs. Sadly, in some parts of Queensland youth unemployment is still too high. I think we should all come together to work out what we can do to grow the job market in Australia. There is going to be a $1.2 billion national wage subsidy pool to target long-term unemployment. I think that is fantastic. Employers will receive the subsidy from the time they are starting a job, when hiring—when training costs are greatest—rather than waiting six months or more. This will ensure wage subsidies are more effective. This includes reforms to Restart. It will make it easier for small businesses to receive government support sooner when they employ older workers. (Time expired)

Joe Bullock (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have not had the opportunity to come fully to terms with all of the details contained in last night's budget, but at first glance it seems that Treasurer Hockey's second budget is on the up and up—spending up, deficit up, debt up. The government has given up. And, for them, the game is up. The bad news is that the budgetary position which Labor will inherit after the next election will be far worse than that bequeathed to the Liberals. While the deficit which this government confronted upon attaining office was the legacy of the heroic efforts of Wayne Swan in saving this country from the ravages of the global financial crisis, the deficit which we will inherit will simply be a tribute to this government's ineptitude and its lack of vision for Australia's future.

The most telling commentary on this budget is the cartoon in today's Australian of the artist Joe Hockey standing in front of a blank canvas entitled 'Reform'. In this budget, reform is missing. Policy is missing. But, remarkably, also missing is the debt and deficit disaster about which those opposite have been moaning non-stop since I arrived here. Magically, as the spending debt and deficit of this government rises and rises under its watch, talk of a deficit problem has disappeared. It would be no surprise if the next thing to disappear was our AAA credit rating—another gift of Labor to this government.

Today, all the talk is about trajectory. All I can see is a trajectory under this government leading straight downhill. This is a budget that is devoid of a vision and will take Australia nowhere. John Daley of the Grattan Institute is quoted as saying that 'This is a budget that relies on a drift back to surplus', relying on the economy growing as rosily as it predicts. The only credible path charted by this budget is a credible path for higher taxes, with the income tax bill on working people set to rise by 33 per cent between now and 2018-19. Income tax receipts will rise by seven per cent per annum over a period during which wages are forecast to rise by 2½ to three per cent per annum. This burden of higher taxes will particularly be felt by the 1.3 million workers earning between $30,000 and $37,000 a year, who will see their marginal tax rate jump by 14 per cent. These are my people: young full-time job assistants and senior part-timers; people with little money to spare who will be forced by bracket creep to do more than their fair share of heavy lifting to rescue the government from deficit. Once again, this government is placing the burden of budget repair on those who can least afford it. While their fundamental unfair bias remains unaltered, instead of a full frontal attack this year's budget mounts a more insidious attack by stealth, creeping deeper into the pockets of working people.

If the government has bet its future on an income tax led recovery, it needs to factor in more income earners. Predictably, the budget conjures up increased employment. Unemployment is forecast to fall from 6½ to 5¾ per cent. Frankly, I think this number was inserted simply to make the tax receipt numbers stack up rather than being based on any realistic assessment of the economy's capacity to grow employment. Significant employment growth from a government with no plan for jobs is baseless optimism. This is a government which destroyed our motor vehicle industry, a government with no plan for manufacturing, a government which cheers on attempts to reduce penalty rates and working conditions, a government in which the electorate can have no confidence when it comes to job creation. Their plan, such as it is, is to implement a small tax cut for small business, stand back, cross their fingers and hope. This may be a plan but it is only a plan to win the votes of small business people in what will prove to be a vain attempt to hold onto government.

Mr Deputy President, time is against me. I wanted to speak about the counterproductive disincentives to employers contributing to paid parental leave built into the government's long awaited but poorly executed paid parental leave plan. Instead, I will finish by referring to the fine assessment by my friend Senator Canavan of the government's linking of childcare funding to cuts to the family tax benefit. Senator Canavan said:

The system we are proposing massively penalises families where a parent stays home to look after children and we think it does not properly value the benefits of unpaid work.

I could not have said it better myself. A government that values people only in terms of their capacity to contribute through paid employment and cannot appreciate the value of the family— (Time expired)

Question agreed to.