Ross Cadell (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of answers from ministers to all coalition questions today.

It's an interesting thing when we're down here and looking at our responsibilities. The role of the Australian government is primarily to look after the interests and safety of Australians. Questions today went to the heart of that duty of disclosure and clarity that was promised but not delivered. We stand here on a day when people in uniform, who put their lives on the line and put themselves at risk to defend this country, have not been looked after, and where their interests, their being injured in the line of duty, are secondary to international relations, to a conversation. We do not get the time that this was disclosed to the Prime Minister. We do not get the time line at which any action was taken. We do not get clarity around this issue being raised. These are the Australians who go out there every day to defend the rest of Australia and to look after the people who are here. They deserve nothing less than to be represented at the highest levels and to have their interests put first because we know that, if trouble ever comes, these people will be put in harm's way first. So it's quite disappointing today to hear the answers: 'We haven't got the information at hand as to when the Prime Minister was informed. We won't confirm who raised these issues with the Chinese Premier.'

All of these issues come to this question of disclosure, which is so core to clear government. It comes back to the issue around some of the other questions today. In regard to the boat landing, we heard the line: 'We won't comment on border matters. We don't know if it's 10 boats since this government has been in. We don't know where these people that have allegedly landed on Western Australian shores have gone. We don't know how many of them there are. We don't know if they have been caught.' Of the 131 people—I think that's the number we're up to—who have been released subject to the High Court decision, we don't know how many are missing or if they don't know their way. We don't know how many have refused to wear ankle bracelets or to be tracked.

The object of our being here is to give surety to our people—the people of Australia—but it seems that, so much more often, we're putting interests over people. We're putting power over people. The doers of this world and of our country—the builders, the growers, the makers and the carers—don't deserve to know. They don't deserve to make decisions based on actual facts. In reference to the last question from the coalition about cost of living and the inflation numbers, they won't even confirm that the RBA is right when they're saying that it's now a home-grown issue—that it's not the war in Ukraine that's driving up the price of fuel and that it's not the trouble in the Middle East. When the Reserve Bank governor says that it is a home-grown issue, we don't know if that's what the government thinks, but we're heading into Christmas, and I can tell you that many Christmas trees will have fewer gifts under them this year. Some will be empty because of the cost of living in this country now.

So many times we come in here and ask the questions on behalf of the Australian people: 'What are we doing to fight inflation?' On this side we know what the answers will be: 'There's $26 billion here, and there's $26 billion there. You voted against this. You voted against that.' We voted against it because we knew it wouldn't work. We voted against it because it wasn't going to make the difference. Ask mums and dads out on the streets: has it worked? It hasn't. That's the basic point: people need to be heard. They are hurting, and we are not doing enough. If we're going to go and put out a fire and someone says, 'We're going to go and pour some petrol on it,' and we vote against that, does that make us wrong when the fire goes up? No. We saw what was going to happen. This side cares. This side listens. In travelling around, I see that what government—this whole place—has got away from is the real on-the-ground issues facing mums and dads. We are working for causes. We're working for international cooperation. We're working for all these things that have the problem of hurting the Australian people. We're not giving them information to make decisions. We're compartmentalising this.

In my office today, I was given a freedom of information request that contained more information than requests for papers here. This is the sort of thing that we're getting to in this place. So, when we're asking questions about national security and about where these murderers, rapists and child sex offenders are, there are no answers. When we're asking people about who is standing up for the defence contractors of Australia, there are no answers. When we're asking about what you're going to do to make the cost of living better for Australians, there are no answers, and that's because this is a government that is about posturing and not a government about people. That has to change. The scoreboard is reflecting it.

Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In taking note of answers to questions asked by coalition senators, there's a fair range of content given to us by senators opposite. In particular, there is not a clear critique of the government coming from those opposite, as is very clear in the context that the questions start with cost of living, and then one of the questions asked by those opposite is on inflation or on immigration, and so it goes on. We can highlight the fact that, as Senator Farrell outlined, we know that inflation in Australia—like in other OECD G7 countries—has been high but has peaked lower and later in Australia than in most G7 countries, so its moderation is a little behind. In the meantime, in order to abate the cost of living in Australia, we have a very clear and firm agenda which includes getting wages moving. It includes targeting relief in the health space. In particular, I had the great privilege of visiting an urgent Medicare clinic in Bunbury last Friday, which sees people able to access urgent after-hours and in-hours care when they otherwise would not be able to get access to a doctor. It's fair to say that they've already seen a great uptake of that service because people are able to get in, on demand, to see a GP for urgent care. This is highly relevant to the cost of living because the alternative was to wait weeks for an appointment to try and get in to see a doctor who may or may not bulk bill.

These kinds of incentives for urgent Medicare clinics, our bulk billing incentives and our relief on the cost of medicines, are really starting to make a difference in accessing quality health care at an affordable cost. This is more and more important, given the evidence that we saw mounting of people forgoing, under the last government, access to necessary health care because of its high cost. There's no other way, really, to mitigate or address access to health care, given the disparate incomes of Australians—whether you are on social security, or on a low or high income—other than to get into the nuts and bolts of reforming our healthcare system in order to make it affordable and accessible. This means, when you're affected by the higher cost of fuel, which clearly relates to a great many international pressures which have indeed impacted on the cost of transport for households but also the costs of fruit, vegetables and other goods and services, we can mitigate household costs by targeting areas where we know we can make the most difference to the people that need it. This means we've been able to start to radically reduce health costs and indeed, in doing, also reform the health system. This means we've been able to take pressure, for example, off emergency departments, who are also experiencing increased pressures due, in part, to how unaffordable it became to see a doctor at short notice.

Andrew Bragg (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In giving some comments on this taking note session, the fundamental problem is that the distorted priorities of the government, combined with the government's inability to say no to the same distortions in its midst, mean that there has not been any capacity for the Commonwealth government to make any meaningful contribution to the battle on inflation. The battle on inflation has been fought solely by the Reserve Bank of Australia, which has ratcheted up interest rates 13 times since the election. They've been doing that in the teeth of the Commonwealth government running a fiscal policy which is fundamentally inconsistent with the approach taken by the central bank.

When the Governor of the Reserve Bank was recently at Senate estimates, the question was put to the governor: is the government running a contractionary, neutral or expansionary fiscal policy? The governor said that the government was running a neutral fiscal policy, when, of course, it should be running a contractionary fiscal policy. We don't know how much longer the government will persist with this approach, but, if it does persist with this neutral approach, it guarantees that there will be more interest rate rises. The 8,000-pound gorilla in the Australian economy is the national government. Every time the Treasurer produces a budget, this Treasurer produces more spending, and that means that the interest rate pain will continue. There is the table of truth in the budget paper, which presents this in all its detail. It presents the fact that the Treasurer is spending more money and taking new decisions to spend new money, which is making a bad situation with inflation worse.

The Australian people need a government that can run a contractionary fiscal stance. That is the thing that will aid the fight on inflation. If the national government can run a contractionary fiscal policy, then the Reserve Bank and the government will be in sync, and then there will be fewer interest-rate rises and there will be less pain at the kitchen table for the Australian people, who don't want to pay higher interest rates. The Australian people do not want to pay high interest rates on their houses. Prospective homebuyers can't afford to pay high interest rates. This is stopping people from getting into the housing market. Labor's stupidly high inflation and high interest rates, which the Labor Party is solely responsible for, are stopping millennials and gen Zs from getting into the housing market. That is the No. 1 priority for this government: to take inflation seriously and to slow new spending.

I was reading the Canberra Times the other day, and it reliably informed me that there are 10,000 new public servants to be employed by the Commonwealth as a result of this latest budget—the biggest increase in 15 years. This is just one example of expenditure by this government that is not necessary. We don't need more bureaucrats. We don't need more people working in Canberra. This is a good example of where the government could make some cuts. It could be part of a contractionary fiscal stance.

As it stands, there appear to be few solutions on the government benches. Many solutions have been developed by vested interests at the unions and the big super funds. That is basically the policy manifesto of the modern Labor Party: a bunch of vested interests and a bunch of rent-seekers. Sadly, none of these are solutions for inflation, which is the topic du jour. Therefore, I think we are stuck in this problem that the government has created for the Australian people. That's why we are flagging different options that can be deployed to address these issues, particularly in relation to housing, where we do think that there is a very important debate to be had around helping first home buyers get into the housing market but also ensuring that people who have a house can keep their house.

Marielle Smith (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also rise to take note of answers to opposition questions in question time. First, I want to say that how we talk about issues in national security matters. How we talk about issues, particularly operational issues, matters. The way you talk about these things impacts national security. What I think we've seen this question time—indeed, consistent with what we've seen over the past few months from the opposition—is that there really is no issue in national security on which they don't seek to have a political advantage. There is no issue in national security that they don't see as an opportunity to further the ambition of the Leader of the Opposition in the other place.

We have seen this playbook from the opposition before. We have seen this playbook which seeks to divide our country and not to bring it together. We have seen the playbook which seeks to stoke fear, which seeks to stoke division, which seeks political advantage from issues affecting our national security and from operational issues related to our national security. We've seen it before. We've seen it when they have been in government; we are seeing it now they're in opposition.

There is absolutely nothing in that kind of division and fear stoking which helps our country. That aggression, that division, that fear which the opposition strives to put into the heart of our political discourse at the moment does nothing to help our country. It does nothing to keep our country more safe. In fact, it does the opposite, because we know that breakdown in social cohesion when divisions are stoked affects our national security. Our security agencies would affirm that.

The political playbook here of division, of fear, of seeking advantage and political gain from national security is abhorrent. The way we talk about things matters, and this question time is reflective of everything we've seen in the last few months on these matters. In fact, the only place the opposition's not willing to talk about national security issues, not willing to talk about the global conflicts around us, not willing to talk about all the external events facing our country at the moment is when it comes to inflation. We saw that again today. You can use these issues to stoke fear and division, but when we're talking about inflation and the biggest financial pressures facing Australian people at the moment: 'Oh, these issues don't matter. They're completely irrelevant.' It's as transparent as glass.

The fact is inflation and cost-of-living pressures are huge issues in our community at the moment. No-one on this side denies that—that's why they're our No. 1 priority and focus as a government. We are investing billions of dollars in cost-of-living relief. We're deliberately doing it in a way which seeks to not add further pressures to inflation because we know acutely—we know in our communities, the people we represent, the people we talk to—that inflation most hurts those doing it tough. We are acutely aware of that.

We have a 10-point plan for cost-of-living relief measures, many of which the opposition walked into this place and didn't vote for. They walked into this place and saw cost-of-living relief on the table, shook their heads and said, 'No, we don't want a part of that,' and walked back out again. And now they come in here complaining about our work as a government to take action on these issues. Electricity bill relief, cheaper child care, increasing rental assistance, income support payment increases, fee-free TAFE, building more affordable houses for people, extending paid parental leave, cheaper medicines, halving the cost of medicines for some people in this country: these are the sorts of things which those opposite can't bring themselves to support. But they are the sorts of things which make a real difference in people's lives. And we know that if we hadn't acted on these things, what is a very difficult and trying situation with inflation would be even worse. That is a fact.

Cost of living is absolutely our priority as a government. It's our priority because we know it is affecting Australians right around the country, Australians who depend on their government to take these matters seriously, to prioritise them, just as they depend on us to do the same for national security—not to politicise it; not to focus on division and obstruction and dividing us, but to bring us together with actions and plans which will make a difference.

Claire Chandler (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today we have heard confirmation from the government that the Prime Minister of this country has failed in his duty to raise in a meeting with the Chinese president a serious incident in which Australian personnel were injured. Senator Farrell was directly asked that question—'Did the Prime Minister raise it?'—by the opposition in question time today and Senator Farrell said that Australia's objections started with the Deputy Prime Minister. They started not with the Prime Minister, who had a face-to-face meeting where he could have raised it, but with the Deputy Prime Minister. And that was only once the Prime Minister had left and evaded questions.

Leadership at the top of this government is completely absent, and we have seen that time and time again in recent months. That is further demonstrated by the fact as I understand it that, in the other place during question time today, the Prime Minister was directly asked this question and he still wouldn't answer it and started talking about trade with China. That is so sadly typical of this government. The Prime Minister's response to a serious naval incident in which Australian personnel were injured by the Chinese navy is to try and boast about trade and other matters. His response was, quite frankly, disgraceful. This is a serious matter which deserves a straight answer in this parliament.

Let us not forget that, just two years ago, Australia was regarded as leading the world in standing up to China's coercion. Our allies were happy to say publicly and often that this was the case. At the time, the Labor Party was prepared to stand with the government and make clear that Australia was in the right in terms of the actions that we took and that it was the CCP's coercive actions that were unacceptable. Fast forward two years, and now all we hear from this Albanese government are the lines about how it was all the previous Australian government's fault. It was all the Morrison government's fault.

Let's be very clear: this was the line that the Chinese government has been pushing for years. This was the reason they implemented the unlawful trade sanctions—to try and get the Australian public to blame our country for standing up for our own interests. For a long time it didn't work, but then the Prime Minister began to see a political advantage in blaming Australia for what the Chinese government had done to cut off contact and implement trade embargoes. He began to do everything he could not to stand up for Australia and our interests but to be granted a visit to China, where he could boast, as he frequently does, about stabilised relations. For many months now, the Albanese government has joined the Chinese government in publicly blaming the former Australian government for China implementing trade sanctions and refusing to take phone calls or meetings. It's an absolute shame.

Question agreed to.