Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal 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.

Today we saw, yet again, a desperate attempt by the government to cling onto this fantasy they seem to have that they're good economic managers, when all of the economic indicators show that things are not doing what they said, before the election, they would be doing and that things are getting worse. This is a government, as I've said in this place a number of times, of broken promises. It promised the Australian people that they would receive a $275 reduction in their power bills. And the tragedy for the Australian people is that, when the $300 subsidy is gone, the higher power bills will remain.

This is a government that promised the Australian community higher real wages, yet, as we know, real wages are declining. This is a government that promised the Australian people they would have lower housing costs, yet in question time today, when the ministers were asked to indicate what the increases in costs were, they were unable to answer, so let's put the numbers on the record. Since this government came to office in May 2022, somebody with a $250,000 mortgage has had $1,940 added to their monthly mortgage costs. That's $24,000 a year.

When we asked how much real household disposable income had fallen on a per capita basis since the government was elected, again, the minister didn't want to answer the question. Do you wonder why, when the answer is 7.8 per cent and real household disposable income has fallen since this government was elected? This government promised Australians that they would make things better, yet things are going backwards, and they wonder why nobody in Australia believes them when they try to maintain the fantasy that they're good economic managers. Then, of course, when we asked how much a 14th interest rate hike might increase the monthly repayments on the average $750,000 mortgage, there was, again, no answer from the government. But, for the record, a 14.25 per cent interest rate would add another $123 per month to costs for a household with a $750,000 mortgage.

What we see continuously from the government is that, when we ask the hard questions, they don't want to answer. They try to deflect. They try to blame somebody else. We asked questions about the inflation rate and their commitment only a few weeks ago to, by the end of this year, see a two in front of it, yet, of course, the figures released yesterday show it going in the wrong direction again. It was Treasury's estimate, not the government's estimate, despite the Treasurer going out in the days before the budget was released to spruik all these numbers and talk about how they knew something special and say that they had special plans, which even the Reserve Bank didn't know about, that would be applied and would bring down inflation.

Of course, we all know now that the Reserve Bank, as they've told us on a number of occasions, have looked through those short-term measures, as they always do. We know that last year's budget didn't shift the dial, which the Reserve Bank told us at estimates. Therefore, the government wasn't doing what it claimed to be doing, which was assisting to bring down interest rates; it was leaving the Reserve Bank to do the heavy lifting. And now we're seeing exactly the same thing happening again this year. There is additional spending, additional capacity is going into the economy, inflation is going up, and now the Australian people face the spectre of another interest rate rise, all because of the complete mismanagement of the economy by this government. They should apologise to the Australian people for that mismanagement and those broken promises.

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you for the opportunity to speak in this debate. It's incredible that those opposite would come in here and try to lecture us about running an economy. When we came into government, we inherited a trillion-dollar debt. We've brought down three budgets since we've been in government, and two of those, the last two, have delivered surpluses. You were in government for 11 long, wasted years without delivering a surplus—not once. Why is that? Because it's a fallacy and a myth that the Liberals and Nationals are better at managing the economy.

We also have the opportunity to place on record that, when it comes to the cost of living, they left us with a $1 trillion debt and higher inflation, and they did nothing about it. What we have done is this. In four short days, there will be a tax cut to all Australian taxpayers. We have increased that tax cut on what the former Liberal government had legislated for. We must never forget that it was the low-income earners that were left off. They weren't going to give them any tax cuts whatsoever. Let's talk about what this government has actually delivered. We have delivered higher wages. We have improved industrial relations in this country. We are actually supporting higher paid, secure jobs right across the country. My question that I asked today was about bringing manufacturing back to this country, creating well-paid, highly skilled jobs throughout the country. We have delivered in our budget—and it will come into effect on 1 July—a $300 energy rebate. We are investing in renewable energy in this country that will actually provide cheaper electricity.

What do we have from Mr Dutton, who, when he was the Minister for Health, was voted by the AMA the worst health minister in 35 years? His big solution to the energy costs in this country is to spend $600-plus billion on nuclear reactors for nuclear energy, which all the experts say will not deliver cheap electricity prices to the household and will not reduce the cost of energy. They want to burden the Australian taxpayer with over $600 billion to do that, and yet they lecture us about managing the economy. It's a joke. Seriously? You don't really think the Australian people are that gullible, do you? They gave you 11 years, and what did they get? Manufacturing offshore and a policy of keeping wages low. That was their government's policy. They were spruiking it and bragging about it. That was their policy—to keep workers' wages low in this country.

On every measure that we have brought in to assist in providing more housing in this country—more social housing and affordable housing—what have the Liberals and Nationals done? Voted it down. What did they do when we introduced the $300 energy rebate? They voted against it. What have they done in terms of creating the $10 billion housing fund? They voted against it. You can't keep coming into this chamber trying to rewrite history with a tale about how you're much better at running the economy, because the proof is in what we inherited. And we inherited a $1 trillion debt, high inflation and interest rates that had already started to go up. They know very well that the RBA set the interest rates and they are independent of the government. What did they do about improving people's superannuation? Nothing. Because they don't believe in it. They wanted you to be able to raid your superannuation to buy a home. How shortsighted, with bad economics, can you be? (Time expired)

Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This week Labor senators have made much of the number of sleeps that Australian households have—four sleeps, apparently—before Australians get to see the very, very light relief in the form of cost-of-living measures from this government. But instead of counting sleeps, unfortunately Australian households are losing sleep, as a result of the inflation figures that were released just yesterday. And everyone should be reminded that Dr Chalmers, the federal Treasurer, on the eve of the federal budget in May, trumpeted the fact that the government was on top of the inflation challenge in this country. In fact, Dr Chalmers said that the mission had been accomplished, that the task of tackling inflation had been accomplished. Don't believe me; believe the Australian, which trumpeted the headline 'CPI mission accomplished by Christmas'. It said:

Jim Chalmers will put the government's economic credibility on the line 12 months out from the election, with Treasury forecasts in Tuesday's budget expecting inflation to hit the 2-3 per cent target band by December …

'Mission accomplished,' Dr Chalmers said. I say, 'Mission impossible,' because the government's economic record is making Australians poorer. Labor is hurting Australian households: 13 interest rate rises since May 2022.

Yesterday the RBA released data indicating the fastest interest rate increase, a jump from 3.6 per cent in April to four per cent in May. Worse than that, core inflation is sitting at 4.4 per cent in the last 12 months, up from 4.1 per cent. And money markets, which give us a sense of what the economic future might look like for Australian households, are now saying they are pricing almost a 60 per cent chance of an interest rate rise by September—a 60 per cent chance of an interest rate rise, on top of the 13 rate increases that Australian families have already had to work hard to get on top of.

This is a government that does not care about the economic and financial ruin that it is putting Australian households through. And they're Australian households; this is not being experienced internationally. Australia has now seen four months of increasing core inflation, which is now sitting higher than in an any other country in the G10, including the United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Canada. Australians are hurting, because the government chooses to make them poorer. This is particularly important because, on the eve of the election in May 2022, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that he had a plan that would make mortgages cheaper for Australians, that he had a plan that would make energy cheaper. In fact, in just two years, this Labor government has presided over a deteriorating economic situation which is making it harder for Australian households.

Australian households know these figures themselves. The price of gas is up by 22.2 per cent, electricity by 21.5 per cent, insurance and financial services by 16.2 per cent, housing by 14 per cent, food by 11.4 per cent, health care by 11 per cent and education by 10.9 per cent. And Australians' real disposable incomes over the last two years have fallen by almost eight per cent per capita in the two years to March 2024. What we hear from the government is a lack of concern for the very real financial stress Australian households are under. So, Sam Lim in Tangney, Tracy Roberts in Pearce, Anne Aly in Cowan and Tanya Lawrence in Hasluck: you must face up to the Australian people, your electors, and explain why Labor is making it harder, why Labor is making them poorer.

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

The Labor government has been more active than any other on attacking inflation and lowering the cost of living. In fact, our workplace relations agenda is helping Australians. It's about better pay, safer workplaces and getting more secure jobs. Next Monday, 1 July, we are delivering a tax cut for every Australian wage-earning taxpayer. We're delivering $300 in energy bill relief for every household, a freeze on previous medicine costs, a pay rise for 2.6 million people and more dollars a year for workers on the minimum wage. We're talking here about real wages in the context of Australia's cost of living.

Funnily enough, every one of those measures was opposed by the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Dutton. It seems that they don't believe that getting wages going is part of cost-of-living relief. They don't believe that controlling the price of medicines is an anti-inflationary measure. They don't believe that energy bill relief helps us tackle inflation, when quite obviously it does. What we also know about the previous government is that, irrespective of inflation, they had a wages policy of deliberate design of a system of low wages. It was a deliberate feature of our nation's economic architecture. Now in opposition, the coalition have, in addition to their record in government, voted against every single one of our workplace relations measures. We recently learnt that their industrial relations spokesperson, Senator Cash, has stepped in behind the New South Wales Liberal Party's state government WorkChoices style platform. It's the kind of platform we've seen state Liberals pursue in the state of WA to undercut wages and conditions. So it's little surprise to me that Senator Cash is now applauding such actions in the Liberal Party of New South Wales. These kinds of so-called good ideas include making it easier to sack people, abolishing the better off overall test, removing rights as a condition of employment and removing award protections for thousands of workers.

When you look at cost-of-living pressures and inflation in our nation, you have to look to what an active and good government does in response to those issues. The simple fact is that those opposite left our nation bereft of the tools to support Australians at a time of growing inflation that was well apparent when they lost government. As Minister Watt highlighted in question time, it's interesting that Senator Cash is here to talk in this place about so-called good ideas that are actually there to remove minimum pay and conditions for truckies, nurses, schoolteachers, police, shop assistants, early childhood educators and coalmine workers. But on our agenda is a tax cut for 2.6 million workers in our nation.

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

It is very clear now that the government's budget, which is just a month old, is out of date. It's already past its expiry date. It's gone stale. It can no longer be consumed. Just a month ago the government forecast that its budget would help bring inflation down to three or less than three per cent by Christmas. As others have said today, inflation in fact has surged back up to four per cent a month after the government's budget. It's going in the wrong direction. In fact, we now have one of the highest inflation rates in the developed world. Of the world's 20 biggest economies, the only countries with higher inflation than us include Argentina, Turkey, Russia, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico. They've the only ones. Every other country in Europe, the United States and Canada, and New Zealand all have lower inflation rates than Australia now. That is a lot to do with this government's complete mismanagement of our economy.

There have been two great sins here that the government has presided over that have caused this inflationary crisis. The first is that they botched the recovery from COVID. We had to reopen our borders after COVID. We had to let some people into this country. But this government opened the floodgates without any control whatsoever, and we now have a situation where over the past few years we've taken in a population bigger than the size of Canberra every year. We can't do it. We don't have the houses for it. We don't have the infrastructure for it. It's plain in front of everyone's eyes here in this country that we can't house this number of people. It's shocking that, in a country of Australia's standard and history, we now have a situation where there are multiple tent cities in our major capitals. It's something I never thought I would see as an Australian. You go overseas and see it. Sometimes you even see it in developed countries. But we were such a well-managed country—an island nation too, which obviously helps a little bit. There are no excuses here, really; every other government since federation has been able to manage our basic housing needs. There are different stresses at different times, but we've never had a situation where thousands upon thousands of working families find themselves with no alternative but to live in their cars or in tents. That's the situation. The government completely lost control of our borders, and that has partly led to these inflationary pressures on rents, housing and other services.

The other big error that's happened at the same time is the government pouring fuel on that inflation fire. We just heard from a Labor senator there that they got to office and inflation was already high. It is true that inflation was increasing. It hadn't set in yet, but it was starting to rise when the Labor Party got to office. So what do you think you would do in an environment where you knew that inflationary pressures were starting to rise and it was happening all around the developed world? A logical, sensible government would seek to rein in government spending to take pressure off the economy, to avoid adding fuel to that inflationary fire and to make the job of the Reserve Bank easier. Instead this government has increased spending in their first two full budgets by more than $40 billion for their own decisions. It's not just the spending; they've made decisions to increase spending by more than $40 billion.

How does that compare? These two budgets now are the two biggest-spending budgets—not including COVID, which was pretty special—since the global financial crisis and Kevin Rudd's budgets. At least Kevin Rudd had a global financial crisis to respond to. He went a bit far, but the direction was right. We had to spend some money to cover our economy from a global downturn. This government has gone in the complete opposite direction from what sensible economic thinking would say. During an inflationary spiral, when inflation is breaking out, governments should pull spending back, not add to it.

That's the mess we find ourselves in now and, unfortunately, the Reserve Bank is possibly going to have to come along and clean up this mess. If they do raise interest rates in the next couple of months, just another 25 points will mean that the average Australian homeowner will be paying $1,000 more a year in repayments. That will swamp all the electricity rebates and other sweeteners they put in their budget. So start a new budget and avoid an interest rate rise in August.

Question agreed to.

David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) 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 today.

I want to take note of the answers given by Minister Watt and Minister Wong in particular today. I'll deal first of all with the remarkable response we got from the government about their failure to bring on the Migration Amendment (Removal and other Measures) Bill 2024. This is the Trump-like travel ban bill—together with the extraordinary God-like powers that they want to give to the immigration minister, this one or some future coalition immigration minister—to effectively put people in jail if they won't agree to their own deportation.

This is a bill that follows a pretty ugly Labor tradition of creating some of the worst precedents when it comes to being cruel to people who have come to this country seeking asylum—and deep attacks on multicultural Australia. Of course, it was the Labor Party, to their shame, who came up with the policy of mandatory detention. That is a policy invented by the Labor Party and weaponised by the coalition. It was the Labor Party that came up with offshore detention, another cruel policy created by the Labor Party and weaponised by the coalition. Now, the Labor Party has come up with yet another cruel innovation for dealing with people seeking asylum and dealing with migration—Trump-like travel bans and deportation powers that they want to give to an immigration minister.

You would have thought that the Labor Party would have learned from that history of cruel innovation in this, and not created yet another ugly precedent. It isn't just the coalition in Australia that has been weaponising these attacks that the Labor Party have created in their history. We now see the rhetoric that has been created by this race to the bottom between Labor and the coalition being picked up in the United Kingdom, in the United States and in parts of western Europe. The race to the bottom on migration, the race to the bottom on how we discuss people seeking asylum in this country, is spreading around the world like some kind of toxic political discussion points and it is dehumanising people seeking asylum.

We have seen it in the last two to three months, this debate between the Labor Party and the coalition, to see who can make the strongest connection between people seeking asylum and criminality. We know that when you look at the data on people seeking asylum, they are no more likely to commit any kind of criminal offence than the balance of the population. We know that the history of people seeking asylum is that they have come to this country and made incredible contributions to our society.

But all we have heard from both the Labor Party and the coalition in the last three to four months is this demonisation of people seeking asylum. And now they want to legislate to deport people or to jail people at the whim of the immigration minister. Is it any wonder that Labor hasn't brought on this bill? The reason they haven't brought it on is not because they're not willing to do this new cruel innovation. It is that they are hurting at the moment in multicultural Australia. They are hurting because multicultural Australia has looked at how Labor has utterly failed multicultural Australia in their appalling stance on the genocide in Gaza, and Labor doesn't want to take another hit. Well, maybe they should learn and kill the bill, pull the bill, and try to build back one small part of their very damaged reputation with multicultural Australia.

The response we got from Minister Wong on the question of why Labor won't support a duty of care for the environment, a duty of care that would protect future Australians, was derisory of the question. The fact that Minister Wong gave that answer—dodging the question, refusing to accept responsibility for her government's recent approval of Gina Rinehart's proposal for 151 coal seam gas wells by Minister Plibersek—the reason that we saw that dodging and weaving and failure to answer the question is because Labor knows that it is betraying the future.

Those answers happened while we had Anjali Sharma and Daisy Jeffrey—two young people in the chamber who had been fighting for this bill, fighting for their future. The minister showed disrespect to them by refusing even to address the questions that came from Senator David Pocock, It was a shameful lack of leadership, and it is shameful lack of leadership which reflects Labor's history and its record on the climate.

Question agreed to.