Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Roads and Regional Transport) Share this | Hansard source

It is with a deep sense of sorrow that I join this debate. I feel sorry for the Australian people, who have had this carbon tax imposed on them without any chance at all to vote on the merits of the policy. They have had enormous increases in their electricity and gas bills—nine and 10 per cent imposed on them in the first year alone by a government that gave them no chance whatsoever to decide whether they actually supported the policy. I feel sorry for Australian business owners and farmers, who have incurred the extra energy costs, making them less competitive with their international trading partners.

You might find this hard to believe, but I also feel sorry for those opposite—those who are the true believers in the Australian Labor Party, the ones who are still committed to standing up for the battlers, the ones who are interested in fiercely representing the interests of the blue-collar workers and are still interested in helping those in the community who are less fortunate.

I feel sorry for those opposite, because their grand old party has been led down a path to political oblivion by a leadership team that lacks judgement and lacks political conviction beyond its own survival. I get the opportunity, as other members on this side do, to move around my electorate a lot. I speak to a lot of blue-collar workers. Many of them have been union members. Many of them are involved in Latrobe Valley power stations. They tell me they feel absolutely abandoned by the Australian Labor Party. Latrobe Valley power station workers have been facing the uncertainty over the last two years of this government's Contract for Closure policy. What they asked me during that whole debate was why this Prime Minister doesn't fight for their jobs like she fights for her own job. That is what they say to me; they ask, 'Why doesn't she fight as hard for my job as she's fought for her own job within her own team?'

So it has been up to me and my colleagues, like the member for Flinders and others in the coalition, to fight to stop the Contract for Closure policy on their behalf. The reason we fought so hard in relation to that policy in particular is that it is about protecting jobs, about protecting blue-collar workers. It is also about reducing the cost of living for all Australian people.

I just have a message for the Prime Minister and her cabinet, and I mean this in all sincerity: I can tell you now that the blue-collar workers who used to support the Australian Labor Party in the Latrobe Valley have had an absolute gutful of being vilified and being called 'big polluters' by this government and the Greens. They have absolutely had a gutful of being told what jobs they can have and what jobs they cannot have, and they have had a gutful of listening to this Greens mantra, which is being preached by inner-city MPs who have absolutely no understanding of life in regional Australia. They are angry; they are still angry. Those opposite might want to console themselves with a Newspoll bounce this week, but let me assure them that they are still out there waiting for you; they are angry and they are waiting for you.

The Contract for Closure policy, as part of the carbon tax policy, was always going to force higher electricity prices and energy prices across the board, and that is what we are seeing. It was always going to force the switch to more expensive forms of power generation, making it tougher for Australian businesses, making it tougher for Australian families and also making it tougher for Australian pensioners and those on low incomes.

This matter of public importance debate today is a critical discussion for the House because it reveals the arrogance of the modern Labor Party. The previous speaker really typified my concerns with the modern Australian Labor Party. This party has become so out of touch. It has no interest in the issues that actually affect regional communities. But those on this side of the House are not surprised by that. We are not surprised that the ALP has no interest in regional issues, because there is not a single member of the Labor cabinet who actually lives in regional Australia. I believe that, to have a passion for regional Australia—to actually care about the future of regional Australia—you have to live amongst us; you have to live and breathe and work amongst the people of regional Australia. There is not a single cabinet minister who is completely committed to standing up for the interests of regional Australia. So we should not be surprised that we do not have anyone in the Labor cabinet advocating on behalf of regional communities.

One of the great myths of the carbon tax debate has been this claim by those opposite that only the so-called big polluters pay the carbon tax. But what we know now—the lived experience of the carbon tax—is that it has forced up energy prices on every household, on every business, on every factory, on every sporting club, on every hospital and on every aged-care and childcare facility. And every Australian knows it, except those opposite, who are still out here every day parroting the party lines fed to them by their party apparatchiks.

Those opposite also like to claim that somehow our opposition to the carbon tax—our anti-carbon-tax campaign—is running out of puff. I can tell you now that the winds of change are still blowing right across Australia, and every member on this side remains committed to fighting this battle all the way to the next election. Those opposite would like to believe that the community has moved on, that no-one is worried about it anymore. Well, if no-one is worried about it anymore, why not test the theory? If this government is so confident that no-one cares anymore about the carbon tax—

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