Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I also rise to add to the debate on the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2014-2015. I am entering now my 17th year in this place, and I am quite frightened about that—when I say that number I am not quite sure where they have all gone. Having just got off the phone with my 15-year-old, I am reminded that all of her life I have been in this parliament. I was also trying to add up how many appropriation bills over that period I may have spoken on, but really could not do the sum because there are lots of them. But this would have to be, without doubt, the first time in those 17 years that we are going into a budget cycle still talking about the last budget. Never in my time in this place have we still been discussing the previous budget, going into the next budget cycle, nor have we ever seen a budget that has not been passed in this amazing fashion in those 17 years. Usually, a budget has about a six-week cycle and then it is gone, done and dusted—as Keating would say, 'The dogs have barked and the caravans have moved on'—but we are still talking about the last budget.

These appropriation bills are another shining example of the Abbott government's continued deceitfulness and disregard for the basic notion of fairness, which is hurting the community in my electorate and across the country. The focus of the government's cuts has been the most vulnerable and those least able to afford it, and that is why we are still discussing this budget and why it has not been able to progress. Members opposite ran a deceitful election campaign, promising to improve living standards and fix the so-called 'budget emergency' simply by delivering 'no cuts to education, no cuts to health' and 'no cuts to the ABC or SBS', and also promising 'no new taxes'. They also promised adult government and no chaos. When is that good government going to start? When are we going to actually see the adults in charge?

Now, almost 18 months into the life of this government, with one leadership spill down, a leaking cabinet and a backbench in open revolt, we are still debating over the stalled measures of an almost one-year-old budget and additional appropriations of $1.7 billion to pay for the government's election promises and economic mismanagement. It is no wonder that the community has completely lost faith.

After waging a fear campaign of debt and deficit during the election, the first act of the Abbott government in office was to borrow more money and increase the deficit by tens of billions of dollars—almost $9 billion for a Reserve Bank loan that the bank did not request or need. Before the election, the 2014-15 deficit was projected to be $24 billion and net debt to be $212.1 billion. As a result of the policies and actions of the Abbott government, the 2014-15 deficit is $40.4 billion—almost a doubling of the deficit—and the net debt stands at $244.8 billion, an increase of more than 15 per cent.

Every dollar is the responsibility of those opposite—the government of this day—and caused by broken promises and the sheer chaos and dysfunction they created by pursuing a strategy of axing revenue raising measures such as the price on carbon and the mining tax, increasing spending measures and then pursuing ideologically motivated, savage and brutal cuts.

They have cut $11.3 billion from the foreign aid budget in an act of base politics that robs money from the world's poorest people and reduces Australia's commitment to foreign aid to a measly 0.2 percent of GDP—a mammoth way away from the Millennium Development Goal of 0.5 per cent. It will be to our eternal shame that we clearly have not reached a bipartisan consensus on quarantining the foreign aid budget, as other successful democracies have—ones who are actually facing economic crises in their countries. That shame will be borne out in our neighbouring Pacific regions on the faces of the 2.2 million children who may not get to enrol in school, the 3.7 million who may not be vaccinated and the 4.7 million who may not be able to access safe drinking water. This government has cut foreign aid at every opportunity, and now we stand here debating an increase of $1.7 billion in government expenditure, because robbing the world's poorest people has not been enough.

But this government has not just taken from the poorest people overseas to fund its broken promises; $270 million has been ripped from community organisations across the country. I have spoken previously in this place about the government's rank hypocrisy of lauding Australian of the Year, Rosie Batty, and her campaign to end domestic violence while also cutting vital funding to the community legal services, which are the primary defenders of women and children experiencing domestic violence.

Sadly, they are not the only worthy organisations to be hit with extreme cuts—organisations who are doing important work in our community to improve lives and help those in need, such as the Mirabel Foundation. Rather than simply paraphrase, I would like to share with those opposite an email I received from a resident in Mount Waverley, in my electorate, about her devastation at the government's cut to Mirabel. She writes:

This is the first time that I've felt the need to write to you and bring your attention to a matter that is of utmost importance to the residents of Chisholm. I have lived in your electorate for more than 15 years and have worked for the highly respected children's charity, The Mirabel Foundation (Mirabel), for 11 of these years. As a resident, I have benefited directly from the many community services available in Mt Waverley for individuals and families in need. I am, however, alarmed that one of these essential services, provided by Mirabel, will no longer receive financial support from the Australian Government.

Mirabel is a children's charity that assists the innocent victims of parental drug use. Mirabel provides essential support and a wide range of programs for children who have been orphaned or abandoned and are now living with their extended family. These families, who are usually grandparents, give up everything so that they can help raise these children in a stable and loving environment.

The need for Mirabel continues to grow with 9 new children being referred for urgent help every week. To date, Mirabel has assisted more than 3000 children and their 5000 grandparent carers.

The loss of federal funding totalling $234,000 will have a crippling effect on Mirabel and a dramatic impact on the disadvantaged families in our neighbourhood. It is incomprehensible that such a decision would be made at a time when our community is faced with rising child abuse notifications and a worrying surge in ICE use.

I want to thank my constituent for being so brave and for writing to me for the first time on an issue that is of great concern. I have had interactions with Mirabel over the years, dealing with some of the children that they have supported and assisted, and I know that this is a phenomenal organisation and it would be devastating to see these cuts progressed. It is astounding that any government or any member of this place could think that such a funding cut is acceptable or that the immense damage it does to our society could ever be equal to the relatively small amount of money that is being taken away. This is an insignificant amount of money in a budget overall but a massive amount to this organisation and the children and families it assists.

But it is symptomatic of everything that is wrong with this government which has cut $878 million out of science and research funding, cut $80 billion from our schools and hospitals and cut the Newstart payment for anybody under the age of 30. These cuts are having a devastating impact on my electorate, particularly on the largest employers in my electorate, who are Monash University; Deakin University; CSIRO Clayton, one of the largest of the CSIRO sites; and Box Hill Hospital. All these institutions are facing enormous cuts and uncertainty. And it is not just devastating to those who work and study in these places; it is devastating to our future because these are the engine rooms of our future: science, research, medical research. These are the drivers of the jobs of the future. Taking money out of them now is sheer short-sightedness. It is just nonsensical.

This is a government who manufactured a budget crisis when in opposition and attempted to use that dishonest crisis as a cover for an ideological crusade. Even today, as the health minister finally—finally—dumped one of the worst measures in the failed, unfair 2014 budget, the GP tax, she defended it, unambiguously stating, 'The policy intent was and remains a good one.' So, despite all the evidence and the vocal concern of the entire medical community, this government is determined to attack the fundamental universality of Medicare. It does not accept the objective evidence that increasing the out-of-pocket costs of accessing primary health care is just bad policy, plain and simple. Instead, all we have is an acknowledgement of the obvious reality that nobody supports the policy. There was not even a glimmer of recognition by the health minister or this government of the reason why nobody supports their attempt to destroy the foundation of Medicare. Instead, the minister is opting to destroy universal access by a thousand cuts, cutting $1.3 billion by freezing indexation of the Medicare rebate and threatening doctors to come up with alternative cuts or endure the freeze permanently.

The government's attacks on Medicare have nothing to do with saving the budget bottom line. They are motivated purely by a desire to permanently and irrevocably degrade the principles of universal access to health care. Medicare is sustainable without cuts. Its costs have not spiralled out of control. In fact, health spending is at record low levels. Health expenditure in Australia was 9.5 per cent of GDP in 2011-12, compared to 17.9 per cent in the United States—a country with an expensive and inequitable health system that this government is so desperately keen to emulate. A decade ago, expenditure on GP services accounted for 0.3 per cent of GDP; today it accounts for only 0.4 per cent of GDP, and that is with a considerably higher bulk-billing rate. But this higher rate is not because people are abusing going to the doctor but because we have had an increase in our population. Indeed, actual attendance at the doctor is not at a high rate. Universal health care is a service that we can afford, it is sustainable as it stands, and we cannot allow any erosion of or increase in out-of-pocket costs for patients.

If this government were actually serious about addressing our long-term societal and economic issues, it would recognise that increased investment in primary health would help reduce the more expensive hospital costs by ensuring that we have a healthier population. By investing in preventative care, in primary care up-front, we can be ensure people do not end up in hospital. It is hospital costs that are spiralling out of control, not GP visits.

There are many, many avenues that can be explored in this space. But that would take time, energy and a bit of intelligence, which the other side seems to be wanting in! Such a policy would require a level of understanding of the value of fairness and equality that those opposite seem unable to achieve. They demand that families 'stop leaning and start lifting', while continuing to allow large corporations to exploit tax loopholes and shirk their responsibilities, pandering to the interests of the big end of town. They cut funding from the poorest people in our society and remove services from the most vulnerable, while they cut taxes for the most profitable corporations and quietly mull over the next plan to slash penalty rates and erode the rights of workers.

They bleat: what would the opposition do? The Labor Party will defend Medicare, as it always has done. We will protect the rights of workers and we will not restore a budget to surplus by attacking the family budget.

I am pleased to be a member of a party that will close the loopholes exploited by multinational corporations to avoid paying tax in this country and send their money overseas. This measure will recoup $1.9 billion to the budget and do so without cutting hundreds of millions of dollars from essential community services and legal aid, without cutting billions from foreign aid, with no $1.3 billion cut to Medicare, without pushing up the price of a university degree to $100,000 and without cutting funding to our schools.

The government is forever talking about intergenerational debt and theft from the future. What greater theft from the future is there than denying people the ability to see a doctor, the ability to get a university education and an environment to live in in the future? That is what this government is doing, now.

The government has spent almost a year trying to sell and implement its budget, and it has done so because every measure in it, every single one, is unfair and unjustified. It has also had the effect of making our economy worse. Consumer confidence is at its lowest ebb and unemployment is at 6.4 per cent, higher than at any time under Labor. Sadly, these bills offer no plan to fix these problems or signal any intent by the Abbott government to govern fairly and in the best interests of the community. We need to better. We can do better.

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