Julia Banks (Chisholm, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Labor do not have the best interests of Australians at heart. They have their own interests. Everything they do or say is designed to get them over to this side of the House. 'Politics before people' is their modus operandi and mantra. Any spirit of bipartisanship is lost on them, particularly on matters where it counts. A constituent of mine in Chisholm recently said to me: 'Julia, no matter the good things that the government does, I am sure I am not the only person in Australia who is sick of the combative response that Labor have to everything. Everyone can work out their response, because it will be negative before they say it themselves.'

The Turnbull government's budget offers fairness, security and opportunity to 24 million Australians, including those Australians who are impacted directly or indirectly by disability. No matter the combative nature of Labor and no matter how people vote, what I know for sure is that the thing I am most proud of about being Australian is that we all help when help is needed. Yesterday, the Treasurer spoke about the heartwarming and emotional story of his brother-in-law Gary—a good, honest, hardworking Australian family man who worked as a fireman and was, sadly, diagnosed with progressive MS. Out of all the speeches, lines and statements that have been made this week in this place, Gary's words, as spoken to the Treasurer, are the most compelling. He said:

It's not flash, being disabled, it's not flash. But if there is anything good about it, it's that you're disabled in Australia.

Australians have big hearts. Crisis, hardship and helping those in need, particularly those who are suffering either directly or indirectly from a health perspective, who have special needs or who are intellectually or physically disabled, are when the true Australian spirit comes to the fore. I saw it for myself only last week with the wonderful people of Burke and Beyond in my electorate in Chisholm. It is one example of where many volunteers provide services to those in need.

The NDIS is totally supported and will be totally funded by this side of the House. But, as with all things under Labor, the ability to pay for things is fictitious or confected. Labor takes its approach of, 'She'll be right on the day,' or whacks something on the national credit card—confected numbers, hoping that the money will appear from somewhere. Despite a lot of promises, the previous Labor government failed to fully fund the NDIS, leaving a substantial annual funding gap of almost $4 billion from 2019 to 2020—a gap that grows each and every year. What does Labor say to all of those people who go to bed at night worried about the future of the NDIS? Labor likes to claim that it clearly identified enough other long-term savings to pay for the NDIS, but how can it make this claim when its actual budget papers did not link any savings to the NDIS and that proposition only appeared in the 2013-14 budget glossy? Importantly, many of the savings Labor supposedly allocated to the NDIS had actually been announced long before and assigned to other purposes, with no mention of the NDIS whatsoever. Savings Labor now claims it made to help fund the NDIS went into consolidated revenue and were never set aside to fund the NDIS. That is the same response it had for the funding gap for the NDIS. Where there was a clear funding gap, Labor in government simply loved to fuel the funding wars rather than come up with practical, real outcomes and solutions. It is politics before the people—'Let's fuel the funding wars.' That is what Labor talks about with the NDIS.

The Turnbull government will guarantee the NDIS is fully funded by legislating an additional 0.5-percentage-point increase in the Medicare levy. This will provide certainty for NDIS participants, their families and their carers that their needs will be met, and ensure that the scheme remains available for all future participants. The additional increase in the levy will apply from 1 July 2019. Importantly, low-income earners will continue to be exempt from the Medicare levy and will not be impacted, so this increase actually represents a little over $1 a day for the average Australian income earner.

Australians help each other. Millions of Australians at some stage of their lives will be affected by disability either directly or indirectly. I am sure that Australians would like the Labor Party on this occasion to put people before politics so that those directly or indirectly affected can be helped and so that the uncertainty surrounding the NDIS can disappear.

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