Justine Elliot (Richmond, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Liberal-National government's unfair plans continue to attack families, with the Prime Minister and his ministers only worried about saving their own jobs. That is all they are focused on—their own jobs. They do not care at all about families that are hurting because of their policies.

The government's plans hurt families in my electorate with their attacks on health, on education and on family payments, and with their cuts to paid parental leave and also to child care. The fact is that all these attacks are brutally unfair and cruel—particularly cruel to those people living in regional areas, like in my electorate of Richmond.

If we look at education and the government's plans for $100,000 university degrees, this means that kids from regional and rural areas will not be able to access university. If we look at health, they have had three different forms of the GP tax so far and they are committed to dismantling Medicare. This is really going to hurt families very much.

The fact is that the Prime Minister and the Liberal-National parties broke their election commitments, and their dishonesty and their incompetence continues to hurt local families. Prior to the last election, in my area on the New South Wales North Coast we had all the National Party candidates running around saying, 'No cuts to health, no cuts to education, no cuts to family payments.' They got in, and that is exactly what they did: cut education, cut health and cut the family payments as well. I can tell you, Mr Deputy Speaker, families in my electorate are really hurting because of the unfair and cruel policies of the Liberal-National party government.