Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, thank you for the opportunity to comment on the responses by Senator Evans to this place during question time. It is entirely appropriate for the people of Australia to want to know what the preferences deal was between Labor and the Greens leading up to this last election. It is all well and good for now Prime Minister Gillard and Senator Bob Brown to say they did not know what they were, but I can assure you that the Australian people deserve and want to know what they were. For the record, there are six Labor members in the other place, including the Treasurer of this country, who are there as a result of Greens preferences. In July next year there will be one Labor and one Greens senator joining us in this place as a result of those same preferences. It is duplicitous of Senator Evans to not even want or attempt or try to answer the questions in relation to the cost of living. They were entirely reasonable questions and deserving of an entirely reasonable answer.

Let me just take the attention of two or three policies of the Greens that are going to have a dramatic impact on the wellbeing of Australians and on the cost of living. The first is the demand by the Greens that there be removed the 30 per cent and, in some cases for older Australians, the 40 per cent health rebate. What is that going to add to the cost of living for Australians? Let me give you this understanding now. Despite the relatively low cost to the economy of private health insurance, 40 per cent of all patients in this country are treated in the private sector and 60 per cent of all surgery is undertaken in the private sector, yet the government, according to 2007-08 figures, contributed only $1.7 billion through rebates whereas they had to contribute $31 billion to the public health system. If and when the Labor government, driven by their Greens partners, do remove the private health rebate, what impact is that going to have on costs of private health and on availability in the public health sector, which, as we know, is already heavily under pressure?

The second point that I draw to the attention of the chamber is the demand by the Greens that we wind down support for the Catholic and independent schools sector, remove all further funding for capital works and take anything away from so-called wealthier schools. Let me tell you what the statistics are in this country, whether you support private education or not. The cost to the taxpayer of every child in a state school in this country is $12,600. The cost to the taxpayer of children in private schools—Catholic and independent—is $6,600, the difference being $6,000 per child that the taxpayer is saved by having them in Catholic and independent schools. The cost in WA alone is $780 million a year saved as a result of parents putting their children in Catholic and independent schools. It is some $780 million in WA and $7.5 billion nationally. Those are the sorts of increases in the cost of living we are going to see in this country if and when the Greens get their power with the Labor government. What they are doing sitting on the crossbenches and not over on the Treasury bench is absolutely unknown to me.

In the time available to me, I now come to the increase in the cost of power and other utilities that is going to accompany this madness associated with the increase and the tax on carbon. It is completely and utterly without any validity for us to go through this process, but let me assure the chamber that as we move to areas such as some of these renewables which are unsustainable—the Scandinavians are already going away from wind power—we have not yet had the opportunity to investigate the real cost. Take the cost of green jobs, for example. In Spain, a country which is now in economic denial and demise, there are at least two jobs lost for every green job saved.

And it is not just the cost of living; it is going to be the cost of dying. Add that to the families beyond as the Greens death duties come into play. We heard that comment in this place earlier; it is now the time for this Labor government to tell the Australian people the truth.

Question agreed to.