Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Furner. We want to make sure that people take advantage of the professional support teams that are available through the Department of Human Services. In no way do I want to imply that we do not appreciate the importance of partnerships. They are critical to our work. It is a core principle on which the new Department of Human Services is based.

I want to make sure that this is not misunderstood either, because Australia is not Tory Britain. Australia is not the sort of Tory Britain that we see those opposite pine for: where we see privatisation by stealth, where we see the quite explicit presumption that the workhouse is, somehow or another, an alternative to a modern social security system. We have to ensure that we are not pushing people off as the responsibilities of others. We are in the business of building the community sector by building a strong public sector that works in partnership with the community sector. We are about making sure we put more social— (Time expired)