Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Hansard source

Yes, but it is very nice to see. I am only asking for $3 million through Regional Partnerships, and I will outline that shortly. I have sought leave from the opposition to table some letters at the end of my speech. If I can do so, I would appreciate that. This was the first budget delivered by the Labor Party in almost 13 years, and many Australians are probably pretty pleased about that because during those years this country has never been in such a strong financial position and delivered so much for, and on behalf of, the Australian people. However, this was a typical Labor budget. It was full of broken promises, which I will outline later in this speech, and has let down many Australians—just ask the older Australians. You would have seen the demonstration in Melbourne the other day that underlined that.

This is a budget about increased taxes, as well. I am not one, generally, to agree with the member for Kingsford Smith, Peter Garrett, but he was right when he said before the election: ‘Once we get in we’ll just change it all.’ That is what we are seeing happening.

I want to start by outlining my grave concerns about what has happened to Regional Partnerships in my electorate of Canning and in the surrounding Peel region, which I share with the member for Brand, Gary Gray. Let me start with the fact that the Labor Party has ripped $1 billion from rural and regional Australia. More importantly, in my electorate of Canning there has been the axing of approved Regional Partnership funding of more than $3 million. As I talk about $3 million I feel humbled, having just listened to the member for Braddon. I could not keep up in adding up the millions of dollars that were being mentioned. But, as I said, it is good to see a member delivering for his electorate. Good luck to him!

It is pretty obvious that the Labor Party has taken more than it has given. In saving $436 million by the cutting of the Regional Partnerships program and Growing Regions, it is only putting $176 million back into regional development—conveniently already committed to Labor’s election promises. There is no new money for regional projects available until late 2009. And—surprise, surprise!—late 2009 just happens to coincide with the run-up to the next federal election.

I stand before you today with the letters of approval—and I wish, as I said, to table these letters shortly—for four projects benefiting the Canning residents and the local community bodies and organisations that have worked hard to secure this funding. I will say at the outset that I tend to agree that there may have been some approvals for projects that were probably wrong, and they should be weeded out. But do not weed out the ones that were properly applied for, properly signed off on and that had matching funding from local government, local organisations, state Labor governments and the federal government but from which money is now being taken away. The ones I wish to outline as examples in my area are the Pinjarra indoor heated aquatic facility, the Meadow Springs open space facility, the Port Bouvard Surf Sports and Life Saving Club, the paediatric ward of the Peel Health Campus and the c-pod digital studios in the city of Gosnells.

Now, as I said, I want you to look closely at these letters. Slashing funding from these projects is nothing short of dishonourable. The cloak and dagger manner in which this has been handled is totally unprofessional. In fact it is unprecedented for an incoming government to reach back into a former government’s programs—where approval has been given in the most proper way by ministers and through departments and budgeted for in the forward estimates—and to take the money away from these groups. For the past six months these invaluable projects have been left in limbo while construction costs continue to soar.

I have a letter here from the Mayor of the City of Mandurah. He has written to the Hon. Gary Gray today, the Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development and Northern Australia, and the heading is ‘Regional Partnerships program: non-funding of approved projects’. The candidate against me at the last election was a councillor from the City of Mandurah. He was there at the launch and approval of many of these programs. He voted for these programs through the council of the City of Mandurah. I considered it a fairly strong Labor council—you cannot make generalisations but it is stronger than some others in my area—and yet this council and the mayor have written an absolutely ferocious letter to the parliamentary secretary today outlining their abhorrence at what has happened to their community. One of the lines in the letter is, ‘I remind you that people affected by this incomprehensible decision are working families’. This is a letter from the Mayor of the City of Mandurah today. I am going to table that letter so I do not take up too much of the time in this debate.

While we have been waiting for the department and the government to make up their minds, the costs have soared enormously. The Labor Party appears to be hell-bent on punishing constituents living in seats held by opposition members now, rating politics higher than representation. We know what sort of infrastructure Labor regards as important. Do not forget the $2.6 billion for the dead tree of life in Queensland. It is going to get a tick. The electorate of Brand neighbours my electorate of Canning. These electorates straddle this area of the Peel region, in one of the most rapidly-growing areas in Western Australia. The Peel Area Consultative Committee covers an area of some 6,000 square kilometres and incorporates the local government areas of Rockingham, Kwinana, Serpentine-Jarrandale, Mandurah, Murray, Waroona and Boddington. During the 2006-07 financial year, 12 regional partnerships applications were submitted from the Peel region, including the above-mentioned Pinjarra pool, Meadow Springs open space facility, the surf club and the paediatric ward. Six projects were approved, with the total amount of funding being $3,365,000 and this funding contributing towards $20 million of capital development in the region. So that $3 million was going to make $20 million worth of capital projects.

I have raised the matter of these projects with the member for Brand myself, and I have been surprised and disappointed that he continues to ignore the needs of his own constituents. I wrote to the member for Brand on 24 April of this year, specifically in relation to the surf club project. I have yet to receive a response. Let me detail these projects now to more fully outline their importance to the region and their value to the local community—for example, the Port Bouvard Surf Sports and Life Saving Club. The former minister approved $651,200 in writing in August 2007—and as I said, I will produce the letters—towards the construction of club rooms at Pyramids Beach. The club rooms’ proposal included a viewing platform for lifesavers, a first-aid room, a training room, a kiosk, change rooms and storage, not to mention a base for the club’s 200-plus members. This project had support from all levels of government and community organisations, with significant funds coming from the Department of Sport and Recreation—which is a state government department—the City of Mandurah, some $200,000 from Lotterywest and $120,000 from the club itself. The bottom line is that this club saves lives. Everything possible should be done to prevent a repeat of the tragedy of February last year when a father drowned trying to save his two sons at this beach. I repeat: a father drowned at this beach trying to save his two sons who were caught in a rip, and we are trying to build something substantial. At the moment the surf-lifesavers operate out of tents on this beach. I will hold the Rudd government accountable for any future tragedies at Mandurah’s southern beaches until this funding is honoured, because they could have honoured it and the fact is that they have not. Let us just remember that this went through the area consultative committee, it went through the state department of DOTARS, it went to the federal department and it went through three ministers and was approved well before the election. The fact is that contracts were not entered into because they were waiting for notification of the funding. So it was a catch-22 situation.

I turn now to the Pinjarra pool project. Some $1.1 million was committed to the expansion of the existing Murray District Community Recreation Centre to include an indoor heated eight lane 25-metre pool, spa and leisure pool. This is a project that had been on the community agenda for well over a decade so the centre could offer swimming lessons, water fitness classes and hydrotherapy as a rehabilitation option. In an innovative partnership—and this is very interesting—Alinta, the state gas supplier, was to provide natural gas free of charge for 10 years to run the micro-turbine that would provide both electricity and heating for these pools, saving a remarkable 273 tonnes of greenhouse gases per year and at least $150,000 in operating costs. This micro-turbine operating system was believed to be the first used in an aquatic facility in Australia. Perhaps this is just another example of Labor not taking climate change seriously despite all the rhetoric.

Funding of $502,000 towards the construction of a 12-bed paediatric ward, furniture and equipment for the Peel Health Campus was approved by the minister—and the foundation has done a remarkable job raising over $3 million towards this project. Families throughout the Peel region would benefit from this new, potentially life-saving, facility. There is no12-bed ward for children in the Peel region now, and this funding was to go towards that. It has now been ripped off them.

Then there was the Meadow Springs open space project in the electorate of Brand but in the Peel region; $1.1 million was committed towards the construction of a $5 million purpose-built sporting community facility. The project is focused on healthy living and community involvement, and offers education and tourism opportunities. Minister Albanese’s allegations of pork-barrelling are just false, as these projects were awarded funding entirely on their merits.

Debate interrupted; adjournment proposed and negatived.

These projects were thoroughly planned. The application process, as I said, was completed in accordance with the program guidelines, and the projects were recommended by independent bodies and finally approved by a panel of three ministers. Last week, Mandurah’s sitting mayor confirmed as much in the Mandurah Mail, the local newspaper, on 22 May. Quite rightly, the mayor is outraged that the Peel community is being punished. The city does not believe Labor’s excuses for dumping the Regional Partnerships program are significant enough to rob many local governments of funding for valid regional projects. Mayor Creevey said:

“To say the Government will only honour existing contracts and not those which had departmental approval and letters of confirmation reveals a blatant disregard for many Australian communities especially when the justification given is worded ‘to ensure funds are allocated for legitimate local needs’.”

In other words, she is offended and regards it as a slur. She went on:

“We believe we do have contracts because of the funding approvals given, so for the Government to announce in the May budget that it would be dishonouring previously approved projects to offset various regional election commitments is nothing short of a double standard.”

She continued:

“It’s about time promises were honoured and local communities were treated with the respect they deserve.”

Labor’s $176 million Better Regions Program is hypocrisy at its best. Despite its fundamental criticism of the Regional Partnerships program as being a coalition slush fund, the Better Regions Program is nothing more than a Labor rort. Remember Ros Kelly’s whiteboard? That is what we are heading back to—because we know that in Labor areas their projects are being funded, whereas in coalition electorates ours have had their funding ripped away. Here they have $176 million worth of election promises to honour in their own key seats. We have just heard about what is happening in Braddon, and good luck to the member for Braddon, as I said—but at least he is getting his projects funded. There has been no application process and no paperwork except for the watchful eye of the Labor campaigners involved. This is the pot calling the kettle black, and local governments and community groups should not have to, and will not, stand for it.

This budget fails to tackle ever-increasing grocery prices, petrol prices and housing affordability, as we know. The Prime Minister founded his election on the needs of working families. We heard Mr Rudd say it over and over again, but it is exactly that group of people that Treasurer Swan’s first budget is hurting, as well as pensioners and small business owners. And Mr Swan says the Australian people are happy! What is that—’happy talk’? I do not think so.

Since Labor was elected, the average mortgage has increased by $152 per month and petrol has increased by 12.8c a litre. In fact, since this speech was written, it has increased further. Health insurance premiums will soar with thresholds for the Medicare levy surcharge being increased; unemployment will go up; and there are new taxes on alcohol, cars and software. Thirty-eight per cent of Canning residents, or one in three residents, have private health insurance. I can assure you this will fall dramatically under Labor’s budget proposals, putting increasing pressure on WA’s already stretched public hospitals and waiting lists. The state governments are not happy. They want to know where the money is going to come from to prop up the state hospitals.

The Rudd-Gillard team seem keen to foster the emergence of an intrusive state, a nanny state. The term ‘nanny state’ was first used in December 1965, in Britain. Today it could not be more relevant. At that time conservatives warned that the lives of citizens were in danger of being overseen and overly directed by intrusive Big Brother bureaucrats that people had to bankroll through even higher taxes. This is what we are seeing under the Rudd government. Mr Rudd has a huge ministry and the ability to regulate and interfere in the everyday lives of ordinary Australians.

We are already seeing the higher taxing with mark-ups on mixed alcoholic drinks, or alcopops. Interestingly, one bottle shop near my electorate office was quick to warn customers of Prime Minister Rudd’s intrusion. Mr Deputy Speaker, I will demonstrate that with this photo I am holding up. I happened to go through the bottle shop the other day—and I suspect the owner is not a Liberal voter—and a sign out the front said: ‘Due to Mr Rudd’s new alcohol policies, all alcohol has increased in price.’ At the bottom it says, ‘Sorry for the inconvenience.’ This is going through all the bottle shops in my electorate, not inspired by me but by the bottle shop owners. They are outraged.

Going back to the issue of the ever-increasing cost of living—despite all of the Prime Minister’s promises, in his 22 May press conference he confessed that there was nothing more he could do to combat the problems. He said:

… we have done as much as we physically can to provide additional help to the family budget. Recognising that the cost of everything is still going through the roof. The cost of food, the cost of petrol, cost of rents, costs of childcare …

Where is the Labor Party’s plan? We know he has actually hoisted the white flag on this issue, from his own words. In fact, he probably deserves a white feather award. Mr Rudd inherited the strongest national economy of any first-term government in Australian history. Unemployment was at record lows, mortgage rates were low and real wages growth was well up. Thanks to the coalition, the government now has a $22 billion surplus.

The education revolution has been a farce. Primary schools will do it tough, with no new funding directed to them in the budget and the highly successful Investing in Our Schools Program axed. I have almost 40 primary schools in Canning, which I fear will be significantly worse off under this government. These are schools I visit frequently that tell me of the things they were able to achieve with IOSP funding. Can we really rely on the state government to look after them now, to replace carpets or provide new desks? No. In fact, school maintenance has gone down.

Treasury has forecast that, as a result of Labor’s recent budget, the unemployment rate will close in on five per cent—we are going to get out of the fours now and go back to the fives—and around 134,000 Australians will lose their jobs As the Leader of the Nationals pointed out last week, this is like everybody in Darwin being without a job. It is just unacceptable.

Not only are there going to be 134,000 jobs lost but the Labor Party is trashing the Work for the Dole scheme. In fact, what is even worse is they are combining it with Green Corps and, as a result, they are taking away the funding of $290-odd a week to participants in Green Corps. Instead of encouraging people in, they are going to coerce people into this, and they are going soft on those who do not want to work. We know that they are not going to be breaching as strongly as they are to get people back into work, and so the people will start manipulating the system. Under the coalition, wages were increased by over 20 per cent in real terms and two million jobs were created. During Labor’s 13 years, the increase in real wages was only 1.3 per cent. Of those two million jobs, 53 per cent were full-time positions.

In my last few moments, I would just like to mention two things that I have been fighting for and would like to see the Labor Party take on board. I have been fighting on behalf of people caught up in franchises. I have raised this on several occasions in this parliament. People have been caught up in franchises where some companies—and I have mentioned Lenard’s in this place before—deliberately churn out weak franchisees. As a result, these people lose their houses and often lose their marriages and lose everything. I am asking the new minister, the Hon. Dr Craig Emerson, to put forward the legislation—which we did not, I must confess—to toughen up the disclosure and transparency for people being involved in franchises. There are some real rogue operators out there, and we need to do the best that we can to make sure that people who think that they are going into a job creation scheme on behalf of themselves and who use their retirement funds to get into a small business do not lose everything. So I appeal to the Labor Party, and to the minister in particular, to have a really good look at this because there are people in really desperate situations.

Finally, Perth Airport is an absolute disgrace. I have written to Prime Minister Rudd about this, and I had a response from Minister Albanese. They understand this is a problem, and I encourage them to get on with it. (Time expired)

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