Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

The Leader of the National Party over there just sighs! He sighs in his tired, old way; he sighs because he knows that, when they were in government and had the opportunity to increase the utilities allowance, they did not do it. They did not increase the utilities allowance. They left it at $107. We increased it to $500. And in this fortnight pensioners are going to be receiving $128, which is the third instalment of that increased utilities allowance. It was left to this government to extend the utilities allowance to carers and people on the disability support pension. They had all that time to extend it to those pensioners. Did they do it? No, they did not.

This government also decided that we would pay the bonuses both to people who are on the aged pension and to carers, to make sure that they got some extra help while we did this very important inquiry, because we do understand just how complicated it is. Another attempt by those opposite demonstrates just why it is so important to get this right. If we were to do what they are proposing then, if you were a public housing tenant, a quarter of what those opposite want to give you would just go in public housing rents. And 13,000 older Australians who are on the carer payment or the disability support pension would just be ignored. Two million Australians who are battling on pensions would just be ignored.

We will not be introducing a flawed piece of legislation. What the government has done is made sure that we have provided around $900 extra to pensioners to make sure that they had some additional help while we did a proper inquiry to make sure that the base rate of the pension, the support that governments provide to pensioners, is right for the long term. We will not be leaving it for 12 years and doing nothing about it. We made sure that in our first budget—in our first budget, not our 12th budget—we delivered an extra $900. Our first budget delivered an extra $900, and we will get this right for the long term for pensioners.

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