Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No.1) 2014-2015, Appropriation Bill (No.2) 2014-2015, Appropriation Bill (No.5) 2013-2014, Appropriation Bill (No.6) 2013-2014 and the Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) bill (no.1) 2014-2015 These bills are a part of the Abbott-Hockey budget that will go down in Australian history as the most un-Australian budget ever. These bills signify a step away from the Australia I hope to see, that I love and that I want my children and grandchildren to inherit. The Australia that I want to see and the Australia that I serve believes in giving people a fair go; this budget does none of that.

The Australia I serve gives our pensioners a fair income to live comfortably in their retirement after spending a lifetime contributing to our nation. I am not sure where the Deputy Prime Minister finds the pensioners he speaks to—the ones he said were blowing their funds on cruises and luxury items. They are not the people I talk to. Ann from Sunnybank, who I spoke to earlier tonight, has spent 12 years in aged care speaking to pensioners. They are not going off on cruises. The lives of the people I delivered meals to when I spent a day with Meals on Wheels a few weeks back were not ones of luxury items and throwing money away. Also, those Australians on disability pensions and their carers should be supported, not punished by a budget that delivers harsh cuts and gives what are effectively tax breaks to those at the top.

I believe in a prosperous Australia and I will stand up for the people in my electorate. They know that this nation will not prosper through us cutting pensions, cutting health care and introducing taxes such as the fuel tax and the GP tax. I believe in an Australia where your destiny is not predetermined by your parents' wealth or your postcode. I believe in a fair and prosperous nation populated by a creative and productive people.

But this is not the Australia we saw reflected in the budget a fortnight ago. It is a budget that targets our seniors and also schoolkids. Irina Bokova, Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, said:

From better health to increased wealth, education is the catalyst of a better future for millions of children, youth and adults. No country has ever climbed the socioeconomic development ladder without steady investments in education.

International research has indicated that early childhood education is crucial to promoting the educational and social development of disadvantaged children. In addition, measures to boost academic engagement and achievement—such as more hands-on learning, a positive school climate and mixed ability grouping—also emerge as key factors in retaining young people within full-time education. This is where we should be investing, not cutting.

In December 2011, the Labor government commissioned the most comprehensive review of our school education system in more than 40 years—the Gonski report. I remind those opposite that this was economic analysis of education by an expert committee led by a banker. It was not a bleeding heart lefty's plan for the future; he and his committee outlined an economic imperative in the Gonski education report. They indicated that there has been a performance decline in the last 10 years and a growing gap between the highest and lowest performing students of up to two years emerging by the time kids are 13 and 14. The Gonski report showed that to strengthen Australia's future the government must provide additional investment to schools, with greater concentration on disadvantaged students, needs based funding rather than the massive cuts to education outlined in the budget papers.

Labor invested $14.7 billion in additional investment in Australian schools because we know that education is fundamental to ensuring young people are equipped in the best possible way to take the path towards their passions and interests. I want to see educational inequality addressed in this nation by assisting disadvantaged schools, whether in Moreton or anywhere else in this land, whether in remote areas or lower socioeconomic circumstances, irrespective of the sign above the school gate. We do not need schools that are hampered by a lack of resources for our teachers or lack access to technology, which will inhibit learning in the digital world that we are embracing. In my electorate of Moreton, there are about 21,000 students attending 45 or so schools. Moreton is home to a large range of fantastic schools and I want to see these students given the best opportunities in life through education. We will not achieve that by cutting the education budget.

When voters went to the polls, they were told by the Liberal and National parties that in government they would not cut education. It was supposed to be a joint ticket. Instead teachers, parents and students were betrayed, with the biggest cut to school funding this country has ever seen. Higher education was not treated fairly. Education is fundamentally valuable because it allows children to develop, but these cuts to universities and TAFEs will restrict so many people who are not well off.

Labor has a strong track record that we can be very proud of when it comes to investing in our children's future at schools, in early childhood and at universities. After all, we are the party of Gough Whitlam, the political party that gave every smart Australian the opportunity to attend university, and we are committed to ensuring that higher education remains accessible and affordable for all clever Australians. This dumb-but-rich strategy that seems to be being advanced by those opposite, the member for Sturt leading the charge—this is a guy who, when he went to the university, according to the internet funded the Days of our Lives club at university and saw that as a significant achievement. I am hoping that that was a joke addition to the internet, but I am looking forward to him correcting the record.

When Gough Whitlam historically abolished university fees so that tertiary education could be more accessible for working-class people like me, Australia took a significant step towards bettering itself through investing in education. This current government is about to make another historic decision for Australia: a decision that reverses this accessible tertiary education and makes it harder for our children and grandchildren to attend university. On the radio today they talked about as much as a 33 per cent increase in the cost of degrees—maybe more at the sandstone universities and some of the red brick universities. I fear that Australia's youth will pay the price of the budget decisions of a fortnight ago. By cutting funds to tertiary education and deregulating university fees, we will return to a time when only the rich could afford to send their kid to university, which creates further inequality and unfairness across our great nation and misses the opportunities to harvest the great brains of those who are in poorer circumstances.

The future of our nation will be built on quality education, not on cutting. It will be built by focusing on skills and innovation, not by slashing these university budgets—especially if we are to strategically prepare for the Asian century, where we will be competing against these emerging nations on our doorstep. This is a budget built on the wrong choices and the wrong priorities. It is very short-sighted. There are short-term savings. Combine it with the Liberal and National parties' fraudband policy where they gutted the NBN, which was going to see innovation and the new jobs of the digital revolution rolled out, especially in services and education being delivered to Asia.

The LNP before the election made a promise to the Australian people that there would be no changes to higher education, and they broke that promise. It is basically the end of affordable higher education, and we will oppose the Abbott government's inequitable changes to higher education and fight to maintain the current assistance programs widely acknowledged and respected throughout the world as being fair.

I believe in a fair go. That is why I am a member of the Australian Labor Party. We are a party that believes in opportunity for all; academic freedom and autonomy; research that advances knowledge, critical thinking and, obviously, productivity; and that delivers access to university based on merit, not just the ability to pay. That investment in education has yielded significant economic and social benefits for our community. In the modern, competitive climate, it is important that the long-term importance of investment in education is not forgotten.

When discussing investment in our future through education, this goes hand in hand with effectively moving Australia towards clean energy and a sustainable environment and economy. Climate change poses a serious threat economically, socially and perhaps even militarily that will severely impact on the world's most vulnerable young people and future generations. Inaction proves that we are willing to pass on our issues to the next generation when it comes to environmental damage, and that is a short-term selfishness that no parent can be a part of. The Labor Party committed to addressing the big issues on climate change and pollution reduction. Those opposite supported that. I remember the 2007 and 2010 campaigns. The first act of the Labor government after coming to government in 2007 was to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, and we then committed to putting a cap on pollution through an emissions trading scheme—one supported by those opposite up until a change in leadership.

Let's see what happened. In six years of Labor Australia's wind capacity tripled and solar went through the roof—and on the roof. We established the Australian Renewable Energy Agency and Clean Energy Finance Corporation, which are already hard at work developing, commercialising and investing in new renewable energy technology. We also established the world's most comprehensive network of national parks in the ocean. The Great Barrier Reef is a magnificent asset that people from all around the world come to enjoy. It is great for tourism in Queensland.

These budget papers reveal some horrible choices from those opposite and some horrible challenges for the future. They are attempting to fundamentally change the nature of Australian society, which is why I have called it the most un-Australian budget delivered in our history. As has been acknowledged by the Prime Minister today and yesterday, Australia's economy is fundamentally strong and this is the legacy that Labor has left behind. There are challenges on the horizon, of course there are. But lets look at what the reality is today. We have low inflation, low interest rates and net debt peaking at just one seventh of the level of the major comparable advanced economies. We have a triple-A credit rating with a stable outlook from all three international ratings agencies—one of only eight countries in the world to have that rating.

Our superannuation savings are larger than the size of our whole economy. Since Kevin Rudd came to office in 2007, one million jobs were created under Labor and then under the Abbott government—although it is looking a bit crook at the moment. That is the real budget environment that we need to look at. We need to look at the budget delivered a fortnight ago. There were challenges if we had continued on course but, obviously, the Global Financial Crisis and decisions made by Labor, which were supported by those opposite, were different. Those decisions were made in the context of the Global Financial Crisis and since then there have been recalibrations and adjustments made.

I saw the budget a fortnight ago as being like an approach to someone like myself who likes to eat hot chips. Obviously if I spent every day of my life eating buckets and buckets of hot chips then that would create a problem. But what do you do? As somebody who is campaigning to make sure that people are aware of diabetes, what do I do? I talk to people about the decisions they are making and try to change their behaviour. The budget we saw the other night was a drastic response to some challenges on the horizon. It was almost like that scene from Pulp Fiction where they dried the adrenaline into the chest of Mia Wallace, played by Uma Thurman. It was a drastic overreaction to a challenge that was coming. It was almost like you solve the problem of somebody eating too many buckets of hot chips by cutting off their hands or their arms. The reality is we have challenges but we have the time and the strategies to solve those challenges and to avoid the big problems.

Sadly, the current government has no consistency in its approach. We saw that with the announcement that they are going to cut thousands and thousands of jobs throughout Australia at the same time as they announced cutting funding to employment services that will actually help those people that are made redundant to find new work.

The reality is this budget from a fortnight ago saw the coalition turn their backs on public schools and disadvantaged students in schools. The education minister, the member for Sturt, said that Australia does not have an equity problem in education. But the reality is, even though he was able to put out a press release before the Gonski report had even been released, he did not read it in great detail. Education is what we should be investing in as it is the economy of the future. Investing in broadband is what is Australia should be focused on. Instead, we have a budget that has provided a savage attack on Australian families, on our pensioners, on young people and—heaven forbid—on anyone that misses out on employment.

It also attacks our environment, our education system, our health system and all of those strong social fabric items that Labor invested so much in over the years including things like Medicare. I believe in a strong and prosperous Australia. I am proud to be a part of the Labor Party that will fight this Abbott-Hockey budget and the broken promises that are contained in it. The legislation before the chamber is a betrayal of Australia as far as I am concerned and should be condemned as such.

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