Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

These appropriation bills, as we have heard from many people in this chamber, are in relation to the government's budget—the budget that was brought down just before the federal election held on 2 July. This budget still contains what we call on our side of the House 'zombie' measures—that is, measures introduced in that disastrous 2014 budget of former Prime Minister Tony Abbott. Those measures include things like cuts to health; cuts to education; cuts to Medicare; increasing the age pension age to 70; trying to make young job seekers wait up to four weeks before receiving income support, which is of particular concern to me; and changes to the pension that will make 190,000 pensioners worse off. There are still a lot of zombie measures in the budget that was introduced just before the election—and what an election it was.

In my home state of Tasmania, we saw health and education become very big issues in the election. Tasmanians were particularly concerned, because they had been told time and time again by the government that there would not be any cuts to education. They were told prior to the 2013 election that the government was on a Gonski ticket with Labor when it came to funding. There was great concern about the funding for years 5 and 6 of Gonski. In the election campaign this time, it became very clear that the government was not going to give Tasmania that additional funding for our schools. We have a really serious issue in Tasmania where a lot of the students do not finish years 11 and 12. This is very high in terms of continuation rates at school, and then we have a very high youth unemployment rate. In the south-east of Tasmania, we have a youth unemployment rate of over 20 per cent. This funding for schools in Tasmania was really critical indeed.

The difference between the Gonski and the non-Gonski funding that the government is offering Tasmania is worth $62 million over the two years that Tasmanian schools would have available to them that they now do not have available to them. This is a serious amount of money that Tasmanian schools and Tasmanian students need. If you want to base funding according to need, if you actually want students who need that support to get that support then that Gonski funding as originally initiated by Labor should be provided.

The other education cuts—the higher education cuts—are still in the budget. The $100,000 university degrees are still on the agenda of this government, as it was with the Abbott government. We saw that quite clearly in the campaign too. I went down to the University of Tasmania and spoke to many students. The concerns from students were about how this measure would work, particularly if it would mean cuts to the University of Tasmania. The University of Tasmania is in a really unique position, in that Tasmania only has one university state wide. It is the only option for students in Tasmania. It is not like they can go and shop around to try to find a cheaper degree somewhere else. There is not any other option. This is a really serious issue: the transition to make sure that more Tasmanian students complete year 11 and 12 and that we get students, particularly from disadvantaged backgrounds, into university in Tasmania so that they have the best employment opportunities.

One of the other issues that I talked about a lot during the campaign was the fact that there has been more than 5,500 jobs lost in Tasmania since Malcolm Turnbull became Prime Minister. Unemployment remains a really serious issue in Tasmania, and we have seen unemployment go up over the last few months. Of particular concern is the participation rate dropping below 60 per cent. That means Tasmanians have given up looking for work, because they know there is no longer any work available. That is why that measure of making young jobseekers wait four weeks before receiving any income support at all is of such concern to me in a state like Tasmania, where you have students not completing year 12; the $100,000 university degrees putting them off from going to university, even if they do complete year 12; high youth unemployment; and a low participation rate. It really is a recipe for disaster for the future of Tasmania's economy if this is not addressed.

On the Labor side, we went around and we talked to a lot of community organisations in Tasmania. We spoke to businesses in Tasmania. We had a lot of consultations about what a positive plan for Tasmania might look like. We put that to Tasmanians during the campaign, and what a result Labor had in Tasmania at that election campaign. We now have no Liberals in the lower house in Tasmania whatsoever—zero, none. The reason for that is twofold: it is because Tasmanians did not believe in the Liberal plan for jobs and growth—that is because there have been over 5,000 jobs lost in Tasmania since Malcolm Turnbull became Prime Minister—and because Tasmanians were concerned about health and education funding.

Tasmanians were really seriously concerned, because they saw the cuts that had happened under the Liberal governments. They had a Liberal state government that would not properly fund our hospitals. After the Abbott cuts, we had a state government saying to the federal government, 'We cannot absorb these cuts. Tasmania cannot afford these cuts,' and we had the federal government not listening to what Tasmanians were saying.

Tasmanians were a little bit encouraged when the Prime Minister changed from Abbott to Turnbull; but the issue now is that Malcolm Turnbull, the member for Wentworth, does not seem to have a real interest in Tasmania at all. It was only after one of my speeches in this place and after several negative front pages that we finally saw the Prime Minister came back to Tasmania close the election. I can count on one hand the number of times that the member for Wentworth has been in Tasmania since he got elected to parliament, since he was minister for communications and since this government has been in government—on one hand.

He is not interested in Tasmania. We have had Smart Cities have roundtables in Tasmania and around the country. They did not have one in Tasmania until it was on the front page of the newspaper. We had a decision to say that we were going to shut down the Antarctic Division's centre on Macquarie Island, which was backflipped a day later after it was on the front page of the paper. This government is wholly disinterested in the state of Tasmania as to what is going on. We have seen it time and time again. We saw it prior to the election campaign, and we have seen it from the Prime Minister's own lack of interest. We saw from their plan in the election campaign that they do not have a serious plan for Tasmania. They do not have a plan to address real jobs and growth in the state of Tasmania. They really seem disinterested on what is happening on our island state.

The backpacker tax is another one of those issues where the government has not been paying attention. We have had the fruitgrowers in Tasmania come out several times about the backpacker tax. They are saying there has been a 40 per cent reduction in people applying for picking work in Tasmania because of that backpacker tax. We have had one of the growers on radio today say, 'This change down to 19c will not make any difference at all. We're going to have fruit that's not going to be able to be picked in Tasmania.' That is because of this government's lack of consultation, its long period of inaction and its disinterest in this issue. Their disinterest just seems to be a repetitive theme from this government.

From the Labor side during the campaign, as part of our plan for Tasmania, we had a tourism package where we were going to invest $15 million in Cradle Mountain, we were going to complete the Three Capes Track and we were going to invest in local and community projects for tourism in Tasmania. The Liberal government came up with a plan to give $1 million to Cradle Mountain, when they had asked for $30 million and we were prepared to put in $15 million. It shows that that side of politics really did not have an interest and had not been listening to what the local issues were.

Tourism has been one of the growth sectors in Tasmania. We have particularly been seeing more international tourists come down to our state. Labor, after consulting with industry and with businesses across the state, decided that this was a good investment Tasmania. It was something the industry had asked for; it was something the state government had asked for. We were expecting the Liberal Party to match our commitments as part of our Tasmania plan, but that did not happen. Instead, they got a much smaller commitment just days out from the election and, again, this was because of disinterest.

The NBN on the West Coast is another example. It took Labor saying that we would provide fibre to some of those West Coast towns before we finally saw some action from the Liberal government in trying to provide some fibre to the West Coast of Tasmania. There was Labor's commitment for the University of Tasmania—and I have talked about funding for the University of Tasmania—where Labor was going to provide $150 million for new campuses in Launceston and in Burnie to trial some sub-bachelor degrees to see if we could try to lift some of the participation in tertiary education in our state.

Labor made that announcement in April of this year. It took the federal government up until the week before the election to make the same commitment after this issue had been on the agenda for months and months. There had been a business case, a feasibility plan and discussions with all sides of politics to try to get bipartisan support for what is a critical community program in Tasmania. We had the state government say that they would fund some of it. Again, the disinterest in what was happening in Tasmania from those opposite was clearly apparent.

It was not until the last week of the campaign when the government finally came to the party and said, 'We might be able to also match Labor's commitment when it comes to the University of Tasmania.' I am very pleased to see that commitment. I, of course, will be making sure that it gets delivered on, because I have my doubts.

The Liberal Party has form on election commitments, when they win elections, in not delivering in Tasmania. One of those was in my electorate in 2013: the Hobart airport runway. Senator Abetz came out and promised that this runway would be 'operational' by 2016. Well, he has turned the sod. The sod has been turned, and $1 million of the several million dollars that is going to be provided to this project—I think it is $38 million in total—has been provided to date. And the sod has been turned. In fact, I was invited to the sod-turning, just a month or so ago. So at least, after two election wins, we have finally seen something happen as to the Hobart airport runway extension. But I will not hold my breath for the completion of that project.

We have seen it again when it comes to the Huon Highway-Summerleas Road intersection, also in my electorate, which Labor actually had in the 2013 budget prior to the election. We had an agreement with the state government and a commitment that that upgrade would occur. It is a very serious crash site, unfortunately, and there have been quite a few incidents in this area. But, again, after several pieces of correspondence and several discussions with the state and federal Liberal governments, I finally got a letter from the state minister saying: 'Construction should start before Christmas this year.' This money has been in the budget since 2013, and it might start by this Christmas! Again, that is two elections that my constituents have had to wait for, for election commitments in Tasmania to actually occur. As I said, I will not be holding my breath on that one. It is a bit like the Hobart airport runway.

But one election commitment that my constituents were expecting this election that they did not get is of great concern. We have now had three rounds of Stronger Regions funding, and my electorate—even though it is regional; even though it is about 7,000 square kilometres—has not received one cent in three rounds of Stronger Regions funding, even though a project in my electorate has had bipartisan support. Even though the Liberal candidate and Eric Abetz and the Liberal Senate team all went and had meetings with the mayor and took their photos and put them up on Facebook and everything, there was not one cent of funding commitment for a vital project. They need $5 million to open up $80 million of development in an area where unemployment is very high, and they cannot get it. They have a business case that stacks up. They have a whole feasibility study that has been done. They have got community support for it. It is part of a master plan that Labor funded last time we were in government for the area. We have got the state government investing in an integrated care centre in this new precinct. And the government will not fund this under Stronger Regions. I do not know why they will not fund it. And they have not been honest with people about why they were not funding it. The mayor from Kingborough has gone back to the department several times and actually asked for some feedback, and they have been told that it meets the criteria. But it just has not got funding. It is the $5 million redevelopment of the old Kingston High site. It is really important to locals for opening up and creating a new Kingston Park area in Kingston in the south of my electorate—very close to where Senator Abetz lives. And I would have thought that the Liberal Party and Senator Abetz and others would have supported this project. Given that they have put it on Facebook, given that the candidate went down and talked about it, I am really surprised that, in the lead-up to the election campaign, this project did not get funded. And I was even more surprised that, when the last round of Stronger Regions got announced last week, it was not in that. But of course I was able, as a Labor candidate, to make a commitment during the campaign that, if Labor had been elected, we would have funded it, because we have a good record of delivering, not just for my electorate but for the whole state of Tasmania—unlike those opposite.

In the few seconds left to me, I do want to thank the people who worked on my campaign, because you do not often get a chance to do that. I particularly want to thank my staff—Jess, Gabby, Simon and Liam—for their hard work; my campaign team: Innes, Nat, Jackson, Lisa, David and Dan; and my poster-putting-up team, Evan, Mike and Graham. Thank you so much to everybody that worked on the campaign and to anybody I have not named. Thank you to Lisa Mycko who has come back to work with me, and to everybody, and particularly to my duty senator, Senator Catryna Bilyk. I want to put on record that Catryna and I have been working together now in the Franklin electorate since 2008, and it is great to have such a local senator who is happy to be out and about on the ground, working with community groups and supporting me as the local member; I think we make a formidable team. And I look forward to continuing to represent the people of Franklin in this place.

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