Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

We've heard a lot in this place in recent days about aspiration, and what's become blindingly obvious is that aspiration means very different things to different people. This morning I had a visit from Raj, Ernestina and Namgay, cleaners from Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra. They were telling me how insecure contracts, split shifts and low pay are making it difficult for them to make ends meet. They've been working in the same jobs for years without pay increases, hoping their contracts will be renewed but fearing they won't be. They've got aspirations: they aspire to decent pay and secure contracts.

Yesterday I met Alanna, an apprentice and TAFE student from Queensland. She's an absolutely inspirational young woman taking an apprenticeship in heavy diesel engine maintenance. She's got an aspiration: she wants to be an assets and facilities manager, and good on her. Yesterday I also met with electrical trades apprentices. All of them, all of these people, are worried about the funding of TAFE and whether their jobs are going to be secure and decently paid when they finished their apprenticeships. And today I met Carly, another apprentice, from Tomago. She's got aspirations as well. She aspires for a decently funded TAFE system and a good job when she finishes.

What about the aspiration of the 8,000 Telstra workers who have lost their jobs today—an aspiration to keep their job, to keep a roof over their head and a pay packet coming in. And what can the minister say about that? He says, 'As a former telco executive, these things happen.' 'These things happen', as though these people have no right to aspire to secure employment and a job to go to.

These workers, and the others that I talk to from right around Australia, have aspirations: for good pay and conditions, yes; for wages that keep up with the cost of living; for secure, stable, well-paid jobs where they feel confident that they'll have a pay cheque coming in next week and next month and next year. They have the aspiration that, if they work on a weekend or a public holiday, they'll actually get paid for the time they're missing out with their family. They aspire to an affordable roof over their heads, a good education for their kids. They aspire to a health system that will be there when they need it, no matter their pay packet or their wealth. Do you know what? We in Labor share these aspirations with them. What these working Australians want for themselves, we want for them too. And guess what? We want to give them tax cuts as well. We want everyone on up to $125,000 a year to be better off, to get a bigger tax cut under Labor.

You do sometimes, every now and again, get a cut-through moment in here, where people drop the facade, stop running out the pat lines, and the spin falls away. Yesterday in question time we got a couple of those moments, where you actually see into the heart of people, into their values. When the Leader of the Opposition asked the Prime Minister whether a 60-year-old aged care worker from Burnie should aspire instead to be an investment banker from Rose Bay so she can get a $7,000 a year tax cut, the Prime Minister said she should aspire to 'get a better job'. 'Get a better job' were his exact words. Do you know what? We all knew exactly what he meant. What he meant was: become an investment banker, make more money, accumulate more wealth, put your money into shares or, better still, the Cayman Islands and get yourself a mansion. Because that's what aspiration looks like to this Prime Minister. It is the only aspiration that he understands.

Caring for elderly and vulnerable people, giving them comfort and love during some of the most difficult days of their lives, that's actually something to aspire to in your work. Working to educate the very young, providing them with a loving and supportive environment while their parents are off at work, making sure they're ready to start school—that's something to aspire to. Spending your life in the service of others, whether it's keeping their workplaces clean, serving in a shop or a restaurant, building offices or homes, farming the food that feeds us—they're all jobs to be proud of, but you wouldn't know it from those opposite. The Prime Minister thinks the only reason that anyone would do any of these jobs is because they can't get a better-paid job. It blows me away. These people opposite talk about 'job snobs'. Who are the job snobs here? People are proud of the work they do in aged care, in child care, in child protection, in manufacturing, in building, in farming, in retail, in hospitality, and those opposite think they only do this work because they can't really be merchant bankers. If only they could be merchant bankers, they would jump at the opportunity

People in these professions would like better pay. They'd certainly like to have their penalty rates restored. They'd like to see better wages growth than they've had in recent years, for sure. But they also do their work because they love their community, they love their country and they get personal satisfaction out of the work they do, and that's something the Prime Minister will never understand.

When the Prime Minister talks about aspiration, the only aspiration he understands is aspiration for yourself, for your own hip pocket. He means: be prepared to crawl over anyone who gets in your way through survival of the fittest, rule of the jungle, dog-eat-dog, trickle-down economics, opt out of paying tax if you possibly can—if your clever lawyers and accountants can get you a tax-free account in the Cayman Islands somewhere. That's the Prime Minister's world view to a tee. If he were still working at Goldman Sachs or working for Kerry Packer or presiding over Australia's worst corporate disaster at HIH, that would be his prerogative. But he's the Prime Minister now and is supposed to be the Prime Minister for all Australians. It's that arrogant, out-of-touch perspective which says, 'Where you're born is where you'll stay. Get what you're given and be grateful,' that's hurting Australia. That idea of cold charity and tough luck, that's hurting Australia.

Yesterday, in all of that red-faced, hoarse-voiced vitriol—a performance only equalled by his tantrum on election night—the most cutting insult he could think of to throw to those of us on this side was that we're 'university educated'. You know what, in the world that this Prime Minister inhabits, if you're a working-class person, if you come from a family where you are the first in your family to go to university, that makes you a class traitor. Universities are okay for him; he can go to Oxford. In fact, universities are a necessity for people of his stock; they're allowed in the club. But if you're a kid from the outer western suburbs of Sydney, if you come from a small country town, if you don't have ancestors who bought the first run of shares in Westpac then you ought to know your place. You're just getting ideas above your station going to university. That's what he means when he goes on about 'social climbers'. How often have you heard that term from the Prime Minister? He means: stay put, stay where you belong, and make sure your kids do too.

Let me tell you something: we don't call it social climbing in the Labor Party. We call it justice. We call it fairness. We call it opportunity for all. We call it giving everybody a chance to fulfil their potential, to lift themselves out of poverty, to give their kids a chance to live a more comfortable life than they've had.

He'll cut Medicare; he doesn't need it. He'll cut the pension; he'll never get it. He thinks public transport's an amusing hobby, not something you wait for at 5 am to get to your job in the city. He's never relied on penalty rates; he doesn't know anyone who has. Every Christmas he talks about the cleaners in this building and how great they are. But he's happy to see their wages cut and see them put on insecure contracts. This is a man who's got millions of dollars but not a cent's worth of empathy for anyone who's not just like him. He has got shares in everything, but he does not share the values of the Australian people. He was born out of touch. He's lived his whole life out of touch. He will always be out of touch. He proved it again today, going on and on, defensive, about this aspiration idea.

To all the aged-care workers out there, this is what we say to you: caring for the most vulnerable Australians is something to be proud of. You're doing a great job. You don't need a better job. You need a better government.

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