House debates

Monday, 22 March 2021

Motions

HomeBuilder Program

11:56 am

Photo of Andrew WallaceAndrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Do you remember that? I remember that. I don't even know if you were here! But there was a cacophony of voices on the other side saying, 'This program will never work.' Well, it is working and it is working brilliantly.

I know that those opposite don't give a tinker's cuss about the residential sector, because they're all involved with their union mates at the CFMEU. All they care about is the unions and the industrial and commercial sector. But the building industry represents about five per cent of our GDP. It employs over a million Australians. It's one of the largest employers and sectors in the country and, as someone who has been intricately involved and linked to it for the last 32-odd years, it is a great sector. Despite the CFMEU, it is a great sector. HomeBuilder is not just helping people to buy their homes; it's helping people to stay in jobs.

I would have thought that those opposite would have been interested in job creation, particularly in what we once called the blue-collar sector, the trades. But those opposite, the Labor Party, have totally abandoned the construction sector and the trade sector. I'll tell you why—and this is proof positive of this happening. During the 2019 election, when I was on pre-poll and at the polling booth, anybody wearing high-vis would brush past every other person and come up to me and say: 'I want to vote Liberal because the Liberal and the National parties stand up for trades. They stand up for the workers.' That is unlike those opposite, who have totally abandoned their roots. Those members opposite are appealing purely and simply to the inner-city green elites. They have abandoned their trades. They have abandoned their working-class roots, and they should be ashamed of themselves. We will stand up—

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