Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Hansard source

The member for Boothby is new here. I give her credit for the fact that before coming to this place she was the chief executive officer of Saint Vincent de Paul South Australia and she won the seat as the first ALP member for 73 years. Well done on that. I listened very carefully and closely to her contribution. In her motion she does not mention the fact that Labor promised on many occasions—by the Prime Minister, in fact, 97 times—that power prices would be reduced by $275. Now, that has not occurred. She mentioned the cost of living. Yes, people are paying more for rent, more for groceries, more for fuel, more for energy, more for housing, more for everything. She talks about a three-point plan: relief, repair, restraint. I heard her closely say that she hears, she sees and she cares about the people of Boothby and others when they talk to her about cost of living.

But what is Labor doing to address the issues? Labor reminds me a little bit of the dog which chases the car, catches the car and then doesn't know what to do with it. We heard for many, many years Labor decrying all the things we on this side were doing when we were in fact getting on with the job, even through COVID-19, of reducing unemployment to its lowest level in decades. We heard the then shadow treasurer give us the challenge and say if there is one thing that the Liberal and Nationals could do, and they will be marked on this through COVID, is to make sure that unemployment goes to its lowest levels and to make sure that we keep the doors of businesses open, and we achieved that. We did not hear the member for Rankin give us any credit for that but we did it. Despite this worldwide virus, we made sure that the doors of business remained open. We made sure that the cost of living was on a reasonably even keel despite the pressures of COVID. I know, right throughout the world, airline companies were going bankrupt. Not only did our planes remain in the air, but one of the airlines, Rex, even expanded. We made sure that indeed 700,000 jobs were saved through JobKeeper. We made sure there were a record number of apprentices—a record number of women, in fact—in jobs. We made sure our trade and exports covered by free trade agreements, which were around 20-something per cent when we got into power, rose to 71.3 per cent of economic activity through our trade and exports. As I say, there are 815,600 female business operators—a record.

But what do we hear from those opposite? We hear them going on about a trillion dollars worth of debt. It's not a trillion dollars worth of debt. Every time a Labor member get their talking points and reads that line out, it's not a fact; they are misleading the House. Similarly, every time they get up at the dispatch box or elsewhere in this House they should be talking about what they're doing about their $275 pledge to reduce power prices; they said they would do it, but they haven't.

Here's the test. The test for Labor, like the dog which caught the car, is: what are you doing about the cost of living? What are you doing about the rent crisis? What are you doing about pushing housing prices down? We heard the member for Macquarie, earlier this morning, talking about green efficiencies in housing. Fantastic! That's at the upper end. But, in the main, people are paying more for housing. What are Labor doing about it? They say, 'We're going to build a million social houses.' Well, good luck with that! Good luck finding the labour and good luck finding the actual timber and metal frames it takes to build a house.

But what are Labor doing about the power situation? They're trying to kill off coal projects, kill off gas projects and kill off what has supplied most of our energy requirements and needs over so many years. In the process they're going to kill off jobs in that sector. And you know who'll cop it in the neck? It'll be regional Australia. Regional Australia expects the Labor government, having caught the car, to now do something about it. Like the dog which wanted to catch the car, you've caught it but what are you going to do to help regional Australia and what are you going to do to help businesses and families?

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