James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I think I heard the last speaker indicate that energy bills were on track to increase by a further $500 than they already have were it not for measures the government put in place last year. In my home state of South Australia, the default market offer has gone up by $500. So the previous speaker is indicating that with the policies they took to the last election—so before they undertook their intervention—the average bill in my home state would have gone up by $1,000 a year when you went to an election saying you would cut bills by $275. You are now admitting that, prior to your purported effective intervention before Christmas, the average power bill in my home state of South Australia would have gone up by more than $1,000. What an absolute disgrace. And now we're being told to be grateful that they've only gone up by more than $500 in South Australia and it could have been a whole lot worse!

Another speaker mentioned how, when he's out talking to constituents, they're absolutely raising issues around the cost of living. Well, I'm sure they're satisfied with that answer of 'You should be grateful; it could be even worse than it is right now; you should thank me'! This is like the commissar who doesn't give enough bread to the Soviet family and they complain and say, 'I can't feed my family; there's not enough bread,' and he says, 'You should be grateful you're getting any bread at all.' That is the position of the government. When they went to an election saying they were going to cut people's energy bills, apparently people should now be grateful that their bills, in this one financial year, in the state of South Australia, are 'only' going up by more than $500, because it could have been more than $1,000. Imagine being proud of that. Imagine coming into this chamber and reading out the talking points. Imagine the pollsters saying, 'Just stick with that line—that it could be even worse than it already is; I think that'll get us through this great fraud that's being perpetuated upon the people, during a campaign that said that power prices would be cut.' And now people should be grateful that their bills are 'only' going up with the velocity that they are.

It's an appalling circumstance, and there are people doing it particularly tough who are being mocked. Apparently the prices of jam and Vegemite going up is something to laugh about. Well, those people are probably not watching parliament being telecast right now. They can't afford to be sitting at home watching this debate. But if they saw members of this parliament laughing about prices of condiments going up by that amount—nothing could demonstrate being out of touch more than mocking people who struggle to even purchase the basic groceries from their household budget. Laughing about that is particularly low. We should be in here talking about how to help those people, not mocking them and poking fun at them.

We've got a difficult cycle starting to unravel upon our economy as inflation remains persistently high, and elements of the household budget going up dramatically more than inflation. Inflation is running at seven per cent, and we know electricity prices in my home state of South Australia for the average household are going up by more than 20 per cent. That is in the future. So the future cost to households is much worse than it is right now, and if they're telling members opposite, out at their supermarket listening posts and street corners and while doorknocking and phone canvassing, that things are tough now, then, regrettably, any member in this chamber has to say: 'Well, it's about to get much worse. You see, that electricity bill you got recently that you thought was tough to pay and you had to make a difficult decision about whether or not you could have a family holiday later in the year, unfortunately the next one you get is going to be 24 per cent higher if you're on the average household bill in the state of South Australia. That's the future you can look forward to.' Be grateful about how tough it is right now, according to the government, because it's going to get a whole lot worse as these price rises continue to flow through the economy. And that's at a time when real wages are going backwards.

So, as all the relevant costs in the household budget increase, the only thing that's not increasing is your pay packet to cover those costs, and that means making very difficult decisions. Laughing about jam, Vegemite and litres of milk might bring out the student politician in some, but it's no laughing matter. There are Australian families who are doing it really tough right now, and people in this chamber should take that very, very seriously.

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