Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Sturt for her question and for the fantastic job she is doing representing the people of those fine suburbs of Adelaide. It was my pleasure, in the lead-up to 3 May, to make multiple visits to the electorate of Sturt, including just a couple of days beforehand, on my last visit Adelaide, and to hand out how-to-votes. And what those how-to-votes said on 3 May and on prepoll in the electorate of Sturt, like everywhere else, was that we wanted Australians to earn more and keep more of what they earned, and we wanted to address living standards and we wanted to deliver on the commitments we have made for the people of Sturt and indeed for people right across Australia, no matter where their representative sits.

A stronger Medicare is a big commitment we have made, with Medicare urgent care clinics being rolled out around the country and with the tripling of the bulk-billing incentive. Another is fully funded schools and free TAFE. Just yesterday I met one of the teachers from Adelaide, who came to Canberra to say, 'Thank you for finally fulfilling the Gonski vision'—which was there for all to see more than a decade ago, but it took the election of a Labor government and this education minister to make sure it was delivered in partnership with every state and territory government, the coalition and Labor, right across the country.

On free TAFE, some people reckon that you don't value something if it's free. Well, more than 700,000 Australians benefit from free TAFE. We want to make sure, in all our policies, that we have an economy that works for people, not the other way around. When it comes to helping Australians earn more, we've had a 15 per cent wage increase for childcare workers, a 15 per cent wage increase for aged-care workers, four consecutive increases to the minimum wage, and same job, same pay—lifting wages by tens of thousands of dollars, in some cases, for workers in mining, meat processing, aviation and construction. And of course we will soon be delivering a world-first agreement for gig workers—decent pay for thousands of DoorDash and Uber Eats drivers and, importantly, better conditions, to keep them safe.

So our commitments are very clear. The coalition have done everything they could to stop this. They of course had low wages as a deliberate design feature of their economic policy. The contrast is clear: only Labor wants people to earn more and keep more of what they earn.

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