David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from the honourable member for Melbourne proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The Government’s failure to address the problems confronting working families while spending vast amounts of money on its own political survival.

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Back in 2004, the Prime Minister had a strategy to win the election, and that was to spend his way out of trouble. We are again in an election year and he has a new strategy: to advertise his way out of trouble. Either way, the taxpayer foots the bill, but at least in 2004 there was a bit of a chance that you would get a road, some childcare money or something like that at the end of the process. The trouble with the strategy that the Prime Minister is now pursuing is that not only is it funded by the taxpayer but, at the end of the process, all you get is the warm inner glow from sitting in front of the television set and hearing how your penalty rates and your overtime are protected by law—or whatever the latest version of alleged fairness in the government’s extreme industrial relations agenda is—how private health insurance is providing an umbrella for all Australians to ensure that they get high-quality health care and how John Howard’s superannuation changes will allow you to retire on a country estate with your own golf course, maybe a swimming pool and all sorts of other delightful things. At least in 2004 Australian taxpayers got something at the end of the giant spending spree. This time round, all they are getting is a giant advertising spree. It is a clear sign of a government that has lost all sense of an agenda for the future—all sense of trying to solve the nation’s problems of high-speed broadband, climate change and investing in the education of young children to ensure that they have better chances in life. All it indicates to Australian taxpayers, to Australian voters, is that the government is obsessed with maintaining office. It is seeking to advertise its way back into office, and it is trying to tell Australian working families that they have never had it so good.

Remember the Prime Minister’s statement in this parliament only a matter of weeks ago: ‘Australian working families have never been better off.’ That is the mentality behind the giant advertising propaganda campaign that is now starting to unfold. ‘You have never been better off; how dare you even contemplate voting us out of office?’ and ‘We are going to spend vast amounts of your money to make sure that you truly understand just exactly how well off you are.’ The statement ‘Australian working families have never been better off’ will be hung around the Prime Minister’s neck from now until election day.

Senior ministers and the Prime Minister stand in parliament, day to day, boasting about their extraordinary economic management record. The Treasurer, who without doubt is the most bombastic politician in Australian history, stands up and says how wonderful his management has been. I know that ‘the most bombastic politician’ is a big statement, but there is no question that he deserves the honour. ‘We’ve paid off all the debt, inflation’s low, unemployment’s low, the budget is in surplus, economic nirvana has been delivered.’ He does, of course, leave out a few things. When he is in boasting mode—when he is in skiting mode—you do not hear many references to productivity. You do not hear much about foreign debt or the current account deficit. You do not hear much about exports. We have not heard them boasting about the performance of Australian exports in recent times either.

They have gone a bit quiet on interest rates, because ours are amongst the highest interest rates in the developed world and, as we and Australian families know, interest rates have been steadily increasing over the last year or two in spite of the government’s promise that it would keep interest rates at record lows. Particularly what you do not hear about is the impact of the costs of everyday things on ordinary working Australians—to name a few: rising childcare costs, the price of petrol, rising medical and dental bills. None of these things ever get seriously addressed by the government.

This is a government that is seriously out of touch. Its solution to dealing with its political problem is not to tackle the issues that face the nation, not to build a coherent future agenda for Australia, but to try to advertise its way out of trouble. Back in 1995, shortly before the coalition came to government, it made a promise that it would cut government advertising by $20 million per annum. We all recall the famous quotes from the then Leader of the Opposition, now the Prime Minister, who said:

In a desperate attempt to find an election life raft, the Prime Minister is beginning an unprecedented propaganda blitz using taxpayers’ money.

He said:

This soiled Government is to spend a massive $14 million of taxpayers’ money—

it looks pretty small in the current context—

over the next two months as part of its pre-election panic.

…            …            …

This grubby tactic will backfire on the Government. Taxpayers will see through it. They don’t want their money wasted on glossy advertising designed to make the Prime Minister feel good.

And he said:

Over the last few days the Labor Party has spent $150,000 of its own money on an advertising stunt which disappeared without a ripple.

…            …            …

The problem for this Government is not communication. The problem is that it is tired, it has broken too many promises and it has hurt too many people.

That was the Prime Minister in 1995. Let us have a look at his record in government. For one year, they stayed pure to their commitment to reducing advertising—their first year in office. And then came the GST and advertising spending—which peaked at $84 million under Labor and typically was in the $60 million to $70 million area—hit $211 million. The following year, which just happened to be an election year, it was $156 million. It started to drop down just a little, to $143 million, in 2003-04 but it was still very hefty. In 2005-06—a non-election year; the last completed year—it was $208 million. Even when you adjust the figures to take into account inflation, that is almost double the highest amount ever spent by Labor.

I cannot help but be reminded of one of my favourite characters in George Orwell’s famous book Animal Farm. I apologise for the comparison, but I am afraid the Prime Minister reminds me somewhat of Squealer, who was a very important figure in Animal Farm. You might recall that Squealer was the pig who was responsible for propaganda and for explaining, when things were getting tough, why they were actually getting better—for example, on Sunday mornings, Squealer would hold down a long strip of paper with his trotter and read out to them lists of figures that proved that the production of every class of foodstuff had increased by 200 per cent, by 300 per cent or by 500 per cent, as the case might be. Reading out the figures in a shrill, rapid voice, he proved to them in detail that they had more oats, more hay, more turnips than they had had in Jones’s day, that they worked shorter hours, that their drinking water was of better quality, that they lived longer than a larger proportion of the younger ones that survived infancy, that they had more straw in their stalls and suffered less from fleas.

I apologise for the comparison between the Prime Minister and a pig, but Squealer was a very cunning pig. Does any of this sound familiar: ‘No worker will be worse off’; ‘We’ll never, ever have a GST’; ‘Your conditions are protected by law’; and, of course, ‘Australian working families have never been better off’?

Duncan Kerr (Denison, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Kerr interjecting

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Denison has been warned and he should understand that my tolerance is limited from now on.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I suspect that members of the opposition are trying to offer me other suggestions for the list, but I will have to leave that aside for the time being.

What we are seeing with this advertising campaign is, in effect, corruption and arrogance reaching new heights. Now they will not even say how much is going to be spent on these campaigns. They are now not even prepared to indicate what the budgets are going to be. And we heard today that it looks as if every household in Australia is going to get a glossy leaflet in the mail explaining why the government are really concerned about climate change—and a letter from the Prime Minister to boot! So rather than addressing the problem—rather than having a serious strategy for Australia’s future—what are they doing? They are concentrating on looking like they are doing something, by advertising the product, not by actually having a decent product.

The Prime Minister responded to these claims with one argument: ‘The Labor state governments do it too.’ He obviously missed the statement made earlier today by the Leader of the Opposition where he indicated that not only do we intend to impose our commitment with respect to the Auditor-General or his delegate vetting all advertising campaigns that are more than $250,000; we intend to act to ensure that state governments fulfil their responsibilities in the same way—that they are subject to the same disciplines.

I just want to conclude on this point with one example to illustrate just how outrageous their spending is in this area. In 1993 the Labor government introduced a massive fundamental reform to industrial relations—the introduction of enterprise bargaining and unfair dismissal laws. The total cost to the budget of those reforms was about $11 million. As the person who was heavily involved in prosecuting Labor’s case at the time of the waterfront scandal and as the person who spent weeks harrying Peter Reith in this place about his misuse of his Telecard, I am embarrassed to admit that I have to say something good about him in this instance. When he introduced his industrial relations legislation, which, in many respects, was as sweeping as the Work Choices legislation, do you know what it cost the taxpayer? Again, it was only about $11 million or $12 million. It was only that much. Peter Reith, to his great credit, relied on his own advocacy. He was prepared to go into battle on behalf of the people he represented and the ideas he stood for and to fight it out in the public arena. But John Howard, the Prime Minister, needs the assistance of $600 million of taxpayers’ money to put his point on these issues out in the community. So not only do you lose your penalty rates and your overtime; your taxes are being used to persuade you that it is a good thing.

Duncan Kerr (Denison, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Kerr interjecting

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Denison will remove himself under standing order 94(a).

The member for Denison then left the chamber.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As we heard today, while all of this is happening, the government spends its time attacking Labor’s economic credibility and alleging that if Labor—the people who created the superannuation system in this country—get into government your superannuation will not be safe. While all this is happening, as we heard in question time today, the Future Fund, under the auspices of the Treasurer and the finance minister, has appointed as its global custodian a company called Northern Trust, which was the manager of the Enron staff superannuation scheme when Enron went under. That company has been found by the US District Court to have acted imprudently by complying with an Enron decision to freeze that fund for a month and prevent employees from shifting their superannuation investments out of the Enron company shares that they had been in. That company ultimately settled the legal actions against it by Enron employees to the tune of about $37 million.

In question time today it was extraordinary that it became clear that the Future Fund, in appointing Northern Trust, knew about its involvement in the Enron scandal but made no independent check as to whether this was a matter of concern before it was appointed. The Treasurer refused to say whether he knew anything about these matters and said: ‘It’s not my job; it’s independent. It’s at arm’s length. I have no role in this case.’ Of course, he is wrong. The Future Fund legislation contains a provision empowering him and the finance minister to issue directions to the Future Fund with respect to how it conducts its investment strategy. It allows them, for example, to issue directions about corporate governance issues, about how the Future Fund votes its shares, and they have done so. The question is, why have they not issued any guidelines with respect to ensuring that all parties who are contracted by the Future Fund to handle the money—the $50 billion that is already there—will do so prudently? So, while they are attacking us for allegedly threatening the superannuation of Australians, they are sitting there spending large sums of money advertising their virtues but not doing their basic job.

Finally, and most basically or most centrally of all, while all this is going on—while all their energies are going into focus groups about climate change leaflets that are to be sent to every household and new Work Choices ads superseding the old Work Choices ads—what is the reality being experienced by ordinary working families in this country? The reality is higher interest rates and fear that they will go higher again; increasing rents in many parts of Australia, in areas where people are being squeezed by much higher rents; continual increases in childcare costs, above and beyond inflation; doctors’ and dentists’ bills going up; and, significantly, because of the Prime Minister’s industrial relations legislation, the wages of significant sections of the workforce, like hospitality and retail workers, actually not even keeping pace with inflation. That is the reality for many working Australians out there. Those are the issues that they want their government to display an interest in.

We accept that in many cases the solutions to questions like rising petrol prises are not simple, but this government has totally got its eye off the ball. It is just concerned about scraping back into office and about advertising its virtues. So instead of the florid boasting from the Treasurer and instead of the claim by the Prime Minister that working people have never been better off, let us see some action on the things that matter to ordinary working families in this country.

Mal Brough (Longman, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is interesting that we should have a matter of public importance brought forward by, of all people, the member for Melbourne about the problems confronting working families, because this nation has a hell of a lot more working families under the Howard government. There have been 2,087,900 new jobs created between March 1996 and April 2007. In 11 years, two million more Australians are working. There are a heck of a lot more working families, I tell the member for Melbourne.

The good news is that those families today have a minimum wage that has had real growth of 12.4 per cent. The minimum wage actually went backwards under those who sit opposite, the Labor Party. They paid the lowest wage earners in this country less, and many of them actually articulated that they were proud of it. The number of unemployed in this country today sits at 482,700—too many, but a far cry from the 934,000 at the peak in December 1992. The unemployment rate peaked at 10.9 per cent—double digits. Unfortunately, I think that too many Australians today forget what it was like when your children left school and they did not have a job to go to, they did not have a future, and they were put on an endless roundabout of training and told: ‘That’s as good as it gets. You’ll get a visit from the social security office whilst you’re still at school so that you can go on unemployment benefits.’ That was the future that families had to confront under a Labor government.

We are proud to say that in this country today when young children leave school, no matter which electorate they are in, they have opportunities, with a higher minimum wage and real job opportunities that can go somewhere—not training that leads to more training that leads to more training and does not end in any positive result. Here is an interesting pointer for the member for Melbourne and all those that sit opposite: back in 1996, 45 electorates out of the total of about 147 had an unemployment rate of over 10 per cent—one in 10 productive Australians did not have a job. As with many of the members, I know the member for New England in his regional area would have had huge pockets of unemployment and despair. Country folk were always used to working hard and pitching in, but there was just nothing there. That is what the Labor Party left; that is the reality. Even today, with the drought in those areas, they are in a far better position that they were then. Since September 2006, there has not been one federal electorate with an unemployment rate of over 10 per cent. That is a good thing. That is about working families.

Let us go directly to what this budget was able to deliver to the Australian people as a result of excellent economic management. You do not give tax cuts year after year if you are running up deficits. You only do it if you have surpluses and you can afford to pay them. In the Treasurer’s budget speech a couple of weeks ago he announced that every Australian taxpayer will receive a tax cut on 1 July. Exactly what will they receive? Not $2 or $3 but, as the Treasurer said at the time, around $16 a week on average and $21 a week for people on $30,000. Incentives will be provided for people to re-enter the workforce. People that do not have jobs will have more reason to re-enter the workforce and give themselves a better chance in life. For those in part-time work there is more incentive to take up additional hours.

In 1999 taxpayers earning $30,000 paid $6,222 in income tax—$6,222 gone in tax. From July 2007 the same person will pay $2,854. That is a reduction of 54 per cent. To families that means being able to buy new shoes for the children when they go to school, pay the fees when the kids want to go to sporting activities and pay for music lessons—the realities in places like Morayfield and Beaudesert and down in the suburbs of Melbourne. Real people in real circumstances will (a) have a job, (b) pay less tax and (c) get higher wages because of economic management.

The member for Melbourne in his speech said, ‘What about child care?’ What about it? We have just increased the childcare benefit in this budget by 13.3 per cent, which means that the average family will have $20 less taken out of their pocket when they pay their childcare fees. Over and above that, the childcare tax rebate means that about 100,000 low-income families that did not have a big enough tax liability to get the benefit of the childcare tax rebate will now get it. It means $300, $400 or $500 which they would not have got to help them with their childcare fees—massive improvements. These families will have up to an extra $30 a week between those two measures. Do you think that makes a difference? Absolutely.

All of this is at risk if a Labor government is elected. That is not just rhetoric. Let us look at some of the facts. Who are the team of people that want to lead this country and this $1 trillion economy? What credentials do they have and what do they believe? It is not about what they say but about what they believe in. The member for Melbourne—he wants to be the Treasurer, but of course he cannot get that job—hopes to be the finance minister, who looks after the purses of this nation and makes sure that it is running properly. Let us have a look at what the member for Melbourne believes in, as stated in this very chamber on this side of the House when he was in government back in 1994—not back in the dim, dark ages but just over a decade ago. He said:

Unlike some, I take no pride in the fact that Australia is now close to or is actually the lowest taxed country in the OECD.

That is an unbelievable statement for someone that wants to lead this country—he is not proud of the fact that this nation has low taxes. The Labor member for Melbourne, who wants to be the finance minister under a Rudd government, went on to say—and this is the scary part for the Australian public:

I am quite happy to state that I think the total tax take is too low.

You cannot be more obvious and direct than that. He said that while championing—wait for it!—death duties, and also stating that the 60 per cent top marginal tax rate is something that he aspired to, not on an income of $200,000 but on an income of $75,000.

Today, a family with two children under the Howard-Costello government will pay no net tax on an income of $50,800. Let me say it again: under the Howard government today, under good economic management, by lowering taxes year after year, the average Australian family on an income of $50,800 with two children will pay no net tax. Compare that with 1996 when the coalition came into government. That same family, for every dollar they earnt over $50,000, gave 47c plus their Medicare fees of 1½ per cent, totalling 48½c. Rounded up, for close enough to every dollar they earnt they gave 50c to the Labor Party when it was in government. So that family would have been paying, every time the bloke did a bit of overtime or every time the woman did a bit of overtime, half of their earnings to the ALP’s tax man. Today the same family pays no net tax, and people want to put that in jeopardy by giving it to a bloke who wants to be the finance minister who purports to support, or does support, as quoted in this place when last in government, a return or an increase to 60c in the dollar for people earning over $75,000.

There is more about this bloke. You have to listen to what the Labor Party has actually said in the past when it had a chance to force things on the Australian public. I will read this passage from The Latham Diaries, written by the former Leader of the Opposition, for Monday, 18 October because it goes to the heart of the belief system of the bloke that actually wants to run the finances of this country and put the living standards of Australians in jeopardy. Here is the former leader of the Labor Party at just the last election. He says in his diary:

Lindsay Tanner came all the way from Melbourne today to see me in my electorate office—a man on a mission. He made a long, rehearsed and slightly bizarre pitch to be Shadow Treasurer, telling me about his wonderful microeconomic reform credentials and links to the economic writers ...

I told you that he aspired to be the Treasurer, Mr Deputy Speaker. Mr Latham says:

I sat there thinking: this is the bloke who argued at Shadow Cabinet that we shouldn’t proceed with trade practices reform until we cleared it with the Shoppies.

For those who do not know, the ‘shoppies’ are the unions. Every time the Treasurer and the Prime Minister stand here and tell the public that this mob are totally beholden to the unions, here is the former Labor leader—who wanted to be the Prime Minister just last time around—confirming that the bloke who wants to be the finance minister could not make a decision on reforms to the Trade Practices Act without talking to the unions. He continues:

Now he thinks he’s Roger Douglas.

Let me go back to what he had to say. He says:

Tanner is one of Comb-over’s mates—

‘Comb-over’ is the member who represents Canberra here, and I do not want to be derogatory to him for his lack of hair; I am going that way myself—

so I gave him some truth serum as well: ‘Listen, Lindsay, the view around Caucus is that you have been a bit lazy, always promising big things but never delivering in the Shadow portfolios you’ve had.

Isn’t this just Labor all over—promising big things and being lazy? You cannot be lazy in government and deliver for Australian families two million jobs, lower taxes, higher basic wages and real wage increases—it just cannot be done. But these are not the Treasurer’s words and these are not the Prime Minister’s words. They are the words of a bloke who knew him really well, the bloke who actually allowed him to be shadow finance minister. He goes on:

I would want to see you perform on the frontbench before even thinking about you as Shadow Treasurer.

It was good enough to make him shadow finance minister. He goes on:

I had in mind his lacklustre effort in developing community building policies. I gave him that gig at the National Conference and said I wanted a big agenda; he delivered something on mentoring and that was it. Cooney said he couldn’t get anything else out of him, so we had to scramble to put a few things together for the campaign ...

That is so insightful. Here is Labor at its best. It wants to run a $1 trillion campaign and the man that wants to be the finance minister is scrambling to put a few things together. We know that no-one in this nation knows who Lindsay Tanner is—the member for Melbourne—but they need to know who he is and they need to know just what a risk he is to their hip pockets and to their job security, to their income and to the future of their children, because this is the bloke that is too lazy to put policies together, who believes in reintroducing death duties, who believes in a 60 per cent marginal tax rate and who wants to be the finance minister in a Rudd government.

This is what we are faced with: a government that delivers, a government that delivers real jobs, a government that has cut taxes and that now has the top marginal tax rate not cutting in at $50,001 but, from 1 July next year, at $180,000—and that is where it should cut in—and a government that has been able to deliver by putting $5 billion into a Future Fund for our kids in universities because we had the money. The money will not be there if you continue to let people flirt with the idea of having Labor in government.

Let us not go back to 1994 but go back to the last election. Let us go back to what these people that sit opposite that want to sit on the government benches were going to deliver up to Australian families. They were going to actually make Australian families on $10,000, $20,000, $30,000, $35,000, $80,000, $90,000 worth of income worse off. It is unbelievable that a Labor Party would take people at both ends of the spectrum and in one fell swoop make them worse off. Of course, not everyone in the Labor Party thought that was a really good idea. On the 20 November 2004, the Financial Review reported:

MPs attacked Labor’s tax policy for creating low income “losers” and for being too complicated to explain.

I do not know how the member for Throsby, a former union boss, can actually be part of a party that would purport to support workers. In their last policy they proposed to cut the income of those that can afford it least. That is what Labor stood for at the last election. The architects of that policy were the member for Lilley, who is now the shadow Treasurer and wants to be Treasurer and, of course, Tanner, the member for Melbourne, who wants to put taxes up to 60 per cent. We wonder why the public should have great doubts about their capacity in government. These are the facts. These are the faces that people do not see. These are the people who will take away your wages, will take away the industrial relations regime that provides the job opportunities, will reduce your real take-home pay and will not be able to deliver for Australia. This is about delivering for Australian families, and the Australian government has done it in spades. (Time expired)

Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The subject of today’s matter of public importance debate is: ‘The government’s failure to address the problems confronting working families while spending vast amounts of money on its own political survival.’ I do not think there is any doubt in the community’s mind that the extravagance of government advertising—at many levels of government, not just the current Commonwealth government—is well out of hand and really does need to be addressed. But today I would like to refer to the problems of farming families—in particular, the government’s absolute incompetence at coming to grips with water issues in this nation and the incompetence of the member for Wentworth, the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources. If the Prime Minister wants to maintain any credibility in terms of the water debate, particularly within the Murray-Darling system, he has to look very closely at what the member for Wentworth is doing in his ministerial capacity. The people I am talking about, in the Murray-Darling system, particularly those who have received allocations of water—admittedly, under the state systems in the past—are under threat from government policy on water. The incompetence of those who are suggesting they have some control over this debate is coming through very clearly.

The member for Longman has just said, ‘Let’s not go back to 1994.’ I would like to go back to 1995 and 1996, when the national competition policy arrangements were put in place. There were certain things said in relation to water, particularly in 1996, which the Commonwealth took some charge of. One of those things was to establish a national approach to water policy. Certain competition payments were made available through the normal processes; if the states met certain objectives and achievements, money would flow through the national competition payments arrangements.

A couple of other things were suggested at the time, including that, as part of the flow of that money, a recognised water market would be put in place and property rights would be recognised as part of that process. The money would flow from the Commonwealth to the states if those particular objectives were met. Those objectives have not been met, but the money has flowed. My office has done some work on this. The current arrangement being talked about is a $10 billion plan. There are no details, but there is a plan worth $10 billion. My office has looked at the money that has flowed to the states in the last 11 years. It comes to $8.9 billion—paid through the competition payment arrangements, the National Water Initiative arrangements, the Natural Heritage Trust arrangements, the National Action Plan for Water Quality and Salinity and a whole lot of other intergovernmental agreements, including catchment blueprints et cetera. Not one extra litre of water has been put into the Murray-Darling system.

The Prime Minister and the minister, the member for Wentworth, are suggesting that we need a massive investment to solve the problem. You have had the capacity to do it through the national competition arrangements for 10 years, and now you are asking those irrigators and water entitlement holders out there to trust you when you have had the capacity to rein in the states over that time.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for New England needs to link his ideas back to families.

Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think there has been incompetence over 10 years. The Deputy Speaker has asked me to bring this back to working families. There are working families out there who have been neglected by this government for 10 years. Their property rights have not been recognised and a lot of their rights have been removed. The cash that has come from the Commonwealth government has gone through the states, and that has allowed the states to rip these people apart. The Commonwealth is now suggesting that it wants the power to rip the other arm off them. I think that is incompetent, and it does affect the survival of farming families. Anybody who suggests that that is not incompetence at a high level really has to look at the policy mix that has come out of this place. These people in the Murray-Darling system are not pawns. They are people who have worked hard, and they are having their body parts ripped off them by an incompetent minister. He has no understanding of basic water mechanics and soil science, no understanding of the difference between a water aquifer and a watertable, no understanding of the various caps between groundwater and river water systems and no understanding of the interconnectivity between groundwater systems and river water. Yet he is the one who is telling the Australian people that the Commonwealth needs to take control of the Murray-Darling system so that it can put in place something that is good for the nation.

I think that is an absolute disgrace. If you need proof of that, look at what is happening with the groundwater systems in New South Wales—and you are well aware of this. The Commonwealth and the states came together with $50 million each to create an adjustment package, a compensation package, for people who had their entitlements taken away because the groundwater systems were assessed as being overallocated. They agreed to do that and a compensation package was put in place. What has this government done to those people now? It is effectively ripping them off again. The government did not tell them about the agreement. The intergovernmental agreement is under the Commonwealth solicitor’s name. The agreement that was put in place suggests that when these people receive the compensation it will be treated not as a loss of a capital asset but as income in the year of receipt.

The Prime Minister’s office is on record in the Canberra Times as saying that that is the way that water entitlement holders will be treated in the $10 billion water document. We have the Prime Minister and the minister running around Australia saying, ‘Trust us.’ I am with Steve Bracks on this. I think he is the only one displaying any sense. It would be a futile and stupid arrangement for the states to get out of their responsibilities on water allocation and give them to a plan when there is absolutely no detail. Mr Deputy Speaker Causley, I think you would be fully aware of why the New South Wales Premier wants to get rid of it. He wants to get rid of it not for any particularly good reason but just because he is sick of it. He wants to give it to the Commonwealth government so that it can have all the problems.

I think there are a number of issues there that display a great deal of incompetence and that will do a great deal of harm to Australia’s working farmers and their families. To spend all this money on advertising, which is going on at the moment, and then to rip 47 per cent in tax off these people whenever they do receive that income is a despicable act that should be addressed. For two years this has been going on. The Prime Minister has said—and I can pull the quotes out if I need to—that he believes that it should be treated as compensation. A Commonwealth solicitor wrote the agreement between the state and the Commonwealth. He is privy to that. He knows it very well. The Prime Minister and the minister said that there were no documents relating to it that could be obtained. I used the Freedom of Information Act and received a truckload of them for the New South Wales government. There is complicity in this.

Most people within the government would be well aware of the circumstances that these people are going through. The groundwater issue needs to be addressed. It spreads across six groundwater systems in New South Wales and it is destroying the morale of those people affected. There is no detail. Freedom of information will not show anything. There is nothing out there; there was no detail at the start. For anybody—including the minister or the member for Wentworth—to suggest to these people, ‘Just trust us on this,’ is a very strange way to go about your business. I encourage the people in New South Wales in particular, especially water users, to be very distrustful of what is going on now because they have been through a process before where this very government, with its capacity to enforce the property rights rules, did not do a thing. That has been raised a number of times over the years and every time—whether it is John Anderson, John Howard or Johnny-come-lately—someone says, ‘We’ll fix it up in the next catchment blueprint arrangement.’ These people are sick of being told that. They want it fixed now. For the Commonwealth to display any credibility, that particular issue needs to be addressed. (Time expired)

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Mackellar, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This matter of public importance dealing with the problems confronting working families and the allegation that the government is refusing to confront these issues while spending vast amounts of money on its political survival is an absolute nonsense. If you go to the most important budget paper of the budget—Budget Paper No. 1—you will see that it shows very clearly that, in the 11 years that this government has been in office, it has directly targeted much of its policy work and benefits at families. Indeed, if you take a look in Budget Paper No. 1 at the period from 1996-97 to 2007-08, you will see that what has been paid to families, both by way of direct cash transfers and tax benefits, has increased by something in the vicinity of 39 per cent. What that means for families is that the government has recognised that families come in different categories of need. There are single parent families, dual income families and couple families with a single source of income. The needs of families and the choices that people want to make about their families is something that this government recognises.

Accordingly, we have introduced the very significant payments of family tax benefit part A and family tax benefit part B. Those benefits are designed to boost the income of families over the long period during the growth of their children so that families are relieved of a tax burden, which brings about something called the real net tax threshold. I will tell you how that works. Take, for instance, a couple family with two children, one aged three and one aged eight. If that family has dual incomes, with one partner earning 75 per cent of their gross income and the other earning 25 per cent, the real net tax threshold is $55,340. In other words, such a family is able to earn $55,340 before they have to pay tax. If you have a family which is a single income couple with children aged three and eight, there will again be a benefit for those families in that they will not have to pay any income tax until they are earning over $50,000. The aim of the policy has been to boost the income of families to enable them to nurture their children and give them the advantages that they require. As I said, the overall increase that we effected in that 11-year period is something in the vicinity of 39 per cent.

The other thing we have concentrated on in looking after working families is in spending an enormous amount of money on educating our people. Thirty per cent of school leavers go on to tertiary education. That is a vast change since, say, 40 or 50 years ago, when a very small percentage of people would have been able to go on to, in particular, university education. The big growth has been in the number of women who are participating in that education. They are gaining skills and higher skills, and we will soon have more female than male graduates from university. Those women want to use their skills for their own fulfilment, but the nation also needs them to work to give a return to the people who have helped give them that education. In order to do that, child care becomes an important factor in the equation. For women who have become mothers, either as sole parents or in a couple, to utilise those skills for their own benefit and for that of the nation is only possible with good child care. Therefore, child care has become a very important program and policy aspect of this government.

We have introduced the childcare benefit and the 30 per cent tax rebate, which is payable for out-of-pocket expenses above and beyond the childcare benefit where the child is in eligible child care—and, whereas that was originally to be gained through filing a tax return, through this recent budget it will be able to be accessed through Centrelink via payments at fortnightly intervals. We have also increased the size of the childcare benefit. For an eligible child using 40 hours a week the payment will go from about $118.40 to $134.80 per week, which is an increase of $16.40. This will benefit 700,000 families—a huge benefit for the working families that the Labor Party is complaining we do not look after.

The record is there; the policy is there. There have been increased policy initiatives to make sure that families, both men and women—couples in a family—have good education, that they are able to use it and that there is adequate childcare provision. The fact that there is an increase in that childcare benefit and a change in the operation of the 30 per cent rebate I think is in part a reflection of the good work that we did in our Balancing work and family report to the parliament. For the Labor Party to say that the government has been negligent in addressing those problems is patently wrong.

The matter of public importance also claims that the government is ‘spending vast amounts of money on its own political survival’. What a nonsense is that! This is an accusation from a political party that is the same political party that is tied with the trade union movement that is selling off Currawong in my electorate, which should be a national heritage property, for $12 million. It was offered $15 million by another party, but, oh no, it wants it to go to someone that it feels comfortable with. It is selling it off for $12 million to put that money into an advertising campaign to bag our industrial relations policies. How hypocritical is that? This is John Robertson who heads up the trade union movement in New South Wales. He wants to get a guernsey to come and join his other mates in this parliament. He is going to sacrifice what is a national treasure in Currawong to spend on ads to bag a government policy. What hypocrisy is that?

This is the same political party that when in office went straight ahead with its deal on Centenary House to put its snout in the trough. Under the lease that it negotiated for its benefit the Auditor-General this year has to pay $8 million in rent. The Labor Party has gouged $58 million out of the taxpayers’ purse over the course of the lease. To be hectored by such a group that, in telling the people what our policy is, we are somehow not spending money legitimately and transparently I find absolutely appalling. The rent for the Auditor-General when this lease ends in 2008 will drop from $8 million a year—Labor Party money—down to $3 million a year. That is the going market rent. The built-in nine per cent escalator clause delivered them the most immoral cash cow this country has ever seen. Not once did any of the Labor Party members over there recant or say that they would give the money back or that they had done the wrong thing. Do not lecture to this government that we do not look after families. Do not lecture to this government that we spend money improperly. You have got a big beam in your eye. (Time expired)

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It will not have escaped the notice of Australian families as they turn on their TV sets at night that John Howard is in election mode. You can hardly miss it—ad after ad beamed into lounge rooms each night, courtesy of this profligate government, on superannuation, Work Choices and private health insurance. Ad after ad after ad—and this is only the beginning.

Harold Mitchell has said that the government is spending so much on advertising that it is having trouble actually finding airtime for them. This weekend, as families go about the juggle of getting the kids to sport, cleaning the house, getting through the pile of washing, doing the weekly shopping, filling the car with petrol and hopefully getting a few spare minutes to drop in on grandparents, they will have had a week of the government’s new Work Choices ads. The government PR campaign on Work Choices over the past week has cost $4.1 million alone. That is $24,404 an hour. This comes on top of the $55 million spent on the original Work Choices campaign. Over the coming months, the Howard government will spend some $111.2 million on 18 media campaigns. This is on top of a further $20.5 million campaign planned again to promote the Howard government’s Work Choices legislation, an additional $500,000 print advertising campaign and, as we heard in question time today, a direct mail campaign on climate change that the Prime Minister is trying to deny exists.

It is worth noting that, while the government squanders $4.1 million per week on political advertising, the average weekly earnings for Australian adults are $1,071. In my electorate, where the mean taxable income is almost 15 per cent lower than the Australian average, families would be right to ask, ‘What else could this money have been spent on?’ I am sure families struggling to cope with record healthcare costs would appreciate some much needed relief, with the cost of visiting a GP having doubled under this government. I am sure that those families that have had their overtime or penalty rates cut will be asking why the government is telling them they have to make a financial sacrifice for the good of the economy when the government is now the nation’s second biggest advertiser, outspending Harvey Norman, Woolworths and Nestle. I am sure families struggling to find the HECS fees for their kids next semester would appreciate increased government funding for university students. Investment in tertiary education has declined by around seven per cent under the Howard government, while student debt has tripled since 1996 to $13 billion.

I am sure the families who have had to face a mortgagee sale—unable to find the mortgage repayments after four back-to-back interest rate rises since the government promised to keep them at record lows—will feel no comfort that the government wants to inform them of the number that they need to call if they are being ripped off by their employers. Contrary to the Howard government’s arrogant claim that ‘Australian working families have never been better off’, families are struggling. Far from feeling better off or relaxed and comfortable, families in Australia are increasingly anxious about their financial circumstances. Some 5,000 families recently told the Family Watch Taskforce that financial constraints are denying them the opportunity to make real decisions about the size of their families, home ownership and time out of the workforce after childbirth.

Middle Australia is working harder than ever before. Longer hours and second and third jobs are eroding family life. Parents are worried about the impact of health costs on their ability to ensure their children are getting the health and dental care they need. They are also concerned about what the rising cost of education means for their children’s future. The pressures on families are real. Household debt is at a record level: the average Australian household now owes $1.58 in debt for every single dollar that they earn in disposable income. Australian household debt is now over $1 trillion. Eight interest rate rises under this government have added around $140,000 to mortgage interest payments on the average median price of homes in capital cities over the life of the loan. Australian households are now spending a record 9.3 per cent of their disposable income simply paying off the interest on their mortgage. And grocery bills have increased by around nine per cent over the past two years. These huge impacts on Australian families come on top of rising petrol prices, which are now pushing well over $1.30 across the nation and are set to rise further.

As families this weekend catch their breath after a busy week, we here in this place reflect that in that week the government has spent $585,000 per day on ads—4.8 times the average outstanding mortgage, 10.5 times the average yearly adult earnings and enough money to cover out-of-pocket costs for over 8,300 people visiting their GP for an entire year. You have to wonder about the priorities of this government. (Time expired)

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is quite hard to sit here and tolerate the hypocrisy that is being delivered in this House this afternoon by the member for Ballarat.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You didn’t! You yelled out the whole time!

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is absolutely obvious the member for Ballarat did not have a housing loan under the previous Labor government, when we were paying 17 or 18 per cent on a consistent basis.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wasn’t old enough. I need to bring that to your attention.

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is quite obvious the member for Ballarat was not in a family situation when there were no jobs to get to receive the overtime to pay the extreme interest rates that were delivered by the Hawke and Keating governments.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Because I was 12.

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is obvious that the member for Ballarat has a very limited knowledge—not a short memory, because I suspect she was not even in the workforce or in that place when that was going on. It is obvious that she has a limited knowledge of what the Hawke-Keating Labor government delivered to the families and the people of Australia who were then trying to care for their families, who were losing their homes and who could not afford to pay the extreme interest rates.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What proportion of their incomes are they paying on their mortgages now?

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is quite obvious the member for Ballarat is not telling her constituents just how much tax they would have been paying when they were on a low income.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Treasury) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What proportion of their incomes are they paying on their mortgages now?

Harry Jenkins (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The honourable member for Ballarat will go and have a cup of tea soon!

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is quite obvious that the member for Ballarat, as she sits there screeching from her seat whilst I speak the truth, is not telling her low-income families that, if they were earning $30,000 under a Hawke-Keating government, they would have been paying double or triple the tax rate they are currently paying. For example, at $30,000 the tax cut will be $21 a week from 1 July 2007. Taxpayers earning $30,000 paid $6,222 in income tax in 1999, but from 1 July 2007 they will pay $2,850. That is a reduction of around 54 per cent. So it is quite obvious that there is little knowledge of just exactly what people were paying under the Hawke-Keating Labor government. Memories are short, that is the problem. Or there is no memory at all and no knowledge at all.

There is so much available at this point in time that has been provided by this government. Now that we have paid off massive levels of debt that were left by a Labor government, we are able to give back to the families of Australia. That is what the Howard-Vaile government have been doing. I repeat the Treasurer’s figures from question time: in 2000, 30 per cent of taxpayers paid 30 per cent or less tax. In 2007, 80 per cent of taxpayers pay 30 per cent or less tax. Is that not a benefit to the majority of Australian families? Yes, I think so, but there would be no cause for anyone on the opposite side of the House to recognise that there is more disposable income within the taxpayers’ pockets as a result of the fine fiscal management of this government.

There has been no recognition or discussion here today in this matter of public importance debate of the great role that the carers of Australian disabled people and the frail and aged provide. There is no mention of the carer payments that will be received by the thousands of carers across Australia when they receive their $1,000 carer bonus. They will also get, through the carer allowance, a bonus of $600 for providing the fabulous care and service to their family members and friends and those who are disabled and unable to fully care for themselves. The program also supports the carers of young people under 30 years of age and carers who are experiencing significant stress in caring for a person under 65 years of age with a disability. We are providing, as a government, options for respite and weekend respite and equipment to significantly reduce the stress on these family carers.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! While the honourable member’s time has not expired, the time allotted for the discussion has.