Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The state of the economy has been the subject of much discussion of late, and we know that we are facing serious inflationary pressures which will definitely be putting and have put pressure on interest rates. In turn, the effect this will have on working families is of high concern to all of us. Before I go further into that, though, I would like to take the opportunity to reflect on some of the promises that federal Labor took to the election and Prime Minister Rudd’s and our absolute determination that we will deliver on all of our commitments.

Amongst those commitments that we promised were—and this list is not exclusive, but it is a fairly long one: funding to address elective surgery waiting lists; increasing financial support to help older Australians and people affected by disability; increasing the childcare rebate to 50 per cent and paying it to parents quarterly; funding for investment in renewable energy and funding to assist businesses become cleaner and greener; funding for schools to invest in solar energy; funding for loans and rebates to assist families in making their homes more energy efficient; the provision of an improved broadband network to this nation—and I was pleased to speak on a bill earlier this evening on that issue; funding for new investigative mechanisms to look at the prices of petrol and groceries; $44 million for trades training centres in ACT schools; funding for a computer for every student in years 9 to 12; funding to ensure every eligible child has access to early childhood education; funding to increase efficiency and effectiveness in our hospitals; funding to re-establish the Commonwealth dental scheme; funding to build more homes for homeless people; funding for a national rental affordability scheme; investing in a housing affordability fund; initiatives to reform federal FOI laws, journalist privilege and whistleblower protection; initiatives to reduce red tape for small businesses and to strengthen the Trade Practices Act; initiatives to develop low-tax home saver accounts; and initiatives to cut government expenditure for MPs’ printing allowances, cut ministerial staff numbers, abolish the Government Communications Unit, cut back on media monitoring and reduce the level of taxpayer funded government advertising.

Those are just a few of the promises that federal Labor took to the election. These commitments are not divided into core and non-core commitments. They are in fact what we will be delivering on now that we are in government. It has only been four months, and already this government is delivering or beginning to deliver on the promises that we made. Some of the things that we have already done or begun include: ratifying the Kyoto protocol; offering an apology to the stolen generation; increasing the powers of the ACCC to investigate the price of petrol; the appointment of a petrol price commissioner; the introduction of legislation to prohibit Australian workplace agreements; the introduction of legislation to make the National Film and Sound Archive an independent statutory authority—and, I have to say, that is something very dear to the hearts of anybody in Canberra who has anything to do with the National Film and Sound Archive, and we are very pleased about it; negotiating the next Commonwealth state/territory disability agreement; beginning the process to implement the National Secondary School Computer Fund; investing significant funds in new health and medical research projects; working to establish the First Home Saver Account; delivering a $643 million cut in government expenditure through the first round of saving measures announced earlier this month; the introduction of legislation to establish Skills Australia, the Rudd Labor government’s first step in addressing the skills crisis; initiating a Productivity Commission investigation into paid maternity leave; establishing a formal ACCC inquiry into grocery prices; initiating a process to boost nursing numbers in our hospitals; and, more locally, the funding of $2.5 for elective surgery in the ACT. Delivery of all of the commitments that I have mentioned will benefit this great city of Canberra.

The inflationary pressures this country faces are well documented. Many external commentators have expressed their concern at the current economic situation. The Reserve Bank has projected that inflation will likely run ahead of its tolerance margin for the near future, and Mr Chris Richardson, from Access Economics, in a recent interview on the 7.30 Report, stated that he believed interest rates will be high throughout 2008.

There is a significant need to eliminate wasteful government spending and inefficiency. In an answer to a question without notice, the Minister for Finance and Deregulation said:

The government inherited challenging economic circumstances: underlying inflation running at 3.6 per cent, five interest rate increases over the past 18 months—with another one well and truly in the pipeline—and government spending growing by 4½ per cent in real terms.

We made no secret of the fact that this government, if elected, would be looking at ways to make very serious expenditure cuts. My particular favourite is the overwhelming overexpenditure of the previous government on itself. Well before the election, we announced that we would seek an efficiency dividend from government departments. That is underway. The Minister for Finance and Deregulation reiterated this commitment during the February sittings, saying in question time:

The Rudd government is committed to cutting into government spending to get it back in line with appropriate fiscal settings to ensure that the budget is putting downward pressure on inflation and interest rates. That involves taking tough, challenging decisions.

The reason that I went laboriously through those two lists was to make a point. The point is that we as an opposition going into government made commitments that we believed needed to be made for the benefit of the community that we live in and the country generally. We cannot keep them without being tough and looking very hard at how to do it. There is no doubt that there are going to be some difficulties faced by some people in understanding how our priorities are different to those of the former government. Within the Public Service, for example, there are some programs that we have already announced we will close because we do not believe in them and we do not want them, and there will be other programs which we will start which will help to initiate the very programs that we have said we want to implement. So there is no doubt that there is going to be movement. There is going to be a little bit of angst out there, understandably so, about how it will all wash through and how we will implement these commitments.

I am very pleased to be part of a government that is going to make these decisions for the benefit of the Australian community. There is no doubt about that. We have to make them to be able to initiate the plans that we have in mind. I am also very mindful of the fact that, in my electorate and in the ACT more widely, we have a high number of public servants. They are not all here, but we do have a number of them. I want to assure them that every effort is being made to ensure that there is a smooth transition—and there has been to date, I have to say—from the previous government’s programs to ours. I am really looking forward to seeing those programs that are still to come on begin.

I listed the things that I did because I think it is worth reminding ourselves that we have a program of reform in many areas of government and we are determined to carry it out. I am looking forward to seeing those things happen and I am looking forward to continuing to work as hard as I possibly can to represent the concerns of my community through that process. I will be doing that with great gusto. Mind you, I think that the things that I have already mentioned have been very welcome in my community. Wherever I go out in the Canberra community, people are still very pleased that we now have a government with new energy, new initiatives and new programs that they are happy to see us implement, and I am looking forward to being part of that process as well.