Justine Elliot (Richmond, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to highlight tonight the really positive difference that the Albanese Labor government is making right throughout the country and indeed in my electorate on the far north coast of New South Wales. Our government is building Australia's future and we have a whole range of plans specifically to address cost-of-living concerns, and that is the No. 1 concern of people in my electorate. Since our government was elected in 2022, our main focus has been on addressing cost of living through a whole range of different policies, and many of those actions have made a huge difference to people in my area. Some of those plans and actions include, of course, the tax cuts for every taxpayer, including the 71,000 taxpayers on the North Coast, with an average tax cut of around $1,500. We're also delivering another cut in July this year.

Pay rises for all minimum and award wage workers have taken the total increase under Labor to over $9,000. This has had a massive impact on the people who live in my region. We expanded paid parental leave to 24 weeks, and superannuation is now paid on all the government paid parental leave. Cutting student debt by 20 per cent means that in my area nearly 20,000 people have benefited, with an average saving of $5,500. This is a major initiative that people in my region absolutely supported.

Of course, we made free TAFE permanent again. What a difference that makes. And that's helped more than 5,000 students on the North Coast save thousands in fees. A lot of young people would not have been able to access TAFE without the free TAFE that we put in place. Through the home battery scheme, we've had over 2,700 installed on the North Coast to help permanently cut power bills. We've expanded the five per cent deposits to our first homebuyers since we came into government, and 566 people in my region have bought their first home with a five per cent deposit. We've brought in paid prac for nursing, teaching, social work and midwifery students, and we're putting all public schools in Australia on a path to full and fair funding. These changes have had a huge impact right across the board.

We delivered another pay rise to aged-care nurses, delivered cheaper child care and capped childcare fees. We are taking the next steps towards building a universal early education and childcare system, with three days of child care subsidy guaranteed per week. When it comes to health care, without a doubt, the difference in my electorate is absolutely massive. First of all, we expanded bulk-billing. In my electorate there are 26 GP practices now bulk-billing. That's double the number before our changes came into effect on 1 November 2025. Prior to that, in the years before, it was really difficult for people to access health care at all, but now, with our massive investment in bulk-billing, they can. We now have 1800-Medicare, a free nationwide 24/7 health advice line and after-hours GP health service, all backed by Medicare. We've made it so much easier in my area for locals to get the urgent treatment they need with the Tweed Heads Medicare Urgent Care Clinic, and what a difference that has made. They are seeing massive presentations there, taking the pressure off our local hospitals, and all you need is your Medicare card to get in.

As I've said in the House before, another major difference was the reclassification of the town of Murwillumbah under the Modified Monash Model. Under the previous government, Murwillumbah was classified as a city. I don't know if anyone in this chamber has been to Murwillumbah. It's not a city; it is indeed a regional town. We changed that classification so it meant that there was more bulk-billing in Murwillumbah, because there was none under the previous government's classification.

We boosted Medicare with $1.8 billion in extra hospital funding. From 1 January, we delivered the biggest cut to the cost of medicines in the history of the PBS. All PBS medicines are $25 or less, and this has made medicines the cheapest they've been in over two decades. So it's only Labor that invests in our regions, that makes a real difference to the lives of people in regional and rural Australia. Of course, all of our cost-of-living measures were opposed by the Liberal and National parties. I can tell you that people in my electorate know that. They know how devastating it is when the Liberals and Nationals are in power and what it means for people in country Australia. It's always us that are making those investments.

Of course, on top of all of that, I did have my election commitments as well, which were wonderful in terms of making a difference locally—the $2 million for Byron Bay Wildlife Hospital. I mentioned the Tweed Heads Urgent Care Clinic as well and my north coast crime prevention plan. As a former police officer, I was very proud to be delivering on my $3 million election commitment—$1 million for each of the three councils. They can then get CCTV, lighting, bollards, whatever's needed for community safety in their region. It's only Labor that delivers for regional and rural Australia.