Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health and Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

I am sorry, Senator Coonan, you did exactly the same in government. But let us go to the question of carers. There have been some absolutely spurious allegations made in this place about the commitment of the previous government to carers in the community. For the last four years the former government pulled the rabbit out of the hat every budget and told carers, in a totally patronising way, how important they are and how much they are valued in our community and then said, ‘And for your good work we will give you a one-off bonus of $1,000 if you are a person on the carer payment—