Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

The hypocrisy in that question is breathtaking—from a senior minister in the Howard government who for 11 years did nothing to improve the lot of those pensioners. But it is an important issue and despite the tone of the question I will take it seriously. The government understands that many pensioners are doing it tough, that pressure on the cost of living with grocery bills increasing does mean that they are under pressure. We accept that food price rises, fuel costs and other pressures in the economy are resulting in inflation that particularly hits those who are on fixed incomes. Pensioners and carers are those who are most vulnerable because they have the least capacity to absorb those inflationary pressures. We are very much focused on tackling the inflation problem. We made it the No. 1 priority of the budget. As senators would know, our capacity to deliver on that fight against inflation is largely based on our ability to get our budget passed. We are deeply concerned that the Liberal Party have abandoned all sense of economic responsibility and have chosen to just oppose for the sake of opposing. In our first budget we did make a serious attempt to assist pensioners and carers. We did provide $1.4 billion of extra support to seniors. A $500 bonus was paid to 2.7 million senior Australians. That came on top of an increase in the utilities allowance from the $107 that the Howard government paid to $500 a year.