David Feeney (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a pleasure to rise and address the Senate on the issue of pensions. Senator Bernardi, in proposing this matter for discussion, has brought to this place all of the eloquence and wit that his hero, Dennis Denuto, brought to the High Court in The Castle. Pensions are such a critical issue for the coalition that we can see that they have come here in force today to make their argument in this place!

Senator Bernardi’s proposal raises some interesting questions. When did the need for financial relief for single age pensioners become urgent? If it is urgent now, this year, why was it not urgent last year? Why was it not urgent in 2006? Senator Bernardi has been a member of this Senate since May 2006, so of course it is fair and reasonable to ask: how many times did Senator Bernardi speak in the Senate on the plight of pensioners in 2006? Not once. How many times did Senator Bernardi speak in the Senate on the plight of pensioners in 2007? Not once. Since Senator Bernardi entered the Senate there have been three budgets—two under the Howard government and one under the Rudd government. What did Senator Bernardi say about the failure of the Howard government to meet the need for immediate financial relief for single age pensioners in 2006 or 2007? Not a single word—not an utterance. Senator Bernardi did not speak on the 2006 or 2007 budget bills. In his speech on the 2008 budget he did not mention pensioners once.

Of course, I do not wish to hold Senator Bernardi solely responsible for the blatant hypocrisy displayed in his proposal today. He is only doing the bidding of his frontbench, who, in turn, are echoing the line being taken by the coalition leadership in the other place. But there is no disguising that this is a cheap, hypocritical populism being dreamt up by the Liberal Party. Of course, it was the creature of the failed former opposition leader, Dr Nelson, who has bequeathed this foolish strategy to his successor, Malcolm Turnbull, and his loyal acolytes in this place. Mr Turnbull’s regard for pensioners has of course been a hallmark of his career—at the bar, in the IT business or in merchant banking! We know what this is all about.

That banal, unemotional delivery by Senator Bernardi reveals the truth. This is a piece of political positioning by the Liberal Party. It is a new opposition fumbling about, trying to find for itself a purpose, a role. It is in the business of trying to find a new position from which to declare itself to the Australian people, but what a foolish attempt it is now for the Liberal Party to try to reinvent itself as the party of compassion. This is a trajectory that will no doubt have the same success as Costello’s book sales. This is not going to work, because you are not the party of compassion; you have spent 12 years in office proving to all and sundry that you are not the party of compassion and you are not going to so quickly change your disguise from your efforts of the Howard legacy.

Senator Bernardi and his colleagues demonstrate through this proposal that they are not immune to the Liberal Party’s voyage of self-discovery that is underway at the moment as they try to search for the socialist heart they believe beats somewhere deep inside the Liberal Party. Keep searching, Senator Bernardi—you will not find it. This is a repositioning by the Liberal Party. They are in opposition; we all understand they have to engage in some repositioning. But what a poor choice, because it is politically implausible.

I have here a list of the new opposition shadow ministry. Let us go through this list and see how much the coalition frontbenchers in this place have done to meet what the proposal says is the need for immediate financial relief for single age pensioners. When Mr Brough, then the Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, took a submission last year to cabinet seeking an increase in the base rate of the age pension, how much support did he get from his colleagues in the Senate? I might take this opportunity to thank the former member, Mr Brough, for his honesty in revealing the absolute depths of hypocrisy to which those Liberal Party strategists have plumbed in trying to reinvent themselves as champions of the pensioners.

We all know what is going on here. Somewhere, deep in the heart of the Liberal Party strategic team, they have rediscovered the need to find the grey vote. Someone in the Liberal Party, in analysing the entrails of their catastrophic 2007, has said, ‘We need to rediscover the grey vote.’ My only advice to you, Senator Bernardi, would have been to try to come up with a more plausible plan—something that did not reek of the hypocrisy and the crocodile tears that you are forcing us all to endure at the moment.