Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy President. In relation to the Medicare levy surcharge, we have an opposition who are so hypocritical in terms of their approach. They are so compassionate, they argue, but this compassion is weighed against the reality. You have to weigh this up against the reality of where they are coming from. They say that they want to look after ordinary Australians, and yet in their opposition to this change to the Medicare levy surcharge they are denying some of the neediest Australians a $1,200 tax cut—tax relief of $1,200.

Senator Cormann should actually reflect on what he is saying in this debate and weigh it up against the debate that we had this morning on Woodside Petroleum and the need to tax multinational corporations to pay for the necessities of a decent society. How could you stand up this morning and say that a company who is earning a billion dollar profit and who has had special concessions for 30 years should not pay its proper rate of taxation and then talk about Medicare and problems with the private health system? It just does not match up. You see, you cannot have compassion for people on the one hand and then say that multinational corporations should not pay their proper tax. You cannot come here and say that you want to look after the Lamborghini drivers and the Maserati drivers and then say, ‘I’ve got compassion for people who are not earning a lot of money and I want to make sure that the Medicare levy surcharge is maintained at its current level.’ What you are doing is exposing the hypocrisy, the absolute hypocrisy.

The more I see the Liberal opposition in action in this place, the more I am convinced that you have never had an economic brain in your heads, that you have never understood the need to balance the market and the needs of the community. You just do not balance it.