Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader (Tasmania)) Share this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to have the opportunity to participate in the debate on the Productivity Commission Amendment (Addressing Inequality) Bill 2017. If you needed any more clear or stark reinforcement of why we on this side, and the Australian people, say that this government is out of touch, you only had to listen to that speech or take it off Hansard because, obviously, the government is living in a different community than we are in Tasmania or in Australia. They just don't understand the difficulties. The reality is that there is greater inequality in this country—much greater than there was when they came to power over four years ago.

I support this bill and I'm very proud to be in a party that is so evidently committed to addressing inequality, one of the greatest social and economic issues facing the nation. The bill amends the Productivity Commission Act 1998 to expand the general policy guidelines for the exercise of the Productivity Commission's function to require consideration of inequality. This bill and fighting inequality are things Labor wholeheartedly supports—unlike those opposite—and, unlike those on the other side, we even acknowledge it. Last year, the Treasurer, Mr Morrison, said inequality hadn't got worse. But it's time to come back to reality. Under the Turnbull government inequality is thriving. Wage growth is at an all-time low. The cost of living is paralysing families. Thousands of vulnerable older Australians can't access care, and the government's health cuts are bankrupting families. Homelessness and housing stress are national crises. Where is the Prime Minister on all of this? He is busy obsessing over his own political woes; he's obsessing about whether he's able to keep his own job. When it comes to the recent polling, we note that No. 26 was rung out this morning—so there are only four more before he reaches Tony Abbott's 30 negative polls, which this Prime Minister used to knife that Prime Minister.

The Prime Minister is so preoccupied he has failed to fulfil one of the biggest obligations that a Prime Minister of this great country has, and that is to know and understand what's happening in our community. He has failed to listen, failed to act and failed to understand what Australia's most vulnerable people are struggling with. Those opposite have taken the low road one too many times, and even their most loyal supporters are turning away. If you were to say to me, Senator Bilyk, that Malcolm Turnbull had a bit of a tough time in 2017, I would give you an award for the understatement of the year, because 2017 was an absolute shocker for the Turnbull government. After a particularly tumultuous year you might have expected them to bunker down and re-emerge in the new year with a resolution to be better and to be different. But 2018 started the same way for the Liberals as 2017 ended—in a complete shambles. From their divisive Trump-style comments about gang violence in Victoria to the delay of the GST report to the revelations that our broadband speeds are now lagging behind Third World countries or the clumsy tirade on China's Pacific affairs, we're seeing more of the same old disorderly government. They've kicked off this year with no direction, no plan and, above all, no narrative.

As a former investment banker, you'd think that Mr Turnbull would have the economic nous to manage the economy and address the cost of living that's paralysing families in this country, in particular those on very limited incomes, such as older Australians. But his elitist approach to economic issues such as tax and housing affordability has created an us-versus-them culture. People are switching off and feeling disenfranchised. In Mr Turnbull's first speech of the year last week he vowed that 2018 would be a year of delivery and that families could look forward to cheaper energy prices and lower childcare costs. What a load of bunk and rot from the Prime Minister.

Last week's Productivity Commission report confirmed that childcare costs continue to skyrocket under the Liberals and that it won't get any better under the government's changes, which won't take effect until 1 July. The Liberals don't support early education or our early educators who do such a critical job. Next month, childcare workers will walk off the job in a bid to raise the industrial-law award wages. This will be the third national walk-off in 12 months, but, again, the Liberals aren't listening. It's not like these early childhood educators want to take these measures, but they are left with no choice. Parents support them; this government ignores them. This says everything about this government's priorities. While Australians have suffered record low wages, it has pursued penalty rate cuts and tax hikes for low- and middle-income earners while cutting tax for millionaires and big business. That's what this government prioritises.

Mr Turnbull is an elitist and the Liberals are so out of touch with the Australian people that it's not funny. From that speech, the first speech in this chamber this year from a Liberal, they've demonstrated very, very clearly that this government still doesn't get it. This government still doesn't understand what's happening in its own community. You might recall on Q&A last year when Mr Turnbull condescendingly asked an audience member to explain how he had disappointed her. How disingenuous can you be? That's the level and mentality of our Prime Minister: too worried about his own job and too big an ego to listen to what's happening in the community. Mr Turnbull has spent most of his life within the top one per cent of wage earners in this country. How can someone who has lived a very privileged life relate to parents who will be trying to balance their family budgets as they buy new school uniforms, school shoes, books and lunch boxes for their kids as they go back to school this week in Tasmania? It's no longer a question of whether Mr Turnbull can relate to the majority of the population, because we all know he can't. The magic number, as I said, of 30 Newspolls has arrived, and no amount of smoke and mirrors can hide the fact that he can neither lead and govern nor close the gap of inequality in this country.

This is a government with the wrong priorities and the wrong vision for Australia. The Prime Minister needs to understand the heartbeat of the country's people. The Prime Minister needs to understand the hardship that's been experienced by so many—too many—in this country. The Prime Minister needs to understand the heartache of parents having to say no to their kids when they can't do music lessons, when they can't do swimming lessons and when they can't dance with their friends. He needs to get real and start showing some heart for Australians who are less fortunate.

Those opposite think that if they give a tax cut to the big end of town, to big business, who do not pay their fair share of tax already, there will be economic growth and jobs created. I'd like to ask the Prime Minister, Mr Turnbull, to explain to me and the Australian people when in history tax cuts for big business have stimulated job creation and caused wage growth. I know he can't answer that, because it hasn't happened. The drivers of an economy are the people. How about you focus on them, Mr Turnbull, just for once?

Last week, Mr Turnbull said that life in Australia was good as a result of the coalition's economic policies and that his government are committed to defending the fair go. That is absolute nonsense. It's rubbish. We heard from a government senator just before I began to speak saying that everything is all right, that they've got everything on track. The problem is that they don't understand and they aren't listening to the Australian people. I don't know who these government senators and members are socialising with or visiting or who the constituents they see in their offices are. Obviously they're very different to the people who have contacted me or the people who have talked to me in the supermarket or around a barbecue over the new year.

The government can never defend the fair go until they change their priorities and policies. They are an arrogant government who are so far out of touch it's not funny. Comments from the Prime Minister that everything's all right and that he's going to defend the fair go reinforce the fact that he just doesn't get it. He doesn't listen or understand what is so evident. He doesn't understand the struggles happening in our suburbs and for the rest of us. The Prime Minister doesn't understand the pressure Australian households are under, and he doesn't care that one in four parents are going without food so that their kids have enough to eat. Instead of focusing on big issues like stagnant wage growth, the rising cost of living, access to affordable health care and housing affordability, we've seen a government fixated on itself. It's comments like those from the Prime Minister which reinforce that the government don't understand and that they haven't been listening.

There are so many people in our communities who have legitimate concerns. Most Australians are focused on putting food on the table, paying their bills, paying their mortgage or paying their rent. But this government is too preoccupied with satisfying millionaires and the big end of town. There are single mums and single dads who are trying to make ends meet by having two jobs. They are also many, many two-income families who are still under increasing financial pressure, and that puts enormous pressure and stress on these families and individuals. Mothers and fathers have lost their jobs because industry is under pressure and government has not reacted fast enough.

And then there are the older Australians, the people forgotten by those opposite. We know the crisis confronting older Australians in this country. It's financial, but it's also about care. It's about the 100,000-plus people who are still waiting to get a home-care package, to get assistance to stay in their homes. Let's face it—we all know that the best place for older people to age is in their own homes. It's also a lot less expensive for every government to have people stay in their own homes. Let's not forget that. They still pay their rates. They still have to pay their own hydro bills and their heating and energy costs. So the least that this government can do is to ensure that older Australians who need assistance to stay at home, to live safely and have the dignity and respect they have earned, get it. But this government has failed.

It's not just this government. We remember the Howard days. They were in government for 11½ years and, even though people thought that John Howard was a man of the people and the man of the poor, he always failed to deliver for older Australians. And this government is no better. There are older Australians in my home state of Tasmania who are forced to wait in ambulances or in queues at emergency departments because there are not enough beds in the hospitals. We know that, in Tasmania, older people have been left on the floor in accident and emergency departments. Why? Because the Liberal state government and the Turnbull Liberal federal government have cut funding to health. The Tasmanian health system is in crisis. Only last week, the head of surgery at the Launceston General Hospital resigned because he couldn't reach an agreement with the minister and the government of the day. He left because they took away all his power to make decisions. That's the calibre of Liberals when it comes to health care in this country.

There's never been a more important time for government to be actively promoting equality of opportunity than now. It's in our national interest. The people are sick of hearing those opposite bang on about their sterile, unrealistic slogans, such as 'jobs and growth' and the 'innovation agenda' and the empty rhetoric of trickle-down economics. I don't have an economics degree, but I do know maths and I do know the numbers. I know the number of people who are still trying to get jobs in this country and the number of people who are doing it really tough in this country, and trickle-down economics will not change our economy for the better for those people who need it most.

We need a renewed debate on the role of government in reducing inequality—something that the Leader of the Opposition, Bill Shorten, continued last week. This brings me to the contrast between Labor and the Liberals. Of Australia's two viable governing parties, only one has a policy approach that will defend opportunities—the Australian Labor Party. Last week, the Leader of the Opposition, Bill Shorten, outlined Labor's vision for 2018 for a fairer, stronger and more inclusive Australia. The contrast between Mr Shorten's and Mr Turnbull's first speeches for 2018 couldn't be more stark. Mr Turnbull used his speech last week to cement the fact that he is the ultimate hollow man of Australian politics. As my colleague Mr Chris Bowen said, 'Malcolm Turnbull talking about income tax cuts is like the English cricket team bragging about winning the Ashes.'

Malcolm Turnbull, in his Toowoomba declaration last week, bragged that he will cut taxes for Australians, when he's increasing the taxes of seven million Australians. The fact is that Malcolm Turnbull is increasing taxes for seven million Australians so that he can cut taxes for multinationals and millionaires. He wants a medal for saying that he might cut taxes, when we know that he is, in fact, increasing them. Under Mr Turnbull's tax increase, someone earning $60,000 gets a tax hike of $300 a year. Meanwhile, he's giving millionaires a tax cut of $16,400 a year and big businesses a tax cut of $65 billion. If Mr Turnbull was really fair dinkum about tax, he would drop his tax increases. All his talk and jibe about tax increases when all this government wants to do is increase tax through the Medicare levy is just hollow rhetoric.

Fact: this is a government that wants to increase income tax, and the Labor Party stands against it in this place. Fact: the only thing stopping Australians earning less than $87,000 a year paying more income tax today is Bill Shorten and the Labor Party's opposition to this government's ridiculous policy. Fact: the Liberals are so delusional and out of touch they think that, if they give a $65 billion tax cut to big business, who do not pay their fair share of tax now, there will be economic growth and jobs will be created.

I could go on and on about the inequality in this country and the fact that this government is still out of touch. Inequality in Tasmania is already impacting many households, as I said earlier. We in Tasmania already experience high levels of inequality and underemployment. In fact, nearly 40 per cent of Tasmanians receive some form of government benefit. This is well above the national average. We know that Mr Turnbull doesn't like Tasmania because we didn't support him; we didn't vote for him at the last election. But he still has to respond to the desires and ambitions of all members of this country, including Tasmanians.

Most income in Tasmania is generated from wages and salaries. Other income is produced in the form of pensions and child payments. However, all income is then further reduced by taxation and other increasing costs. Any impact on our income stream, such as the Turnbull government's cut to penalty rates further, reduces our ability to support normal basic living costs, education and health. Clearly with this low wage growth any rise in unemployment in Tasmania will lead to defaults on mortgages and consumer loans and could have catastrophic results for our state. We have already lost 4,700 jobs in the last 11 months. We cannot afford for this to continue under Malcolm Turnbull or the Liberal state government of Tasmania. We need action. We need leadership. I know I'm asking too much when I ask to have leadership from this Prime Minister, but the Australian people deserve nothing less.