Richard Di Natale (Victoria, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I could say a lot about this piece of legislation, the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Promoting Sustainable Welfare) Bill 2018, and the fact that the government, with the support of the Labor Party, are backing in a bill that attacks newly-arrived migrants to Australia and makes life harder for them. But perhaps the most damning indictment is Senator Hanson's support for this piece of legislation. Senator Hanson just said in her contribution that she's proud of the Labor Party for supporting this piece of legislation. She's proud of you. You've had a ringing endorsement from One Nation and Senator Hanson, for a piece of legislation that attacks the rights of people who come to this country to make a contribution here. I hope you feel proud about that!

I hope that ringing endorsement is ringing in your ears as you stand with the government to support a piece of legislation that says this. Let's say, for example, that you are a migrant who has come to Australia on a skilled visa or a family visa, that you've come here because you've got a promise of work. You want to make a contribution to this country. You want to start a better life for yourself. You start work in a small business. Things seem to be going well. But, before you know it, in six months time, the business goes under—it just doesn't work out. Well, under this piece of legislation, you're out on the street. You're not going to get the support that you need. You're going to be faced with a different set of rules and conditions from those that other Australians have to live with. In a decent country we say to people who live here: 'We're going to look after you if you don't have employment, if you can't put a roof over your head, if you can't put food on the table.'

Senator Hanson also talks about looking after Australians. Well, I've got news for Senator Hanson: these people are Australian. In Australia, nearly 50 per cent of people were either born overseas or have a parent who was born overseas. These people are Australian. They are why Australia is such a rich, prosperous nation. We are the incredible nation that we are because of the contribution of so many people who come here to make Australia their home. These people are Australian. They might not be Australian citizens yet. If they were, they could go out and get the support they needed before they found their next job. But these people who've come here are, for all intents and purposes, making a contribution; they are sending their kids to school, contributing to local communities and helping their local economy. If, through no fault of their own, their employer ceases their employment, or the business goes under, we're saying to them: 'Tough luck. You're out on your own. We're not going to look after you.' I just say to the Labor Party that you should be an opposition here, that you should be an opposition party. This is bad government legislation.

We know where the next election is going. We know that this will be an election fought on fear and division. We just saw that in Victoria. In Victoria the Labor Party and the Greens stood against that agenda, and the Labor Party was rewarded for it. They fought a campaign fought on fear and division. They fought against a campaign that was designed to divide the Australian community. And the people of Victoria said: 'Do you know what? We want a bit of hope. We want our governments not to prey on base instincts but to actually have a vision for our country—a vision that's more decent, more compassionate and more caring.'

This piece of legislation is punitive. This says everything about the coalition government. It says everything about its cruel, inhumane approach to people who come from overseas. It's shown its true colours when it comes to the treatment of refugees and asylum seekers. It's shown its true colours through attacks on settlement services. We once had a proud record of leading the world when it comes to settlement services—the support that we provided to migrants through housing services, through language and education services, through assisting people to get employment and, of course, through looking after people during that difficult period. We once led the world. Yet this government, in attempting, again, to divide the community, is showing its true colours. It's not just attacking people who might not have been born here; it's also attacking people who are down on their luck. These are the two areas in which the coalition has shown itself to be the mean, cruel, nasty government that Australians are rejecting and will reject in a few months time.

We believe that income support is something we should be proud of—to be able to offer help and assistance to people at a time when they might not be able to find a job. We think that's a good thing. It's a good thing that a rich, prosperous nation can provide universal health care, public education, support to assist someone to pay their rent and an income to put food on their table. Yet what we see, consistently, are attacks on people who are vulnerable, people who, often for brief periods of time, don't have the means to support themselves, and attacks on people from different cultural backgrounds. It sums up this government.

My colleague Senator Faruqi made an impassioned contribution about how important this sort of assistance was to her. Could there be a better example than somebody who has come to this country, who has worked hard, who has made an enormous contribution and who now sits in the Senate representing the state of New South Wales? There she was, in 1992, coming to Australia with her husband, her child and a couple of suitcases, becoming an engineer, along with her husband, working hard, providing for her family, getting some support from the government, and now she is paying it back in spades. That's not an unusual story; that's the story of millions of Australians—getting a little bit of support to begin with, and then paying this nation back in spades.

Creating jobs, creating businesses, contributing to local communities—that is the story of multicultural Australia, yet it seems that this government is intent on attacking it. The great shame here is that it's with the support of the Australian Labor Party. Government is about choices. You've got a choice to be mean and nasty to people who come to Australia to contribute and to add to this nation. You can be mean and tricky to them. You can be nasty. You can make life harder for them, if you want to, in an attempt to pinch a few dollars and try and steal a few votes from One Nation, because, let's be frank, that's what this is about: let's beat up on immigrants and refugees; let's pitch to the One Nation supporter base. You can do that, or you can be a decent society where you provide people with the means they need to be able to put a roof over their head and feed their family.

Here's a suggestion: instead of accelerating those $10 billion of income tax cuts—tax cuts that go to people on $120,000 a year—instead of spending billions of dollars to bribe people in the lead-up to an election, how about putting those on hold and continuing to support multicultural Australia and people who come to this country?

That's what you should be doing. But, because you don't have the guts to stand up to One Nation, we end up with policies like this. And here we are. We wouldn't even be having this conversation if it weren't for the Labor Party. I say to them: why is it that you would want the endorsement of Senator Hanson? What is it about this piece of legislation that means that you want to get in there with the coalition and Senator Hanson and attack a community that you once represented? We know that this is being rushed through this chamber in unseemly haste because of this dirty deal you've done with the Liberal Party to sell out these people. They might not vote yet, but, let me tell you, this is a community of people that have built Australia. The success of Australia is built on the contributions of people that you are selling out today.

Many of the contributors to the inquiry into this piece of legislation made it very clear that there's no place for a discriminatory policy like this which removes income support from these people who will pay it back in spades. I want to take a moment to appeal to FECCA, an organisation that we've worked with closely over many years, to ask Labor to reconsider their views on a bill that is quite clearly intended to make life harder for migrants and ethnic communities right around the country. If Labor were to vote with the Greens and the crossbench, this bill would be defeated. We need to ensure that you understand that it is the Labor Party who are facilitating the passage of this legislation.

We've got a bill that wasn't even on the Senate agenda at the start of this week, and, because last night the Labor Party decided to join with the Liberal Party, we're now here, without even having been given the due courtesy of letting us know this was coming up for debate. We have the Labor Party cosying up to the government to stitch up a deal that attacks migrants. How does that happen? I look across the chamber and I note that members of the Labor Party have their heads down and are not engaging in this. They're quite clearly ashamed of the fact that the most ringing endorsement of their position comes from Senator Hanson. I'll remind you again of what she said: 'I am proud of the Labor Party for finally realising we have legislation that looks after Australians.'

Well, guess what? The nation of Australia is a nation of migrants. It's a nation built on the back of the contributions of families like Senator Faruqi's and like my own family—people who came here and, with the support of the Australian government, were given some modest assistance to start their life. They were given assistance to settle, to learn the English language and to put a roof over their head and house their families. They were given assistance to find employment and they were given income support for that short period of time when they were not able to look after themselves. But they knew they were coming to a decent country that would look after them, and they were prepared to make a commitment that, if they were being looked after, they would make sure they contributed to this nation. So here it is: we've entered an election period based on race baiting and dog whistling, an election period that targets people who have come here to make Australia their home. Rather than embracing the diversity that is the Australian community, it seems the two major parties are rejecting it.

Let me tell you a few things. People who migrate to Australia pay income tax. They pay the GST. They contribute to their communities. They send their kids to schools. They make sure that they get an education. They become the nurses and doctors and teachers of tomorrow—