David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Behind some of the welcome and big-ticket items in last night's budget, like the new housing accord that aspires to deliver a million homes over the next five years, expanded childcare subsidies, more paid parental leave and cheaper medicine, there lies a bigger, much more worrying story. It's a story of rising inflation, rising interest rates, slowing GDP growth, rising unemployment and rising costs of living across the country. The last one is a real killer—a 56 per cent forecast rise in electricity prices, a 44 per cent forecast rise in gas prices and a jump in both groceries and rent.

The Treasurer is saying we're unlikely to see a rise in real wages for at least another couple of years. Despite this acknowledgement, the government hasn't done anything in terms of raising the rate for JobSeeker, Austudy or Commonwealth rent assistance. I absolutely understand and commend the need for 'responsible economic management', the need to 'live within our means' and the many other phrases bandied around this place when it comes to the budget. But, equally, I simply don't accept that we can let this crisis continue. The budget is about priorities, and what we've heard from the new Labor government in their first budget is that the three million Australians living in poverty are not a priority. The one in six children across Australia who are growing up in poverty are not a priority to the new government.

We have to think about this in terms of the things that we are happy to spend money on. At a time when fossil fuel companies are pulling in record profits, we're still happy to subsidise them. We're still happy to pour money into things like the Middle Arm project. That's $1.9 billion here and a few billion dollars there for the gas industry. But, when it comes to Australians in our communities who desperately need the support, we're silent. The government had an opportunity to increase JobSeeker. Forty-eight dollars a day is not enough to live on. We heard the government pat themselves on the back when the rate was indexed and went from $46 to $48. But $48 is still nowhere near enough.

Let's be clear: the choices that we make in this place and in the other place are keeping one in six children across Australia—one of the most wealthy countries in the world—living in poverty. It has huge implications, not just for those kids' futures but for all of our futures, to have one in six children growing up in poverty and three million Australians living below the poverty line.

We know times are tough. Here in the ACT, our front-line services are stretched to breaking point. Food pantries have massive lines and are battling to get enough staff. People with jobs are struggling. How do we not support to get back into the labour market people who are in between jobs, looking for jobs and trying to get their lives back on track?

I really implore the government to think more about this. You're governing for the Australian people. You're answerable to those three million Australians who, through your decisions, are being left to live on $48 a day. For those one in six children who are growing up in poverty, the rest of their lives will be shaped by their experience of growing up in poverty, of growing up not being able to afford things, of looking at their friends at school and asking, 'Why can't I have that? Why do I have to live like that?' These are the choices that we are privileged to make in this place, and I implore the government to raise the rate before or at the next budget in May.