Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of answers given to all questions asked by coalition senators.

I'm going to do just two things in the brief opportunity I have this afternoon. In all seriousness, the first is to remind the government about their commitment and their policy that was aimed at improving, sustaining, refreshing and energising Australia's charity sector. The second thing I'm going to do—and I'm embarrassed to have to do it—is to highlight the very, very real concerns and the evidence that is now appearing which demonstrates that Australia's charity and not-for-profit sector, which has done good work that many Australians regularly rely upon, is feeling the strain. It's feeling the strain of a number of things. It is feeling the strain of the current cost-of-living pressures, which are made worse for it because many charities are still feeling the fatigue and the exhaustion of having responded to a series of natural disasters in our country. They stepped up in their local communities during the pandemic and now are facing very, very real, serious and immediate challenges.

I hope that after today's brief remarks this issue gets to the top of Senator Gallagher's priorities. I hope it gets to the top of the government's priorities, because you can't be interested in providing cost-of-living relief if you're not also interested in supporting Australia's charity and not-for-profit sector.

Labor committed, in its 'Building capacity, Building Community' policy, to do just three things, and we heard from Senator Gallagher this afternoon that not one has been delivered. The first was the appointment of an expert reference panel. How difficult can that be? How long should that take? The second was to create a blueprint mapping out how Australian charities could reach their potential—how urgent has that now become? Thirdly, they said they would provide coaching to the charity and community sector to fulfil its important and very, very urgent and needy role as frontline responders. And Labor said in the budget that it would do one more thing, and that was to initiate a Productivity Commission inquiry into philanthropic giving. How difficult can that be? And how urgent it has become. It's disappointing that, over the last few days and last week, much of the commentary in our newspapers has been about cost-of-living pressures and about the number of fixed mortgage rates shifting across to variable rates. There are 800,000 fixed rate loans shifting across to variable rates in this year alone, but we heard from the responsible minister that it's not yet reached the list of the government's priorities.

Let me just share what the sector is saying. In December last year, the sector released a report. It said in the key findings—you don't have to look very hard; they're on page 7—that three per cent of participants said their main service could always meet demand. That means 97 per cent of services do not feel like they can meet demand. Sixty-three per cent of survey participants—and this is surveys of charity providers—reported that cost-of-living pressures affected the people or communities their service supports. This was the most frequently reported challenge. Fifty-seven per cent of participants said access to affordable housing or homelessness affected their service users and communities. This was much higher amongst providers focused on domestic and family violence, which was 94 per cent, and financial, legal and emergency supports, which was 90 per cent.

In the last budget, just in October, the government applauded itself for delivering on its election commitments. Today is the third sitting day of the new parliamentary year, and they still have not been able to deliver on what has now become a most critical, a most urgent, election commitment and election promise. The matter is serious, and I hope we get some responses soon.