Mehreen Faruqi (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I must say it is pretty rich of the Liberals—the party most closely aligned with the one per cent—to talk about the cost of living. I am really sick and tired of the Liberals, the Nationals and Labor lecturing people about a cost-of-living-and-housing crisis that their governments created and their governments continue to perpetuate. It is hypocritical, it is hollow and it is cruel. When ordinary people are suffering, the Liberals turn up like charlatans in the town square, claiming to have answers, but they are selling the same snake oil they always do: racism, fear, hate and blame. They talk about solutions but offer only scapegoats: migrants and minorities. And Labor is cut from the same cloth, just with different marketing. Labor, the Liberals and the Nationals all claim to stand with ordinary Australians, but their actions tell a different story. When it comes time to act, relief flows in one direction only—upwards to the big banks, to landlords, to coal and gas giants, and to billionaires. They protect corporate profits and refuse to tax obscene wealth. This is not an accident. These parties defend a broken housing system, which lets speculators pocket millions while first home buyers and renters suffer.

Today's interest rate rise is pure profit for the big banks while mortgage holders and renters are being pushed deeper into pain. None of the big parties can claim the moral high ground while fanning the flames of hate and blaming migrants, exactly like One Nation does, and making matters worse for ordinary people. We need structural change to overhaul an unfair economic system so that it starts working for the 99 per cent. (Time expired)