Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The President has received the following letter from Senator Fifield:

Dear Mr President

Pursuant to standing order 75, I propose that the following matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion:

The Gillard government's decision in this Budget to be tough on Australian families, rather than tough on itself with a new assault on families that are already struggling under cost of living pressures

Is the proposal supported?

I call upon those senators who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

I understand that informal arrangements have been made to allocate specific times to each of the speakers in today’s debate. With the concurrence of the Senate, I shall ask the clerks to set the clock accordingly.

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think the subject of the matter of public importance bears repeating:

The Gillard government's decision in this Budget to be tough on Australian families, rather than tough on itself with a new assault on families that are already struggling under cost of living pressures.

I do not think there has ever been a government that is so reticent to take difficult decisions, that is so timid and so hidebound by its own electoral self-interest, that it does not take the decisions necessary for the national interest.

'The national interest' is a phrase that you will hear Labor members and senators use over and over. Any half-baked idea, any act of political self-interest, will always be followed by the phrase 'because this is in the national interest', as though those are magic words—you use the phrase 'national interest' and it transforms self-interested policies in the eyes of the electorate into worthwhile policies. Whenever we hear those words 'national interest' from the Labor Party we know that it is anything but.

The Labor Party used to tell us all the time that they were the party for families. They used to say that they were the party for workers. That then morphed into the 'party for families' and then you could not turn on the television in 2007 without hearing a Labor MP drone on about 'working families'. We care about working families, but for the Labor Party it is a mantra. It is a focus-group tested mantra which they think will convince the voting public. But what has changed between 2007 and now? Labor did profess to care about working families and Labor have now cast away that commitment to working families. There was no mention of working families in the budget. Given the measures in the budget, it was a little too much even for the Labor Party to talk about a commitment to working families—such would be the hypocrisy if they did that. Indeed, not only has the budget neglected families, it has absolutely potted them, with a raft of measures that are going to make things worse for families. e know that Australian families are facing severe cost-of-living pressures due to Labor's profligacy and waste. Electricity prices are up 51 per cent since Labor was elected; grocery prices are up by 14 per cent; education and health costs are up by about 20 per cent; and there have been no fewer than seven interest rate rises in a row, increasing average mortgage repayments by over $500 a month.

I am not asserting that every one of those cost-of-living increases is the direct result of Labor policies. Some of them are. Some of those cost-of-living pressures have been exacerbated by Labor policies. But, surely, it is the job of government firstly, when it comes to the Australian people, to seek to do no harm. This government has exacerbated those cost-of-living pressures and has made it even harder for families to meet those in this budget.

So, instead of trying to fix this problem, Labor's budget has cut support for families and it has hit them with new and higher taxes. The budget strips $2 billion from families by freezing for three years the indexation of key family tax payments and income thresholds. It also slugs families and businesses with $6 billion of new and increased taxes. To make matters worse, Australian families are yet to be hit by the Gillard-Brown carbon tax.

Instead of taking the opportunity that this budget presented to end months of uncertainty around the carbon tax, the budget fails to give any details of the carbon tax or its impact on living costs or jobs. We know that all the budget forecasts will be thrown out the window when the government finally does get around to releasing the details of the carbon tax. I guess they will have to release some sort of mid-year economic forecast to update all of those effects.

As Tony Abbott has said many, many times, the budget is not worth the paper that it is written on, because it does not include the biggest macroeconomic so-called reform. Not everything a government does is a reform. But this government calls it a 'reform'; it is a misnomer. The budget does not include that significant macroeconomic reform that they claim.

The government's failure to rein in reckless and wasteful spending is going to lead to high inflation. It is going to put upward pressure on interest rates. That is going to see more interest rate hikes by the Reserve Bank—we know that. But just at the time that families are being slugged by increases in interest rates, they will be in a worse position because there will be the freezing of indexation of key family tax benefits which are usually indexed to the CPI, so it is a double whammy.

The government has also frozen the indexation of the higher income thresholds for family payments for the next three years. These thresholds are usually indexed by the CPI. These thresholds are to be frozen, and they include the $150,000 limit for FTBB, the $75,000 baby bonus eligibility limit for family income, the $150,000 paid parental leave income limit and the higher income threshold for FTBA.

This is also the first budget in eight years that has not provided tax cuts for Australians. Instead, as I have mentioned before, Labor has hit Australian families and the economy with more than $6 billion in new and higher taxes. Labor are still determined to means test the private health insurance rebate to hurt families. Labor have been tough on families because they have failed to be tough on themselves. I want to evidence that. There is a thread that runs through and joins each Labor budget. There is an unerring constancy and a consistency of approach. They are undoubtedly works of fiction. I have those works of fiction here: the 2008-09 budget, a work of fiction; the 2009-10 budget, a work of fiction; the 2010-11 budget, a work of fiction; and the most recent work of fiction, the 2011-12 budget, another work of fiction.

I want to detail what I mean. Let's go back to 2008, the first budget by Mr Swan, when he said:

We are budgeting for a surplus of $21.7 billion in 2008 -09, 1.8 per cent of GDP, the largest budget surplus as a share of GDP in nearly a decade.

An opposition senator: Yeah, right!

'Yeah, right' indeed! What was the outcome of that budget? It wasn't a $21.7 billion surplus; it was a $27.079 billion deficit. So, there is another work of fiction. If you look hard in 2009-10 budget, you will not actually find the forecasted deficit, so embarrassed was Mr Swan. The outcome was a $54 billion deficit. In the 2010-11 budget—and these numbers actually get further back in the budget speech as you go—Mr Swan said the budget deficit would be $40.8 billion for 2010-11. It ended up being $49 billion. Now we have the final work of fiction, which says that there will be a deficit for 2011-12 of $22.6 billion. I am guessing it might actually be a bit bigger.

But the government actually did something extremely helpful: they changed the colour of the budget papers, so now it is really easy to work out what is a surplus budget and what is a deficit budget. The last Costello budget, as all the Costello budgets were, is white in colour—a surplus budget. Wayne Swan, very kindly changed the colour of the budget paper to blue so we can now easily tell. Any blue budget paper is a deficit budget. That was very thoughtful, Mr Swan. Thank you for doing that.

These are the exhibits to support the case that Labor are not tough on themselves. They are clearly not. They always take the soft option. I just want to touch on a few comments of Mr Swan over the last few days. He said yesterday that the opposition is set to wreck the surplus. There is no surplus, and any good psychologist will tell you that the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour. I do not believe there will be a surplus. Mr Swan yesterday said:

I've done a lot of things Peter Costello has never done.

He is spot on. Peter Costello: 12 budgets and 10 surpluses; Wayne Swan: four budgets, four deficits and no surpluses.

Penny Wong yesterday said this is a typical Labor budget. You bet it is—debt and deficit, with no tough decisions, and at the same time slugging ordinary Australians. If you listen to Senator Wong, she will tell you that they have really had a lot of bad luck, that overwhelmingly it is revenue shortfalls that have led to these budget deficits. That is not true. The overwhelming majority of the reasons for the budget deficits have been policy decisions by government. If you look at the reasons for the budget deficits, they are policy decisions by government, not revenue shortfalls. But if you listen to Senator Wong and Mr Swan you will believe that no government has ever had such a bad run of luck as this outfit has.

This government, the Labor Party, claimed at the 2007 election that they would be economic conservatives. They have not been. This has been a government of sloth, waste and incompetence. The people who are paying the price for that are the Australian public, and this budget stands as a testament to the fact that the Australian Labor Party are not tough on themselves; they cannot take a tough decision. It is always the Australian people who pay. They are paying again. They are suffering from rising costs of living. This budget will exacerbate those costs of living. Every budget tells the story of deceit. Every budget tells the story that it is the Australian Labor Party, through their bad policy decisions, who are inflicting pain on the Australian people.

Catryna Bilyk (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What an appalling matter of public importance brought on by Senator Fifield. It is appalling because it feeds into the campaign of fearmongering that the federal opposition continues to engage in. It is absolutely breathtaking in its hypocrisy. Another day, another scare campaign. The opposition are trying to tell us how to budget when they brought forward election costings with an $11 billion black hole. Being criticised by the opposition on fiscal responsibility is like being flogged with a feather duster. I would sooner take marriage guidance lessons from Tiger Woods than I would take lessons in accounting from those opposite!

The other great hypocrisy is that, if there was ever an assault on families, it has been perpetrated by the coalition. Let's look at their record. They talk about Work Choices being dumped and yet they come up with a workplace relations policy that revives the worst elements of Work Choices. They talk about cost of living pressures and last year they proposed a levy that would feed through to the cost of every grocery item at Coles and Woolworths. They talk about the effects of a carbon price and then they come up with a so-called 'direct action' plan which will cost the average family $720 a year and will blow a $30 billion black hole in the budget.

While the opposition perpetrates its attacks on families, the Gillard Labor government is actually delivering for families in this budget. The family assistance measures in this budget build on the $46.7 billion we have already delivered in income tax cuts. A person earning $50,000 a year pays $1,750 less tax now than they paid in 2007. The budget also builds on the family assistance we have delivered through the education tax refund, the childcare rebate, our teen dental plan and pension reforms. And through the budget we continue to deliver on skills and jobs, after making our workplace laws fairer and simpler and tearing up Work Choices.

I will outline just a few of the initiatives that are helping Australian families through this budget—just in case Senator Fifield missed them. We are providing a $296.3 million boost to provide more community based support for people with mental illness and their families. We are providing $147 million through the Better Start for Children with Disability initiative, which will give children with disability affecting their development better access to early intervention services.

We are trialling new measures in disadvantaged communities to help teenage parents to finish school and support their children. These measures will break the cycle of disadvantage experienced by some families. For vulnerable and disadvantaged Australians we are making investments in financial counselling, emergency relief and other money management initiatives.

The headline initiatives for families are our changes to the family payments system. At the same time as making the system fairer, simpler and more sustainable in the long term, we are providing more support for low- and middle-income families raising children. From 1 January this year, family tax benefit part A will be increased for 16- to 17-year-olds in secondary school by $4,208 per year and for 18- to 19-year-olds in school by $3,741 per year. This measure will benefit the families of 650,000 teenagers. We will also give families access to more flexible advance payments of family tax benefit part A.

At the core of this budget is the one thing that helps Australian families more than anything else, and that is the dignity and financial independence that comes with getting a job. Since coming to government in 2007, Labor has created well over 700,000 jobs, and we intend to build on this success. The Gillard Labor government is investing $3 billion over six years in skilling the Australian workforce. We are also delivering a package of participation reforms to make sure that more Australians have the opportunity to engage in the workforce. This includes a workforce development fund to deliver 130,000 training places over four years, a national mentoring program to help 40,000 apprentices finish training, and investment in more flexible training models to allow apprentices to be fast-tracked as they acquire critical trade skills.

We are providing additional investment in the national partnership with the states and territories to boost vocational education and training. We are reforming the disability support pension and providing more support for DSP recipients to participate in work. We are extending our 'earn or learn' requirements to 21-year-olds and creating new pathways to full-time employment for early school leavers. We are investing in targeted wage subsidies and extended work experience programs to help the long-term unemployed into work. Now let me go to the issue of a carbon price, because there are a couple of things the opposition conveniently overlooks in its commentary on this. First of all, the carbon price is not going to be included in the budget because the design is yet to be finalised. It will not affect the budget bottom line because the measure is expected to be revenue neutral. However, one member of the opposition who is sceptical about that claim put in one of the best comical performances I have ever seen on Insiders last Sunday morning. I am referring to the shadow Treasurer, Joe Hockey. For those who missed it, here is the transcript:

JOE HOCKEY: Well on budget night when they claim to deliver a surplus in 2012/13 there will be a gaping hole and the hole will be the carbon tax ...

BARRIE CASSIDY: It's true that the carbon tax figures won't be there but isn't it generally accepted that the figures will be broadly neutral in that first year?

JOE HOCKEY: No, because revenue will be higher.

Mr Hockey claims that the government's carbon price will make it more difficult to deliver a surplus in 2012-13 and then five seconds later he claims that revenue from the carbon price will be higher than expenditure. Can the opposition please make up their minds on this one? If one member of your caucus has two views, it is no wonder you have trouble coming up with any sensible policies.

The other salient fact that the opposition choose to ignore when they start their big scare campaign on cost of living pressures is that this is a tax on big polluters. While we accept that there will be some price increases, we have committed to at least 50 per cent of the revenue from a carbon price going to household assistance, a measure that we expect will fully compensate many Australians and will leave millions of Australians better off.

When it comes to supporting families, this government's record is second to none. The opposition likes to try to scare families because it suits its political purpose, but the scariest prospect for families would be if Tony Abbott became Prime Minister. We must not forget that if Tony Abbott had his way there would be an $11 billion black hole in the budget and 200,000 Australians would be out of work because of his opposition to the economic stimulus plan.

We understand the pressures that Australian families are under. We have just been through a global financial crisis and, despite Australia's resilience, we have all felt the effects. But this Gillard Labor government is supporting families, supporting skills and jobs and supporting strong and responsible fiscal management that will return the budget to surplus by 2012-13.

We all know Mr Abbott has a knack of getting the big economic calls wrong. Just look at his approach to the global financial crisis, the flood recovery package and his so-called health reform. The big risk to Australian families is the opposition, just as it is a big risk to the budget and a risk to our $1.3 trillion economy.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Bilyk said this Gillard Labor government is committed to fiscal restraint and fiscal responsibility, but we are yet to see a budget in the black. This matter of public importance today about the harm this government is causing to our families and to their cost of living is simply a free kick in front of goal for us on the opposition benches.

It is important to look at the history of the Labor Party. Senator Cormann pointed out to me last night what happened in the 13 years of the Hawke-Keating government. How many budget surpluses were there? Just three out of 13. It was borrow, borrow, borrow—and run up the debt. We know the debt. It was $96 billion inherited by the Howard coalition government. They had some 10 or 11 years to pay it off. We can go back to the late eighties and the early nineties and look at the way the Labor Party managed the states. Victoria had a $60 billion debt and down the tube it went. South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania were similar.

Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Sustainability and Urban Water) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That's not true!

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is absolutely true. What happened to your bank in South Australia, Senator Farrell? It had to be cashed in to clean up some of your debt. It was all brought on by the Labor Party. It has not changed. On 26 March this year, there was a state election in New South Wales. I think those opposite would probably like to forget about that date. They should remember it. It was when the people of New South Wales really had their say on what they thought of that state's Labor administration after 16 years. And guess what: the Treasurer has now confirmed there is a $5 billion hole in the New South Wales budget and forward estimates. Does that surprise anyone? Not at all. All my life I have talked to people in the street and they say, 'Every time Labor gets into government they send us broke.' Nothing has changed; it is the same here.

Let us have a look at what is happening now. Senator Fifield pointed out earlier that this current financial year has a budget with some $41 billion deficit, and $9 billion has been added to that. There was $50 billion borrowed this year. It is amazing. Yesterday I looked on the website of the Australian Office of Financial Management. It stated that the debt was $187.7 billion and growing.

I find the stimulus package amazing—the $42 billion stimulus waste that was brought forward to this parliament. That package had a section in it where the government could borrow up to $2 billion. That was the overdraft. I think we will have to extend the overdraft. If we are on $187.7 billion now, by the end of this month it will be $190 billion; yet next year's budget forecast is $22.6 billion. So it will be back to the parliament to extend the overdraft.

There is not only concern about the federal government's debt but also concern that this parliament has underwritten the states' debts for some $240 billion. If the federal government's gross debt goes to $220 billion and there is $240 billion for the states, we would be looking at a $460 billion debt between the states and the federal government of Australia. With a $1.3 trillion GDP, we will probably be looking at 40 per cent. It is only a guess.

The real problem is what this is going to do to working families. Remember that prior to the 2007 election it was all about working families. These are the same families that had $2 billion taken out of their family allowances in Mr Swan's budget last night. hat this means is higher interest rates. I have told the Senate before about the days of Treasurer Paul Keating. At one stage he was the so-called 'world's greatest treasurer'. For what—borrowing money and running up debt? We were paying an interest rate of 22.25 per cent on the farm. People cannot believe that today. It is a figure I will never forget, and I hope Senator Cameron does not forget it. We have now had seven interest rate rises. The cash rate was at three per cent but it is now at 4.75 per cent and there is more to come.

When interest rates go up, there are two effects. The Aussie battlers, those buying their home and trying to fulfil their dream, are the ones who will pay. People in small business, with their debts, will pay. The farmers, after eight years of drought and with many having their crops washed out over the summer months last year, will pay. That is what happens with interest rates. But the bad effect of all this is that the higher our interest rates go in Australia, the greater the difference between Australian interest rates and overseas rates. And then what happens? We have foreign investors investing in the higher rates in Australia and we have a stronger Australian dollar, and the stronger the Australian dollar gets, the more income is wiped out of regional Australia again. This is why, when the government say they are out to promote jobs and help unemployment, the higher interest rates and the higher Australian dollar are going to have a very negative effect on the future of our regional economies.

What concerns me is that, for the next four years, the government's interest bill will be close to $20 million a day. That is quite amazing. Last night, when I was watching Sky TV, I saw the member for New England, Tony Windsor, saying, 'Don't be concerned about the deficit, it is really not a problem.' How far he has turned to the left since he has been in alliance with the Labor Party and the Greens!

We have seen the budget deficit growing and this is on top of increased taxes. First of all, there was the alcopops tax, then there was the car tax and then the flood tax. Soon there will be a mining tax and then there will be a carbon tax, the tax we were never going to have. We had a promise from Ms Gillard that, under any government she leads, there will be no carbon tax. And we had the magical words of Treasurer Swan on the hysterical accusation that if Labor won the election in August 2011 they would introduce a carbon tax. Of course, it is on the way. So that is the situation we face now.

But I want to raise a smaller issue—it might not be big to people in here—and that is the funding of our cooperative research centres, which do all the research. Look out for cures for disease in animals, whether it be in the poultry industry, the pork industry, the sheepmeat industry, or in the cotton industry now that we have $33.4 million sliced out of the funding to our CRCs.

Sue Boyce (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Oh, careful, they might've been productive!

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Exactly, Senator Boyce. I will take that interjection. They would be productive; they will increase productivity; they will lead to growing more food so that we can actually feed people. But, no, Treasurer Swan and the Labor Party take an axe to research and development in our regional centres and our rural and agricultural products. I find that simply amazing.

Senator Ryan made this point earlier on. So many times we hear this comparison about Australia's debt in relation to many other countries: 'Well, it's not too bad really, there's nothing to worry about.' That is a furphy. Imagine if you were having trouble paying your mortgage, if you owed, say, $300,000 on your home loan. Does it make you feel better if the bloke down the road owes $400,000 or if the lady across the street owes $450,000? That does not help you to pay your debt any easier. The fact is that $18 million to $20 million a day, every day, seven days a week, is what we are going to have to pay in interest for the next four years.

The government talks about the surplus. If there is a four per cent reduction in commodity prices, or a further increase in the exchange rate, there will be no surplus. As I said at the start of this debate, we had 13 years of Labor from 1983 to 1996 and we had three surpluses. We have had another four years of Labor from 2007 to 2011. That makes 17 years of Labor government and we have had just three surpluses. Borrow, borrow, spend, spend, and mortgage our children's futures away, and they call it economic and fiscal responsibility! It is reckless, it is wrong, and that is why the people of Australia are going to turn against this government in a big way. When interest rates rise—and, as sure as I speak, they will—and the exchange rate rises further as a result of that, we will see less income for our nation, more imports and the loss of jobs, and industries like cement, aluminium and steel will be affected. When we get the carbon tax that is when we are going to see it all come to a head. We will see exactly what that tax does to destroy jobs and destroy families' livelihoods.

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, thank you for the opportunity to respond to the opposition's MPI. I am very happy to have the opportunity to place on record the benefits of the Gillard government's budget, a budget to ensure the long-term future of all Australians, and I congratulate Treasurer Wayne Swan on this budget. The Gillard government's budget of 2011-12 will strengthen the Australian economy, creating jobs and opportunities. We said this would be a tough budget, and it is. However, the Gillard government is delivering for Australian families with increased flexibility and fair and sustainable financial support. We will deliver a further $300 a year of the low-income tax offset into pay packets and not at the end of the year. Extra support is also being directed to families with an increase in family tax benefit part A of up to $4,208 per year for older teenagers and $3,741 per year for 18- and 19-year-olds in school. We understand the costs associated with raising children and we know that you cannot plan for unexpected expenses. For this reason we will be offering a $1,000 advance for family tax benefit part A to Australian families at any time to cover those unexpected costs. he government is providing more support for low- and middle-income families raising children through our election commitments to increase family assistance to support teenagers in school; making advance payments more flexible; and encouraging parents to get health checks for their children before they start school. Finding a way to include these important measures in a budget that makes a substantial saving to return to surplus in 2012-13 shows the strength and the discipline of the government's commitment to supporting Australian families.

The FTB part A will only be available for families where their teenager is in full-time study, secondary study or vocational equivalent. This government is committed to ensuring Australian youth have access to the best possible educational opportunities. This funding is aimed at helping youth stay in school until at the least year 12. This government believes that having the building blocks for further education or vocational training is essential for the youth of Australia. The families of around 650,000 teenagers turning 16 over the next five years could benefit from substantial increases if the young person stays in school. Family tax benefit will be the primary payment for dependent full-time secondary students living at home. Youth allowance will continue to be available for those children who meet other eligibility criteria.

This has been a budget that required us to make difficult choices and create savings where possible. However, our commitment to supporting Australian families is obvious. The Gillard government is committed to supporting families through increased funding aimed at education and training, placing industry at the heart of the training effort with a new $558 million National Workforce Development Fund. $233 million will be aimed at supporting the very long-term unemployed move back into employment through the Building Australia's Future Workforce package. Would the coalition prefer people to stay on welfare and struggle to make their lives meaningful? It is very easy to forget the day-to-day benefits of employment when all you have are concerns with political spin. The more Australians we encourage to get into the workforce, the larger our tax base will be. This gives us additional funding to spend in areas of necessity such as health and education.

There is nothing the government can do to assist a family more than to have those family members eligible to work having a job. The Gillard government is reforming the apprenticeship system to make it more modern and flexible, including accelerating apprenticeships and mentoring support. It is increasing workforce participation by getting disadvantaged Australians the skills they need to get a job—something the opposition had plenty of opportunity to do over the 11½ years those opposite sat on the government benches. We know and industry know, as the Australian community know, that they failed to do anything. They failed to provide the skills this country needed. Those on the opposition benches should hang their heads in shame because we are reaping the disadvantages of those 11½ years of the Howard government.

Mental health has been a focus of this budget, something I know we all welcome in this chamber. $2.5 billion has been committed over the next five years to improve and establish an array of community mental health services. This is, once again, another area that those opposite had 11½ years to do something about but failed miserably in. They should be ashamed of themselves. To come in here with the hypocrisy that they have demonstrated thus far is shameful. But the Australian people do see through them.

The Gillard government has also understood the importance of easy, accessible, quality health care and as a result will invest $1.8 billion to improve regional health infrastructure through the Health and Hospitals Fund regional priorities round. This funding will be directly helping people in my home state of Tasmania, where $240 million has been allocated to the Royal Hobart Hospital. Funding has also been allocated to Cygnet and Sheffield.

Senator Bushby interjecting—

I am surprised—no, I should not be surprised, Senator Bushby, at your interjection, because we know your record on standing up for Tasmania. This expansion will particularly benefit people with mental illness living in regional and remote Australia who have access to psychological and related services, with referrals through general practitioners.

Keeping Australians engaged and connected with their communities and fam­ilies is of high importance to this govern­ment. Thousands of older Australians will be able to stay connected to their family and friends through free access to broadband internet, with continued funding under the Gillard government's successful Broadband for Seniors initiative. This government will invest a further $10.4 million over four years to 30 June 2015 to keep supporting the 2,000 Broadband for Seniors kiosks already established across this country.

This is a budget that will ensure we are on track for a surplus in 2012-13. This is despite dealing with the new challenges to our finances that come from natural disasters and the lingering effects of the GFC. The budget will also train Australians for better jobs and spread the opportunities of the mining boom. Our government has a track record for getting the big economic calls right. Our policy responses helped protect hundreds of thousands of Australian jobs—

Opposition senators interjecting—

Those opposite can laugh, because we know what their solution was with the GFC—and that was to keep your head in the sand, sit back and do nothing. The Australian people have their jobs. We have Australian workers still working because we took the action that was needed. We protected Australian jobs and businesses from the worst global financial downturn in 75 years. Now we are putting the settings right to deal with the pressures and to build our economy.

The contrast with the performance of Tony Abbott and the coalition cannot be more stark. He has a knack of getting the big economic calls wrong: whether it is the GFC, the flood recovery package or health reform. That is what makes them such a risk to the bottom line, to jobs and our economy. For the party that once claimed the high moral ground for fiscal responsibility, they would now struggle to get a seat even at the Mad Hatter's tea party! All the coalition do is oppose. They oppose everything and support nothing. They say this budget is too tough and then they say it is not tough enough. The aim is to cause political division and confusion within the community. But the Australian people are much smarter than that and in fact very much smarter than those opposite. aybe it is about time the coalition thought about the Australian community rather than their own selfish interests. And what I have to say to the chamber and to those listening today it is that I encourage Australians to listen in tomorrow night to what I hope will be an alternative budget put up, because it would be the first time that has happened. We want to know where the savings are coming from, because those opposite cannot have it both ways and they cannot just attack the Public Service in this country. They will not be able to do that because the Australian community sees through them. The Australian community sees how ineffective those opposite are and they are also very much aware of the three Stooges that lead the coalition's financial team.

Sue Boyce (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am not quite sure where the three stooges are, but I think we can generally—

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, I can name them if you like.

Sue Boyce (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think they are sitting on the government benches. It is worth making the point that this is about families and I will repeat the motion, which I think was a good move by Senator Fifield, to make the point. Our concern here is about:

The Gillard government's decision in this Budget to be tough on Australian families, rather than tough on itself with a new assault on families that are already struggling under cost of living pressures.

I must admit I found the whole effort of the Treasurer last night quite bemusing. He is happily admitting that we have a patchwork economy that is growing unevenly across the nation, and then he uses the current Labor mantra for why this would happen. Thank God in some ways, the Labor government must be saying, for the natural disasters that have affected my home state of Queensland and many other parts of Australia because it has allowed them to continue to mask the fact that the only thing that is prospering in this country right now is the mining industry and businesses associated with it. We do indeed have a patchwork economy. And perhaps the government might like to think a little bit about that and about how they might do something about it because this budget certainly is not the way of doing it.

Let us look at families and some of the budget measures that have come up. Families include people with mental health problems, they include people with disabilities, they include teenage mothers and their children, they include the vulnerable people who have been affected by floods and cyclones and other natural disasters, they affect fathers who are planning for paid parental leave, they affect people who own small businesses, and yet none of these areas have been helped in any way by the Labor government's budget and by the smoke and mirrors in it.

Let us start with mental health and the much-trumpeted $2.2 billion, shall we? There appears to be about $500 million of new spending in that. The rest of it has already been announced. It follows on very much from the pattern and the policy announced three weeks ago by the Leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott, and our shadow minister for mental health, Senator Fierravanti-Wells. I might also make the point, perhaps for Senator Polley's edification, that when the current Leader of the Opposition was the minister for health Australia had a record national spend on mental health, the establishment of most of the policies that underpin the work that is going on in that area.

Let us look at that. Mental health, an extra $500 million or so over four years, and a desperate need. It is a good start, but it is just a bit of a start. Let us look too at the need to get disability support pensioners into work. Great idea, good idea, should be done. However, how are we proposing they get to work? I have received email after email in the past month, since these moves were mooted, saying, 'I'd love to work, but I can't get the care package I need to get someone to come here, give me a shower, get me dressed and give me breakfast in time to turn up to work at the starting time every day.' So we have the much-vaunted national disability insurance scheme, which of course is not even mentioned here because it is not even going to start in this forward estimates period. We already have the criticism of the current scheme saying it is underfunded, inequitable, it is not even a support scheme; it is just something that has been cobbled together. Yes, let us get disability support pensioners out to work, but let us put the supports in place that would give them the chance to take jobs by providing someone to assist them to get ready for work in a timely fashion. Let us put all of those support services out on the never-never, then whose fault will it be when this fails? It is yet another implementation problem that this government has.

We need to also look at the wonderful $200 million package for early intervention services. Now in the disability area, special education area, I think people are grateful for all of the crumbs they get. People are grateful for this, but $200 million over three years divided by 165,000 students—you come down to about $400 a year per student. This is to provide necessary early inter­ventions and specialist therapies. Has anyone tried to employ a speech pathologist recently? You will pay well over $100 or $150 for an hour's session. So $400 a year per student. It is a start, but it is just a start. It is not something that is going to assist families in any meaningful way. Let us look at the teenage mothers, shall we. I was most amused to hear an apologist for the Labor government on radio recently suggest that, if teenage mothers had problems getting child care locally so they could go to work, as this government wants them to, they could just drive to another childcare centre about 10 minutes away. We are talking about teenage mothers who own cars and who are going to drive to childcare centres? Yes, we are. Again, this government does not have a clue about the reality out there. I do not know many 16- or 17-year-old mothers who drive their own cars.

I said in my newsletter a little while ago that I am expecting a series of poorly thought through plans to take money from middle-income groups so that the government could then ineptly squander it somewhere in the vicinity of people in need. But I did get that wrong because it is not even being squandered ineptly in the area of people in need—it has not even been brought within the vicinity of the people who need it. Once again, we have ideological plans that have no chance of being able to be implemented because the government does not understand their audience and does not understand the practical needs of people.

We will have increases in the costs of petrol, electricity, groceries, health costs and mortgage costs brought on by the flood levy, the carbon tax and the mining tax. It will go on and on, yet this government is attempting to say that it is helping families. It is a nonsense.

Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am always amused when I hear these Liberal members and certainly members from the Nationals lecture about economic competence. The coalition government, when they were in power, had 11½ years to build this country, yet they had not one big vision, not one big initiative. We had massive problems in the hospitals and we inherited massive infrastructure problems. I will come to these further on.

What is Labor doing? Labor will get the budget back into the black by 2012-13. We will build Australia's future workforce. One of the biggest crimes against this country committed by the coalition was to diminish the number of tradespeople that were trained in this country. You handed money over to McDonald's and Red Rooster and forgot that you needed tradespeople in this country to build the country. Your record on building skills for this country was abysmal. It was an absolute national disgrace.

We will build the infrastructure in this country. You were warned time and time again by the Reserve Bank, by the Treasury, by engineers and by academics. Academics said the infrastructure in this country needed to be rebuilt, and what did you in the coalition do? You did nothing because you had no vision and no values to take this country forward with. We will continue, through this budget, to invest $36 billion in roads, rails and ports, including $1 billion in funding for the duplication of the Pacific Highway. We are going to put better hospitals and health care in place. When we came to government, what was the complaint we heard? That the hospitals were in crisis. The coalition could not deliver on hospitals. They could not deliver on health care.

We said we would make every school a great school, and we will make schools great schools. I have opened a number of BER projects and, let me tell you, the number of coalition members who want to come along and actually bathe in the glory of increasing the infrastructure in our schools is quite mind-boggling. Your members are there in droves, trying to get their picture taken with the opening of the new facility that the federal government has put in place.

We are going to help families, we are going to help low-income earners and we are going to invest in our regions. The Nationals, who are supposed to be about regional Australia, delivered nothing but pork-barrelling over all the years they were in power—anything to try and get a vote but nothing of any vision or future proofing of the economy. We will invest $4.3 billion in this budget on our regions and on our businesses. To argue that this is an assault on families and the hypocrisy of the coalition to talk about cost-of-living pressures is mind-boggling.

This is a government which has delivered 750,000 jobs since it has been in power. We will deliver another 500,000 jobs over the next two years. We are prepared to take on the fear campaigns and the nonsense that will leave our economy in the backwoods for generations to come. We will put a price on carbon and we will make sure that our industries are at the cutting edge. We will build for the low-carbon future—something which you know has to be done but which, for pure base political motives, you are not prepared to pull on. We are prepared to make sure that the miners pay their fair share of taxes, that ordinary people in this country get a fair go and that the money does not just slosh around in the back pockets of the mining magnates. We will look after pensioners. We will look after school­children. That is what Labor is about—building jobs and building a good society. Let me tell you about Menzies—the great Sir Robert Menzies that you keep talking about. He said:

Nothing could be worse for democracy than to adopt the practice of permitting knowledge to be overthrown by ignorance.

The knowledge in this nation is being overthrown every day by the Leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott, and his three-line points of view. Tony Abbott is certainly about delivering ignorance, not knowledge, in this country—the antithesis of what Sir Robert Menzies said. Sir Robert Menzies also said:

Fear can never be a proper or useful ingredient in those mutual relations of respect and good-will which ought to exist between the elector and the elected.

Every day in this place, we see a disrespect for the Australian people from the coalition; we see fear and ignorance from the opposition party benches. We see fear being peddled on everything that this government is trying to do. The Leader of the Opposition takes unprincipled positions and shamelessly peddles fear and ignorance.

The opposition are the great pretenders. That is what they are: great pretenders. Tony Abbott is out there masquerading as the friend of workers. Well, workers are onto Tony Abbott. They know he is not a friend of workers; they know he is a friend of Work Choices. They are the great pretenders. The opposition try to tell us they are good economic managers, but what did they say at the time of the global financial crisis? They said, 'Wait and see what happens.' That was the opposition's approach. That has been proved wrong, while it has been proved that what this government did saved and underpinned 210,000 jobs and kept this country out of recession. They are the great pretenders on climate change. Those in the opposition who do believe in climate change pretend that they now do not believe, because the Leader of the Opposition considers it 'crap'. There are those on the other side like Senator Boswell, who just does not believe in it, who keeps telling us that he goes out on his yacht off Brisbane on a regular basis and cannot see any rise in the sea level. That is the level of argument dominating the coalition. The great pretenders try to pretend that there were no disasters in Japan, that the GFC had no influence on the Australian economy, that there were no disasters in Australia—no floods, no Cyclone Yasi—and no disasters in New Zealand. None of those things matter; they really do not matter! They want to continue to run fear campaigns on refugees, on government debt and on climate change.

There is little left of the Menzian legacy in this rabble sitting across from me every sitting period. They are not Menzians; they are extremists—and they are extremists on all the issues that are important for this country.

They talk about us being tough on Australian families—what hypocrisy! Let me go back to what Senator Bushby said a bit earlier in this place. He said, 'We created 380,000 jobs through Work Choices.' Senator Bushby, who is in the chamber, nods his head, because he is a great supporter of Work Choices. Senator Bushby and Senator Abetz want to go back to Work Choices. They want to go back to a position where 65 per cent of workers on individual agreements lose their penalty rates, where 70 per cent of workers lose their shift allowances, where over a million award workers lose $100 a week, where 68 per cent of workers lose their annual leave loading, where 25 per cent of workers lose their public holidays and where 3½ million workers lose their protection from unfair dismissal. Don't lecture us about economic ability; you are a failure. And Peter Costello was one of the worst treasurers this country has ever seen. The record is there. He was incompetent, he had no courage and he did nothing to build this nation—a failed Treasurer, and now a failed opposition.

Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The debate has concluded, pursuant to standing order 75.