Maria Kovacic (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Women) | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by Opposition senators today.

In my family, we have something called word of the day. I run the word of the day for our family chat. The word of the day today in the Senate chamber is 'egregious'. I think it's really important that we understand what that means. It means remarkably bad. That's what Senator Hume was talking about when she referenced the tax changes that face Australians now.

I think what's really important for us to focus on are the questions that were asked around the widow's tax. Senator Duniam asked those of Minister Wong. This is important because the Albanese Labor government and the Australian Greens—from whom we've just seen quite a performance—chose to pass legislation that they knew was flawed. They chose to pass legislation that they knew had problems with it. They chose to pass legislation that had unintended consequences. When Senator Duniam asked the minister why the government had failed to introduce legislation to abolish it, the answer was: 'We have plenty of time. We've got until 1 July 2027, so there's no hurry.'

Then the question is: if you have so much time, why didn't you just wait and get it right before you rammed it through? It goes to two things that must be of great concern to Australians. Number 1 is this government and their associates, the Greens, do not care whether the legislation they pass in this chamber is fit for purpose. They care about the theatre of it which was just very clearly demonstrated by Senator Shoebridge. Number 2 is they do not care that it sits there uncorrected. We have to ask: why is that, and will they actually even correct it? Are they being genuine that they will fix it, or will it be the case that if an Australian has this kind of tax treatment, and their spouse or partner passes away, they will in fact be charged the widow's tax, a quasi-death tax, designed by the Albanese Labor government and the Australian Greens.

I couldn't bear the hypocrisy of them talking about young Australians and superannuation, when, in fact, the Greens traded that away. That could have been part of their package that they traded, but they didn't. But they want to sit here and pretend like they care about it. If they cared about it, they would have fought for it. But they did care about a widow's tax, so they fought for that. They did care about taking away the rights of SMSFs to invest how they see fit, so they took that away as well.

What Senator Bragg said before was correct. They do want to ensure the primacy of big super funds in our country. They want to stop Australians from being able to make decisions about their own lives, particularly as it comes to SMSF, because guess what. A big industry fund can invest in property, but, a mum and dad, the average Australian who has an SMSF, can't. Talk to me about the intergenerational equity of that because it doesn't exist. That is in fact egregious. I agree with Senator Hume in relation to that. It is absolutely egregious.

Just, very quickly, in relation to the housing completions, Senator Wong couldn't answer that question effectively. She said how many completions, or purchases, there had been in New South Wales under the first homebuyers' scheme, but there was no answer about the fact that the Albanese Labor government have built fewer homes than the previous coalition government.

Tammy Tyrrell (Tasmania, Independent) | Link to this | Hansard source

I'd like to thank Senator Bragg for bringing up housing, and I'd like to talk about that. We love housing. We want more housing. We're putting money out there for the whole of Australia to get more homes.

Maria Kovacic (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Women) | Link to this | Hansard source

But still there are no houses.

Tammy Tyrrell (Tasmania, Independent) | Link to this | Hansard source

But, in our first term, we took the Commonwealth from being a negligent bystander, Senator Kovacic, to being the boldest and most ambitious Commonwealth government since the World War II with an ambitious $47 billion plan and the vast majority going towards building more homes. I love myself a good home, and this budget builds on that plan.

Home building is turning around. Home starts are up 26 per cent on this time last year, and construction cost inflation has fallen from 17 per cent under the coalition, a half-century high, to 2.5 per cent. 660,000 homes have been built since we were elected. I might even say that again. 660,000 homes have been built since Labor was elected. Our targets are ambitious. That's the whole point of it, though. It's designed to drive national change to our housing system. The right response here is not to lower the national ambition or indeed to have none at all, as unfortunately we saw from the coalition in their last term. We need a bit of guts and courage. You saw this from our government in our first term, and you'll see it all the way through our second term. To unlock these homes in our cities, suburbs and regions, we're training more tradies, building more infrastructure, investing in innovation and cutting red tape.

I'd like to give a shout-out to Loreto Community Housing in my home state of Tasmania. They took me through a tour in Newnham the other day of 49 homes, single bedroom all the way up to four bedroom, that are going to be low socio and give people the opportunity to have a place to call their own and to raise their children. They're available for people with disabilities and those that are struggling, and they're going to be well supported. Loreto, you're legends. The tradies that were there on the day, working in the rain and showing us around in the mud—you too are legends. Building homes is going to actually increase the tradies that we have in our communities because we need more tradies to do what we need to do, which is build homes and keep people in our home states.

Speaking of the states, Labor is working with the states and territories to implement substantial planning reforms and scale up modern methods of construction. We're also directly investing in building new social and affordable homes, like the ones I mentioned at Loreto in Newnham. What matters is the longer term trend. Building approvals have increased three years in a row. Approvals are higher than when the coalition left office, when they were going backwards by 21.7 per cent. Starts and completions are also higher than when the coalition left office. There seems to be a trend where we are lifting the game, we are aiming high and we are going to achieve. You know what? If we're not going to aim high, we shouldn't be here. We should aspire to do better. We should collaborate, cooperate and do what the people of Australia did when they elected us—have an expectation that we will do better. That's something that I hope that everybody in this place aspires to.

In the last term, those opposite stood in the path of more housing at every opportunity, and it feels like they keep on talking negatively about what we can and can't do. But they had an opportunity to do a lot, and they chose not to do a lot. So, in our second term and maybe our third and fourth, we're going to aspire and inspire the people of Australia to aim high, dream big and achieve great things.

Jessica Collins (NSW, Liberal Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

'Dream big', 'dream big'—dream big, Australian people, because guess what? Labor is going to tax your dreams. There will be $77 billion coming straight from your blood, sweat and tears when you build up and turn your dreams into reality—$77 billion of new taxes. They call it tax cuts, but it's $77 billion of new taxes. What else did we hear? 'Guts and courage'. How about more freedom for the Australian people? How about less government for the Australian people? How about lower taxes for the Australian people so they can get on with their lives and dream big and turn that into a reality for them and their families and their households?

The problem with this government is that they spend an awful lot of money. It's a big government. It's a very big government. They spend a lot of money. What does that do? That pushes up inflation. They stand there and talk about tax cuts for workers, but what's really happening with your wages? Your real wages are going down. You earn more; you get taxed more. And we have heard about this widows tax. We asked about the widows tax today. We asked for the government to explain why the Prime Minister voted for a widows tax but has failed to introduce legislation to abolish it. Actually, all we want to understand is whether this government is completely incompetent and didn't realise that they had a widows tax in their legislation or whether they knew that there was a widows tax and yet voted for it anyway. That's what we want to know—incompetent or egregious? What's the answer, Labor? Well, we don't know, because they don't give us the answer.

We also want to know whether the widows tax staying in the legislation is part of the dirty deal with the Greens. Is this the Greens tax that they want to put in? We don't know. We heard this week that Labor's budget wasn't ambitious enough, didn't go far enough and didn't tax the Australian people enough. And here we are. They've rushed through legislation and now they're scrambling to fix it up. They're scrambling to do consultations because the Australian people took one look at it and said, 'That's not okay.' Now they're trying to work out how they're going to make it better. Of course, our position is to scrap the whole thing altogether and start again.

Let's talk a little bit more about this widows tax, because it's not just a tax on widows—

Tammy Tyrrell (Tasmania, Independent) | Link to this | Hansard source

Don't forget about widowers.

Jessica Collins (NSW, Liberal Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

of course—or widowers. Thank you, Labor. Don't forget the widowers.

Karen Grogan (SA, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

It's taken you a couple of weeks to remember.

Jessica Collins (NSW, Liberal Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

I will take that interjection. Did you remember it? Did you know about it? Did you remember it afterwards? What is it, Labor? There are the widows and the widowers, but what about the divorcees? What about them? Is there any kind of consideration for the tax slugs that you're putting on these people? It's absolutely disgraceful. What about the women that are escaping violence? If you want to quickly talk about houses, where are the houses for the vulnerable women and children? Four thousand houses were meant to go to vulnerable women and children. Have they? Nobody can give me the answer on that. And you tut!

Tammy Tyrrell (Tasmania, Independent) | Link to this | Hansard source

I didn't tut.

Jessica Collins (NSW, Liberal Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

You did. I heard you when I was talking about vulnerable women and children. How dare you, Senator Tyrell!

Raff Ciccone (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

It's amazing to see how much this place can change in 12 months since the last federal election. The opposition have now gone through two leaders. Now with Mr Taylor we've seen an opposition in complete freefall because not only he but all his colleagues both here in the Senate and in the other place have an obsession with One Nation and outdoing One Nation. You can see that they are very spooked by the contributions that we have just heard and the contributions that we continue to hear in this place.

Instead of focusing on delivering real cost-of-living measures to help Australians with what they need and want, we have an opposition that is in denial. They are absolutely in denial. They come into this place and say that the government of the day, the Labor government, has not been standing up for workers, ignoring the fact that they have a track record of voting consistently against tax cuts for Australian workers. That is the greatest shame that you are bringing to the Liberal Party brand, if I can give you some free advice. The fact is that they continue to vote against tax cuts, and you do not hear them utter an actual word about that. The fact is the Liberal Party has voted more times against tax cuts in this parliament and in the last than in their entire existence since Menzies formed that great party.

Then we heard words from Senator Hume about being egregious. Well, I'll tell you what is egregious: the Liberal Party is now pandering to the far right. Every single member of the Liberal Party that stands up for preselection and re-election will have to be thinking, 'Jeez, I wish I get the No. 1 spot, because if I'm No. 2 or No. 3, I won't be here in this place any longer.' You can absolutely see that right now.

That's because the Liberal Party—I want to focus on the Liberal Party—have voted, again, against these tax cuts for 13 million Australians. What do you say to those people, like those people in the gallery that you tell us to look at? You are voting against tax cuts for nurses, for retail workers and for hospitality workers—we could keep going on. There are all those workers that we relied on during COVID, the essential workers, the construction workers, and the workers in this building like the cleaners, the security guards and the people who do the Hansard. You're saying, 'No, we don't think you're worthy of having a tax cut.'

Not only that; you went to the last election saying that you would repeal those tax cuts. You said you would repeal those tax cuts, Senator Henderson, and that is a fact—you and all your colleagues, through you, Deputy President. It is on the record that you have an awful track record when it comes to defending Australian workers and actually being on the side of Australian workers. This government has to work in this place, acknowledging that we just don't have the numbers and we have to work with the crossbench to get the best deal that we can for the Australian workers.

Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Shadow Treasurer) | Link to this | Hansard source

You work with the Greens.

Raff Ciccone (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, and the Greens are happily backing Australian workers. You should be ashamed of yourselves. The party that used to be the party of aspiration are now the party on the side who are anti worker, anti the economy, anti productivity.

Slade Brockman (WA, Deputy-President) | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Ciccone, it would be helpful if you directed your remarks through the chair.

Raff Ciccone (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

I will come back to you, through you, Deputy President. What we are seeing now is a collaboration of the three conservative parties in this place and outside. They should be ashamed of themselves for not standing up for— (Time expired)

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

I will come back to the question before the chair, which is taking note of answers given by government ministers to questions asked by the coalition during question time, which I didn't hear much of in the last contribution; you should have been taking notice during question time of what the questions were, Senator. Quite frankly, we don't need advice from Labor, the most dishonest government in living memory, about how we might operate on this side. We're not interested in being a dishonest government like the Labor Party is. No person in this country can believe their words, even when they're conducting their take note responses to the debate on the question before the chair.

We saw the tactics of avoidance again during question time today, when we asked questions about the widows, widowers and divorcee tax—some simple questions about what process the government was going through to mitigate the mess that they've created with something that they didn't know was in the legislation. That has to be the conclusion that we take—that they don't know what they're talking about, what they're legislating or what they're voting for when they come into this chamber.

We've seen it before. We've seen it in other measures. On the firearms legislation, they didn't understand the legislation that they were voting on, which is a real concern because they truncate committee processes. They try to ram things through the chamber without proper scrutiny, and they find things that, understandably, they didn't know were in there because they haven't done the work properly in the consultation for the development of the legislation. They are all about getting the vote done rather than doing the job properly, and therefore they don't properly scrutinise the legislation, and then they vote for things that they don't know about.

When it comes to housing, I've not seen Senator Wong twist herself more than when trying to avoid answering some very simple questions in relation to the number of housing completions, as I saw today. The simple question was: how many houses were completed under the coalition, and how many a year have been completed under the current government? The answer is simple. About 200,000 houses a year were being built under the coalition. Under the wrecking that this government has done to the Australian economy, it's down to 170,000. It's all very well for them to say they have these wonderful aspirations, but only the Labor Party could spend $47 billion on houses and build fewer of them. There's $47 billion more being spent on housing by the Labor Party, and they're building 30,000 fewer houses per year. What an extraordinary record!

Of course, this goes with all their other broken promises. They promised lower housing costs. Well, we know how that's going and how much more people are paying on their mortgages because of Labor's high cost of living and inflation. They promised a lower cost of living. They promised to reduce energy prices by $275. They promised they wouldn't change the tax on superannuation, and then they legislated to do it. They promised they wouldn't change capital gains tax, and then they legislated to do it. They promised they wouldn't change negative gearing, and then they did it. You cannot believe a thing this government says at any point in time because they just don't tell the truth. They deserve the ignominy that the Australian people are directing in their direction.

Question agreed to.

Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by Greens senators today.

Today, the Greens asked the government what it will do about fossil fuel companies gaining access to Australian school kids because a new report from Comms Declare identifies more than 260 fossil fuel linked industry programs, partnerships and sponsorships reaching children and young people right across the country. This is a concerted effort by coal and gas corporations to embed themselves in trusted institutions, funded to the tune of tens of millions of dollars. They're trying to brainwash kids into buying their spin about the climate and their poisonous industry.

Having been a teacher for more than two decades, I find that appalling. Schools should be places where young people learn to think critically, ask questions and follow the evidence. But massive corporations have been allowed to enter Australian classrooms and use them as a platform for their propaganda. Coal and gas are cooking our planet and wrecking our kids' futures, and any honest account of the science would communicate that. It should outrage every parent to learn that there are lesson plans and educational programs being written not by educators and experts but by vested interests and big corporations.

Despite what Senator Walsh would have you believe, Labor has not fully funded public schools. Every single public school outside of the ACT receives less than its share of school funding, and that's 98 per cent of schools across the country. That's why teachers are stretched and are looking for help. But they shouldn't have to rely on corporations with sinister agendas to fill the gap left by Labor's underfunding.

Across regional Australia, communities know this pattern well. Fossil fuel companies put money into local sporting clubs and events in schools and then expect that sponsorship to buy social licence while they pollute, damage First Nations heritage and send enormous profits offshore. We cannot keep letting them get away with it. The Greens are calling for a ban on fossil fuel advertising and sponsorship and a parliamentary inquiry into fossil fuel industry influence in schools and other child centred settings. Students deserve facts, not fossil fuel spin.

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) | Link to this | Hansard source

Flip a coin. Heads—they win. Tails—you lose. That is the story about you and some of Australia's biggest, most profitable mining corporations. While you are paying more for fuel, multibillion-dollar mining companies are not. They are getting a completely free ride with completely tax-free fuel, and that special deal is not available to you. Your government takes your taxes and hands over more and more of your money every year to massively profitable mining corporations to help them burn fossil fuels that are causing climate collapse. Heads—they win. Tails—you lose. Your money goes to big corporations to burn cheap fuel that you don't get access to, which causes climate change, which is pushing up your food costs, which is pushing up your insurance costs and which is increasing the cost of cleaning up after floods and bushfires that are made worse by this entire scam.

Australia's most profitable corporation, BHP, was paid $627 million of your money in just one year. Rio Tinto got $416 million of your money in just one year. They can burn cheaper fuel than you get access to—tax-free fuel that you don't get. This corporate welfare has to end. The billions of dollars that Labor is giving these massively profitable mining corporations should be put into allowing us all to have more of the things that we used to be able to afford. Vote Greens. Heads—you win. Tails—they lose.

Steph Hodgins-May (Victoria, Australian Greens) | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to take note of the Minister for Early Childhood Education's answers to my questions. The minister spoke about the government's leadership in education, but that leadership does not seem to extend to ensuring Australian children are receiving evidence based resources about climate change. Fossil fuel companies are literally embedding themselves in schools, early learning centres, museums and community organisations, seeking to shape how their role in the climate crisis is understood by the very generation that will have to live through it. You can't make this stuff up. We would never let Sportsbet teach financial literacy—although God only knows in this place! We would never—I hope—let Philip Morris write the health curriculum. So why are we letting fossil fuel corporations teach children about climate change? They are not there to educate; they are there to protect and to build their social licence. My message to these companies is simple: get out of our classrooms, get out of our communities. Our children are not your advertising space.

Santos' community grants ask applicants, 'Does this program create awareness and positivity for the Santos brand and recognise Santos' support?' That is not philanthropy; that is PR spin. Through Woodside's sponsorship of the Nippers, children become walking billboards for a fossil fuel company seeking to industrialise Scott Reef. Some uniforms carry Woodside's logo; at the last count, we saw six Woodside logos on one uniform. A child turns up to learn about water safety to build confidence and serve their community, but instead they become part of the fossil fuel companies' marketing strategy. Our children are not their advertising space.

To the government: do not let our children be that advertising space. These corporations are going to do whatever they can to make profits, to conserve their social licence and to stop paying taxes, but it's up to you to stop them. That is the role of government. Woodside does not get to seek public goodwill through children's sport while arguing against measures like a gas export tax that would ensure Australians receive a fair return from our resources. The minister accused me of manufacturing outrage. Parents do not need to manufacture outrage on this, I assure you; they will do that themselves when their child comes home with fossil fuel funded teaching materials. There has to be a hard line, and our children are that hard line. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.