Kate Chaney
Curtin · Independent · Australia
“Digital platforms will have a legal responsibility to prevent harm, but the design of this commitment matters enormously, and I want to flag three things that the government must get right. First, there must be a single overarching duty.”
“The government gave stakeholders representing millions of Australians affected by gambling harm a single 45-minute consultation session on the exposure draft, with written submissions due the next day. Emeritus Professor Mike Daube, who took part in that session, described it afterwards as a charade.”
“A doctor who uses the phone, internet, fax, email or video conferencing to provide lawful VAD care risks prosecution and fines greater than $300,000. This means seriously ill patients must attend every consultation in person, travelling long distances while gravely unwell, often more than once, to make and confirm their request.”
“I rise to present a petition signed by more than 13,000 Australians. The petition has been considered by the Petitions Committee and found to be in order. It calls on this House to amend the Criminal Code Act so that it no longer applies to voluntary assisted dying, VAD.”
“She lived in one half of a single house divided into two separate dwellings. She got on well with the quiet single working man next door. This particular morning she was devastated and in shock. The man had hung himself in the shed where she found him, and left a note listing all the people he owed money to including the amounts.”
“No avenue to call up customer service at these companies and request this person be denied an account. Our nightmare never ends. There's nowhere to help us. The only option presented seems to dissolve the marriage and the family.”
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“Tomorrow marks 1,000 days since Peta Murphy, the former member for Dunkley, introduced the You win some, you lose more report into the parliament and reported that to an empty room. No action on gambling reform has happened from the government in the 1,000 days since then, and I am devastated about it. During that committee inquiry we heard about 45 hours of evidence from people whose lives were being destroyed by gambling. There is broad public support for gambling reform, yet there has been radio silence from the government. We can only conclude that that is because the government is listening to the money and the power more than to the people of Australia.”
“The government must take an active approach, because we must ensure that Australian voices are determining our future, not big tech.”
“Finally, we must start planning for the most significant future risks. There are some very dramatic predictions about how AI could change our workforce, society and economy. These may or may not come to pass but, with the speed of AI, we can't afford to wait for them to happen before thinking about how we might respond. Even if the likelihood of some of these scenarios is low, the consequences are so significant that we need to be prepared. A large chunk of the workforce could become unemployable. Economic value could be concentrated in a small number of companies across a wide range of industries, and our tax bases could be undermined. All of these shocks would require a government intervention, and it would take time to build the social licence needed. What is clear is that this hands-off approach is not good enough.”
“The institute has a significant responsibility in monitoring risks from AI and working with policymakers and regulators to manage them. Yet funding for our AI Safety Institute is about one-sixteenth of comparable efforts in the UK. It needs more funding. It also needs to be protected from the bureaucracy of the standard Public Service so it can move nimbly and independently. The government should also consider giving the institute more powers to gather information so it can effectively monitor the AI risk landscape. Another no-regrets policy is investing in an AI-ready workforce, from university training to mid-career transition pathways and deepening international collaboration with trusted partners on standard safety and governance. These investments will never be wasted.”
“We should ensure our regulators have the technical expertise to identify and disrupt AI powered scams. We must also start to develop policy to manage AI enabled disinformation campaigns, particularly during elections. On the opportunity side, AI's potential in science and research is already clear. Australia should be investing heavily here. The government has already committed more than $360 million through existing programs. That's a strong foundation, but it must be clearly directed towards AI powered research, and it must be scaled up. Second, we should pursue no-regrets policies, policies about our future that make sense regardless of how AI ultimately develops. Strengthening the AI Safety Institute is an obvious one.”
“Perhaps today's excitement will amount to little more than a generation of very effective chatbots. But, globally, there's an incredible amount of capital riding on the bet that the impact of AI will be much greater than that. We should be shaping our own future. At present, many of the most consequential decisions are being made by the tech oligarchs on the other side of the world. We must seize the reins. So how do we do this? First, we must deal with the risks and opportunities that already exist. We're already seeing real harms from AI: psychological distress from chatbot interactions, sophisticated AI-enabled scams and fraud at scale. A sensible starting point is a digital duty of care, requiring platforms to take reasonable steps to prevent foreseeable harm. This must extend to include AI chatbots.”
“There was little ambition in relation to capturing AI's upside and limited reassurance on safety. While I commend the establishment of the AI Safety Institute, the plan did not offer much of a sense of preparedness for the future. The underlying message felt like, 'Let's sit back and see how this develops.' That approach is also reflected in investment. Australia is not investing much in AI compared to other countries. Over the last five years, Canada has invested six times more than us in AI. Singapore has invested 15 times more than us. The UK and Germany have both invested three times more than us per capita. To be fair, part of this tentative approach reflects genuine uncertainty. No-one knows exactly how powerful AI will become or how quickly.”
“At its heart, this motion speaks to the government's current hands-off approach to artificial intelligence. AI is already reshaping economies, labour markets and the information environment, and, while its ultimate trajectory remains uncertain, the scale of potential change is enormous. Yet, despite this, Australia has done remarkably little strategic thinking about what this transformation means for our economy, our institutions and our society. That gap was apparent in the government's long-awaited national AI plan. It set out three worthy objectives: capturing the opportunities, spreading the benefits and keeping Australians safe. But, beyond that, its 37 pages largely collated existing announcements. Somehow both the techno-optimists and the techno-pessimists walked away dissatisfied.”
“We've pushed for legislation because the evidence was clear a voluntary framework is not enough. This bill reflects that evidence, and it reflects the overwhelming consensus from the medical community, consumer groups and, importantly, the insurance industry itself. This is what good evidence based policymaking looks like. Schedule 1 is a sensible, proportionate reform that strengthens privacy, supports public health and removes the barrier to early diagnosis and prevention. It shows that when parliament listens carefully, works collaboratively and follows the evidence, we can deliver reforms that make a real difference to people's lives. I commend the government for bringing this forward, and I commend schedule 1 of the bill to the House.”
“It allows insurers to continue to rely on clinically diagnosed conditions and family medical history, but draws a firm line around predictive genetic information which reflects risk rather than illness. Just as importantly, it gives people certainty that choosing to undertake genetic testing will not jeopardise their access to financial security. This reform matters, because fear of insurance discrimination has been preventing people from accessing potentially life-saving genetic testing and participating in medical research. No-one should have to choose between protecting their health and protecting their financial future. Many of us on the crossbench have been raising this issue for some time through letters to government, questions in parliament and collaboration with health experts, researchers and consumer advocates.”
“I rise today to speak to schedule 1 of the Treasury Laws Amendment (Genetic Testing Protections in Life Insurance and Other Measures) Bill 2025. I want to begin by acknowledging the work that's gone into bringing this bill before the parliament. This is an area that has been discussed, consulted on and called for over many years, and I welcome the fact that we're now delivering clear, legislated protections for Australians. Schedule 1 bans life insurers from requesting or using a person's genetic test results when making decisions about life insurance. It replaces a voluntary industry moratorium with a clear legal rule, backed by enforcement and review.”
“These are practical steps that can help the nurse at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital, the apprentice in Innaloo, the downsizer in Subiaco and the young family in Doubleview stay connected to the communities that they love. I urge the government to meet this moment with courage so more Australians can get into housing they can afford. Debate adjourned.”
“We should also make it easier and safer to rent out spare bedrooms by simplifying tax settings and providing a standard, fair agreement. Even modest uptake in Curtin could add capacity quickly for a student, a midwife on night shift or an apprentice needing somewhere close to work. These four measures share three things in common. They use existing levers, they respect local communities and they sequence changes sensibly. These build on the measures I've already discussed in the House, reforming property taxes, building more social and affordable housing, allowing more medium-density supply and strengthening renter protections. The point is that we need to pull all these levers at once.”
“Resequencing marginal infrastructure is basic capacity management. It reduces cost pressures, frees up workers for housing and gets more homes finished sooner. Third, stamp duty locks people into homes that no longer suit them. It penalises downsizers, discourages mobility and strands spare bedrooms. The Curtin housing policy supports a gradual transition to a broad based land tax, with federal support to help states manage that shift. Do it slowly and transparently, but start it now. Every year we delay, more households remain mismatched to their homes while affordability worsens. Finally, the fastest, lowest-carbon housing supply is the supply we already have. A modest vacant-home levy or higher rates for long-term vacancies could encourage more homes back into use.”
“With that in mind, here are four more steps the government should take now. First, labour shortages are the handbrake on housing delivery. You can rezone and approve forever, but, without more workers, completions won't rise. We should prioritise construction trades in migration, fast track skills recognition and align training places with real project pipelines through a time-limited construction workforce compact tied to housing output. This is targeted capacity building, not open-ended migration, and should wind up as supply catches up. Second, in tight labour markets, government infrastructure projects can unintentionally outbid housing projects for the same carpenters and sparkies and concreters. For the next 18 to 24 months, residential construction should take priority over lower value infrastructure projects.”
“If we're serious about fixing this, we need clarity about what each lever can and cannot do and, importantly, what else can be done. In this House a fortnight ago, I set out four practical ideas from my community to help ease the housing crunch, and today I'm adding another four drawn from the Curtin housing policy I developed with residents and housing experts. None is a single fix, but together they are achievable, fair and evidence based. They require governments to work together rather than passing the buck. As context, in Curtin we have about 7,000 vacant homes and about 29,000 homes with two or more spare bedrooms, while essential workers and young families are priced out of the communities they serve. People want practical actions that activate the homes we already have while unlocking capacity to build more.”
“On tax settings, I agree changes to capital gains tax and negative gearing won't on their own build extra dwellings, but they can help level the playing field so first homebuyers are not consistently outbid by tax-advantaged investors, and I continue to urge the government to reform these property taxes for the benefit of younger Australians. We should be honest that Australia's housing crisis was allowed to develop across successive governments, as both sides of politics realised that they were popular when house prices went up, at least with the two-thirds of households that were owned. For the other third, owning a house became increasingly out of reach. Houses have increasingly become vehicles to passively store and grow wealth rather than places to live.”
“I share the member for Fadden's concern that expanding the five per cent deposit scheme has added pressure to an already overheated market, increasing competition and exposing first homebuyers, particularly young Australians, to larger mortgages. While the Housing Australia Future Fund is well intentioned, it's moving too slowly to deliver the social and affordable rental homes Australians urgently need. Two years in, the $10 billion fund has delivered fewer than 900 completed homes, roughly two per cent of its 40,000 home goal; although there is much activity still in the pipeline.”
“Pursuant to standing order 113, at the request of the member for Indi, I fix Monday 25 May 2026 as the day for presenting the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Strengthening Communications in Natural Disasters) Bill 2026.”
“My question is, how is the minister ensuring that public money will be used in the NAIF early enough to crowd in public private funds rather than replace them?”
“I just have a question for the minister about the investment mandate and return expectations for the NAIF and other SIVs. The NAIF plays a really important part in our decarbonisation journey, and I support it. I've heard some concerns from the clean energy industry about the risk appetite built into the investment mandate and that return expectations that are set near commercial levels can cause SIVs like the NAIF to compete with private capital for low-risk projects rather than catalysing investment in high-public-benefit, long-term decarbonisation projects. If public money is replacing private capital, then it's not a good use of public money, and SIVs should operate where there's market failure, not where markets could efficiently deliver the same result.”
“At the same time, the government granted Alcoa a national interest exemption from federal environmental laws allowing clearing for a further 18 months. Historically, this power has only been used for emergency safety works or urgent species protection, not commercial considerations, and this sets a troubling precedent. We've seen too often in WA how legacy mining approvals fail to keep pace with modern environmental standards. The reality is that jarrah ecosystems have never been successfully rehabilitated after mining. I urge the government to take a rigorous, transparent approach to the strategic assessment process. Before any approvals are granted, we must show that Alcoa's operations can be properly prevented— (Time expired)”
“The Northern Jarrah Forest is one of WA's most precious landscapes. It supports threatened species and significant waterways and holds deep cultural significance for Aboriginal communities. Its economic, cultural, social and environmental value cannot be overstated. Alcoa has mined bauxite here for more than 60 years, but recent developments deserve scrutiny. The government's announcement that Alcoa will pay $55 million for habitat clearing between 2019 and 2025 may sound significant, but it equates to just $27,000 per hectare, well below comparable undertakings for similar harm. Equally concerning is that no remediation order was imposed, despite findings that Alcoa unlawfully destroyed protected habitat over years. When I met with Minister Watt last week, I did not receive a clear explanation for this omission.”
“In relation to the safeguards the minister has put forward, I don't think the safeguards listed address any of the issues I've raised. A number of them relate to a different class of people, people who are in Australia. We're talking about people who are actually not in Australia and safeguards for that group. You mentioned that the determination should be tabled, but it's not disallowable, so there's no actual scrutiny that comes with its being tabled. Requiring that the order be remade after six months is effectively the same as extending it. And saying that exemptions may be made for individuals because there is a provision in there that says the minister doesn't have to consider any applications for those exemptions doesn't create a right or a safeguard.”
“It does not limit the minister's ability to refuse a certificate; it simply requires the minister to turn their mind to a request when one is formally made. This is a basic requirement of procedural fairness in the rule of law. Lastly, under the bill, when a determination is lifted a visa comes back into effect, yet it may already have expired during the suspension period. My amendment would effectively pause the visa clock for the duration of the determination. In closing, these amendments do not undermine the purpose of the bill. They strengthen it by ensuring that any extraordinary powers are exercised with fairness. I urge the government to adopt these improvements.”
“Under the bill as drafted, these people are not exempt, and their visas can be suspended, stranding them abroad despite being part of an applicant's immediate family structure. My amendment expands the exemption to parents, siblings and step equivalents, aligning it with family definitions used in refugee, humanitarian and protection visa pathways, where we recognise that families are not always confined to the nuclear model. Fifthly, section 84D(8) is an extraordinary provision. It states explicitly that the minister has no duty to even consider whether to issue a permitted travel certificate, even when someone has formally applied. This doesn't merely preserve discretion; it nullifies the right to apply altogether. My amendment removes this clause.”
“As drafted, the trigger could encompass almost anything: diplomatic tensions, economic instability or foreign policy shifts. This is far too open ended. My amendment narrows the definition to the scenarios the provision is plainly designed for: conflicts, natural disasters and major global events that genuinely threaten the integrity of Australia's migration system. This introduces a necessary and proportionate boundary, ensuring the power is not invoked on an excessively broad or subjective basis. Fourthly, the bill exempts spouses, de facto partners and dependent children from arrival control determinations but stops there. This creates a troubling gap. Consider a person whose elderly parent depends on them for care, or an adult sibling who is the sole remaining family connection in a crisis situation.”
“These determinations operate as legislative instruments with the full force of the law. The idea that such decisions should be entirely insulated from parliamentary scrutiny is inconsistent with the basic principles of responsible government. My amendment restores disallowance. This does not impede swift action. Determinations take effect immediately, but it ensures parliament retains the ability to review and, if necessary, overturn them after the fact. That's entirely appropriate for powers of this scale. Thirdly, the phrase 'event or circumstance' is the legal trigger for one of the most coercive powers in the migration system—the power to suspend visas on a broad class basis—yet the bill offers no definition of this phrase.”
“My amendment removes this speculative limb and retains only the stronger, more principled threshold: would the visa have been granted had the current circumstances been known at the time? This is a more defensible standard. It ensures the power is used in genuine cases where the event is significant enough to change our temporary visa decisions. Broad overstay risk predictions are notoriously unreliable and can easily become a pretext for restricting travel from particular regions. A higher bar protects against this. Secondly, the bill removes parliamentary disallowance for arrival control determinations. This means parliament would have no capacity to overturn an instrument that effectively suspends the rights of thousands of visa holders. That represents a profound concentration of executive power.”
“But, while the objective may be sound, the drafting of this bill has been rushed, has avoided scrutiny and carries a real risk of unintended consequences. Powers of this magnitude need careful calibration, not sweeping discretions that may undermine fairness or trust in the system. In the 24 hours since I first saw this bill, I've prepared a series of amendments to tighten safeguards and improve accountability, and I'll address each of these in turn. Firstly, as drafted, the bill allows the minister to restrict arrivals based on nothing more than a risk that a visa holder might overstay. This is an extremely low bar. Almost any unpredictable overseas development could be framed as an overstay risk, creating the potential for travel bans with little concrete evidence.”
“(4) Schedule 1, item 6, page 7 (line 6), after "de facto partner", insert ", parent, sibling or step equivalent". (5) Schedule 1, item 6, page 8 (lines 18 to 21), omit subsection 84D(8). (6) Schedule 1, item 6, page 9 (lines 21 and 22), omit "at a particular time during the visa period for the visa if, at that time", substitute "if". (7) Schedule 1, item 6, page 9 (after line 28), after subsection 84E(2), insert: (2A) If a temporary visa held by a non-citizen comes into effect again because of subsection (2), the visa is extended by a period equal to the period for which it ceased to be in effect under subsection (1). I rise to speak on the Migration Amendment (2026 Measures No. 1) Bill. I acknowledge the intent behind it. We all want a migration system that's sustainable, responsive to global events and respectful of human rights.”
“by leave—I move: (1) Schedule 1, item 6, page 4 (lines 23 to 32), omit paragraph 84B(2)(b), substitute: (b) if the event or circumstance had occurred, or had been occurring, at the time non-citizens of a kind to whom the determination is to apply were to make an application for a temporary visa, the visa may not have been granted; and (2) Schedule 1, item 6, page 6 (lines 8 to 13), omit subsection 84B(13). (3) Schedule 1, item 6, page 6 (after line 13), at the end of section 84B, add: (14) In this section: event or circumstance means a conflict, natural disaster or significant emergency which increases or is likely to increase the risk that certain classes of temporary visa holders will not depart Australia when their visas cease to be in effect.”
“We keep the budget on a sustainable path by prioritising prevention, by raising revenue fairly, by reducing tax concessions that no longer serve their intended purpose and by considering well-designed levies where the public interest is clear. That is how we protect the next generation's opportunities, how we give people in Curtin and across Australia confidence that their parliament can deliver practical progress, clear priorities and long-term responsibility at the same time.”
“Now, there is much to consider before implementation of these proposals, but they do show that there are options out there for long-term budget repair while supporting outcomes such as intergenerational equity and the clean energy transition. Appropriations are ultimately about choices: how we invest scarce public dollars to ease cost-of-living pressures now, build the productive capacity of the economy and honour our obligations to each other, especially to the young and to the vulnerable. There is much in these bills and in MYEFO that helps: cheaper home batteries that cut bills and emissions, a serious expansion of youth mental health care and a housing package focused on first home buyers. But we must also be honest about our long-term fiscal pressures.”
“Finally, there are a number of potential future sources of revenue for the government. The Superpower Institute, for example, has recently put forward two concepts. First is a polluter-pays levy on the carbon content of fossil fuels extracted or imported for use in Australia. This would cover around 140 sites, accounting for roughly 80 per cent of emissions, while raising an average of $22 billion per year to 2050, with a substantial share recycled back to households. Secondly, they've suggested a fair-share levy on superprofits in the gas sector, raising an average of $13 billion per year, largely borne by offshore foreign shareholders and designed not to raise domestic gas prices. Together, these two levies are estimated to raise $35 billion per year on average between 2026 and 2050.”
“Several independent proposals recommend requiring that the rebates for the largest companies be used for decarbonisation, turning a blunt subsidy for wealthy companies into a driver for decarbonisation without impacting farmers or small operators. There's also been noise about the capital gains tax discount. The CGT discount costs the government about $22 billion per year, while negative gearing costs about $6 billion. These are expensive schemes that in large part support wealthy investors in housing. These two concessions do play an important role in our economy, but there is appetite for reform which could increase budget sustainability and support first home buyers. My community of Curtin is supportive of reform despite receiving a lot of benefits from these tax concessions.”
“We also need to properly consider the cost of future natural disasters in our budget projections and find sustainable ways of supporting recovery efforts. These problems are going to worsen, and we need to be ready. To find other ways to balance the books, there are a number of expensive programs that the government could consider reforming. The Fuel Tax Credit Scheme costs the budget roughly $11 billion per year, with the top 15 claimants alone receiving about $2.9 billion in 2023-24. These top 15 claimants are often multibillion-dollar companies, and yet they continue to receive nearly $3 billion in rebates every year, incentivising them to burn more fossil fuels.”
“This is just one example of the way the government could consider investing in long-term preventive solutions to support the long-term sustainability of the budget. There's a lot to be said for investing in prevention in a wide range of areas. Climate change is another obvious one. The government now spends an average of $1.6 billion each year on disaster recovery, but each year forecasts that it will only spend $215 million in the following year. Apparently, each year we're again surprised by the scale and scope of natural disasters, and this is only going to worsen. We need to invest in the net zero transition at home and build momentum abroad to limit the growing impact of disasters on our communities, environment and budget.”
“The Victorian Department of Treasury and Finance is trialling the use of the Early Intervention Investment Framework, a policy proposal assessment framework that's used to calculate and bank not just upfront costs and expected outcomes but also an estimate of the avoided cost to the government from the reduction in the use of acute services. This has allowed support to be provided for programs that may have struggled to get up otherwise, such as the Journey to Social Inclusion initiative, which has reduced homelessness by 90 per cent and hospital bed stays by 60 per cent in the intervention group. When considering the second-round fiscal effects, this program is cost negative. It saves more money than it costs.”
“This means that social intervention programs that may drastically reduce costs to the healthcare system or judicial system down the road cannot consider these benefits in their costings because they exist in different departments and are considered second-round fiscal effects. Now, while this policy is designed to ensure costings are conservative and well-evidenced, the government should be investigating ways to prioritise prevention and early intervention over treatment for long-term sustainability in our social services and healthcare systems.”
“As soon as any politician puts a potential spending cut or new tax on the table, they're open to attack, but we need to have these hard conversations. There are a few areas that I would put forward for consideration to improve long-term effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability of our spending. Firstly, we need to prioritise prevention over treatment. Particularly in social services and health care, investment in prevention can reap significant savings in treatment. There are some practical improvements that could support a greater focus on sustainability. Currently, Treasury costings exclude consideration of second-round fiscal effects and do not consider impacts across portfolios.”
“Further, while this mid-year budget reduces debt as a percentage of GDP during the four years of the forward estimates, it increases debt as a percentage of GDP over a 10-year horizon. It's yet another example of short-term political decision-making that we see so often in politics. As usual, governments would prefer policies that look good in the forward estimates, even if they make our spending problems worse over the long-term, simply because people primarily look at the forward estimates. With inflation rising and a continually growing national debt, it's increasingly important that the government makes decisions for long-term budget sustainability. Now, it's easy to call for budget sustainability but much harder to actually talk about where you would cut spending.”
“I also acknowledge specific steps to restrain spending efficiency and reprioritisation across the Australian Public Service, including a drive to reduce spending on consultants, contractors and other non-wage costs; attempts to improve the sustainability of the NDIS, including through the Thriving Kids initiative; and introducing reforms to the aged-care system to improve sustainability, including through means-tested copayments for independence and everyday supports. But even with improvements in the forward estimates, the long-term outlook still shows upward pressure from defence, aged care, health, the NDIS and disaster recovery, and government spending is at 26.9 per cent of GDP, the highest level since 1988 outside of the pandemic.”
“On the big picture, the government is right to point out that this MYEFO improves the bottom line in every year of the forward estimates, reduces gross debt in each year and delivers net savings from policy decisions. The 2025-26 deficit is now estimated to be $36.8 billion, about $5.4 billion better than before the election. These are non-trivial improvements and they deserve credit.”
“Housing is the other major pressure on household budgets and productivity. I support the government's plan to invest $10 billion to deliver up to 100,000 homes reserved for first home buyers. But ambition must meet delivery, and, while the government's rhetoric on housing has been good, house prices continue to rise and the affordability crisis continues to worsen. I would encourage the government to look at the 15 policy ideas surfaced by my community in our Curtin Housing Policy and be bolder on this issue. At UWA's orientation day recently, housing again came up as the No. 1 concern for first years on their first day of university. There are other programs in MYEFO and the appropriations bill that I support, including investments in the net zero plan, CSIRO, and vital skills for the construction and energy sectors.”
“I welcome this expansion and support continued cost-effective investment in reducing energy bills and reducing emissions. Second, I welcome the government's $1.1 billion investment in mental health care. This continues to be a neglected, yet increasingly important, problem in society. Mental ill-health is now the leading health and social threat to young people worldwide, yet mental health receives roughly two per cent of health budgets globally. This is not enough, given the size of the threat. My Curtin Youth Advisory Groups from the past four years have all reiterated the importance of appropriate supports for young people experiencing mental health challenges. For this reason, I support the government's investment in mental health care, and I hope that it continues.”
“As well as reducing energy bills, batteries and rooftop solar reduce emissions and can stabilise our energy grid. They play an essential role in our net zero transition. At my Curtin's Pathway to Net Zero—Progress Report event a few weeks ago, we heard from a constituent and a neighbour of mine, Chris Johnson, about his solar journey from a tiny PV system 18 years ago to an updated one with a battery. He now lives in a zero-emissions household, charging his EV with sunlight and paying little more than his connection fee for electricity. He's one of nearly 1,500 Curtin constituents who have taken advantage of the Cheaper Home Batteries Program. The government has expanded this program in response to unexpectedly high take-up. This bill enacts the expansion from an estimated $2.3 billion to $7.2 billion over the forward estimates.”
“I welcome the expanded Cheaper Home Batteries Program, which is doing exactly what it set out to do: reducing the upfront-cost barrier, so more households and small businesses can store their rooftop solar energy, cut bills and reduce emissions at the same time. Australia is already a world leader on solar. We have more than 4.2 million rooftop solar installations—more than a third of all households. We have more rooftop solar panels per person than any other country on Earth. On average, rooftop solar panels save Australian households about $1,500 every year. With a battery alongside solar panels, bill savings nearly double. A household with solar and batteries could save up to $2,300 a year. Often, bills will be reduced to zero.”
“I rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2025-2026 and its companion bills. These appropriations give effect to the government's expenditure decisions since the 2025-26 budget, including measures announced in the 2025-26 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook, or MYEFO. In this speech, I want to cover three things: first, to acknowledge a number of important and effective programs that deserve recognition; second, to offer some cautions about the risk of excessive, ineffective or opaque future spending; and, third, to suggest practical ways to raise revenue fairly and to improve the quality of our budget decisions. Firstly, I'll cover important programs worth supporting.”
“My question is for the Treasurer. My constituents are deeply concerned about how artificial intelligence is reshaping our economy and society. Our National AI Plan adopts a largely hands-off posture and leaves all risks up to an AI safety institute with one-sixteenth of the annual funding of its UK counterpart. Comparable nations are moving faster to set clear standards, support innovation and manage risks. Will the upcoming budget include further investment in AI opportunities and safety to ensure Australians, rather than overseas tech companies, shape our future?”