Elizabeth Watson-Brown
Ryan · Australian Greens · Australia
“We terrified the major parties because they knew it was popular and they were going to lose votes if they didn't do something. So they caved. Both Labor and the Liberals committed to 50 cent fares permanently. In 2022, we won bigger taxes on coal corporations in Queensland with the same method. We announced our policy.”
“Labor MPs were sitting around a table with Sportsbet at the Midwinter Ball last night, and this morning they introduced gambling reform designed to appease the gambling lobby. Gambling is a multibillion-dollar industry built off the losses of everyday people. People are losing their livelihoods and their lives over this.”
“This is the motion that Labor just tried to stop me talking about: the need for essential public services to return to public ownership. Instead, Labor replaced it with their own topic. I've never seen this happen before in the entire time I've been here.”
“It's no wonder that they want to stop me talking about it. They don't have the solutions. The real solution is staring us in the face. We have to end 40 years of privatisation and corporate rule. If you're out there in the real world listening to this, I just want to say something.”
“on indulgence I also acknowledge that it's a very good idea that we do have a conversation about this because it's a critical thing. We here on the crossbench are representing our constituents, and we are giving them a voice here in this parliament. Any potential suppression of that is a suppression of the voices of our constituents.”
“That's why I reckon we can win a gas tax, but only if we organise. We know the people in Labor and the major parties are still too close to big corporations to really put everyday people first, so we'll have to replace them. But you know how we replace them? By getting organised.”
The complete record
Every one of 365 lines we hold for Elizabeth Watson-Brown, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 7 of 8.
“Dolphins and seals are washing up dead on the shores of South Australia. This is happening. It's happening now. It's an existential emergency. And what do Labor do? They give an enthusiastic tick of approval to the biggest new fossil fuel project in the Southern Hemisphere. It is beyond cynicism and beyond hypocrisy for the Labor Party to talk up their credentials on renewables and talk about emissions reduction targets only to turn around and approve this monstrosity. Much of this gas is going to be given away largely for free. Next to no tax will be paid on this. It'll create very few jobs. Most of the gas will be for export, and we have enough gas for domestic use already. It's no coincidence that Woodside is a major donor to both parties. Over the last decade, it donated over $1 million to the Labor Party.”
“Within 15 days of being sworn in, this Labor government committed a truly criminal betrayal of the Australian people and of future generations all over the world. Labor approved the extension of the North West Shelf gas project to 2070. This project will produce annual emissions greater than all of Australia's existing coal-fired power plants combined. During the 2025 election campaign, Peter Dutton committed to approving it within 30 days. Labor, eager to perhaps prove its loyalty to the gas corporations, did it in half that time. Disgraceful! There's no doubt we're in a climate crisis. It's everywhere. Every month a new heatwave record is broken somewhere in the world. We've seen historic floods, one after the other, across the country. Record bushfires hit LA in January; now they're smashing Spain and Portugal.”
“I move: That this House: (1) notes that: (a) during the 2025 federal election, the then Leader of the Opposition promised to approve Woodside's North West Shelf gas project in Western Australia within 30 days, and the Government approved it within 15 days of being sworn in; (b) the North West Shelf gas project is estimated to produce annual emissions totalling more than all of Australia's existing coal-fired power plants combined; and (c) the Government has accepted more than $1 million in donations from Woodside since 2014, making them the tenth largest donor over the last decade; and (2) calls on the Government to: (a) cancel the draft approval for Woodside's North West Shelf gas project; (b) implement a moratorium on new coal and gas projects; and (c) commit to addressing corporate influence over our political system.”
“Study after study shows people get trapped in fewer pointless meetings and businesses invest more in genuine labour-saving technologies. But we don't really need those studies; it's just the right thing to do.”
“Everyone else is working their guts out just to get by and to pay their mortgages or rents, their grocery and electricity bills, their child care and school fees, for a music lesson for the kids or for club sport. We're all working longer hours and more overtime with more commute time. Then you're exhausted by the weekend. You can't enjoy the precious time you have with your family and friends, and then the Labor government convenes an economic roundtable with CEOs telling us that we need to be more productive. It's an insult, frankly. Give us a four-day week with no loss of pay. Study after study shows people will be happier, stay in their job longer and have fewer mental health issues. They'll be more productive and take fewer sick days.”
“People can't buy a house; people cannot get ahead. Millions of people struggle to pay their bills and feed their families. It's past time for a tax on billionaires in this country. Put that wealth to good use. Use it to build enough genuinely affordable homes for everyone who needs them, not to buy another luxury yacht. Let me just point out the startling hypocrisy of some of Australia's wealthiest people lecturing Australians about productivity. Australians, the business establishment says you are not being productive enough. I say they're making you work too much. It's time for a four-day week with no loss of pay. Life is for living, not just working. Over the past decade, profits have gone up 97 per cent and wages have gone up 50 per cent. Big corporations are having a great time—a bonanza.”
“The world's billionaires increased their wealth by $6.5 trillion over the last decade—enough to end world poverty several times over. Here, in Australia, we have the glory of doubling the number of billionaires in the country over the last decade. It doesn't seem to matter who is in government; the absolutely mega rich just get richer. Over the past decade, under Labor and the coalition, the total wealth of Australia's richest 200 people has more than doubled; it's now at $667.8 billion. Under Labor and the coalition, the average rich-lister now has 116,000 times the wealth of someone in the bottom 50 per cent. The wealth of that bottom 50 per cent of Australians has flatlined over the last decade. Since I started speaking, billionaires in this country have increased their wealth by about $95,000.”
“They will mobilise their millions of corporate dollars to distract you with fear campaigns and smear campaigns. They tried all of this with Mamdani, but when people get together and organise, when they stand up for what is right and when they realise that they can demand more of their government, they can beat all of that. That is what 'Mamdani' means. This last election, in Australia, we stopped Dutton. People rejected Trumpian politics, but the Labor government is banking on people thinking we can't demand more. Mamdani shows that we can, because the stakes are high. Economic inequality is out of control and getting worse. Have I gone mad? When did we decide that billionaires' wealth should surge while millions of people can't pay their rent or buy a house?”
“Mamdani proves people can demand more and win. Freezing the rent—this idea just won in New York. Fast, free buses—this idea just won in New York. Cheaper groceries with government owned stores—this idea just won in New York. Universal free child care, giving everyone a living wage and taxing big corporations and the wealthiest one per cent—these ideas just won in New York when Zohran Mamdani won the NYC mayoral democratic primaries. And you know what? They'll win here in Australia too, because these ideas will benefit the overwhelming majority of people. They would make everyone's lives better. The political establishment and big corporations will do everything they can to stop this. They'll tell you it's impossible; they'll tell you that it's reckless.”
“My question is to the Prime Minister. Your government has placed more than 14,000 sanctions against Russian individuals and entities as well as sanctioning trade with Russia for their invasion of Ukraine. Netanyahu's genocidal assault on Palestine now means that more than two million people are at critical risk of starvation. Will you commit to applying equivalent sanctions to Israel as you imposed on Russia?”
“My question is to the Minister for Resources. Australia is the world's second biggest exporter of global emissions after Russia. Last week the International Court of Justice made it clear that Australia has international legal responsibility for its fossil fuel production, regardless of where the coal or gas is ultimately burned. Will the government stand up to coal and gas corporations and phase out these dangerous fossil fuels that are supercharging the climate crisis?”
“Your debt goes up with inflation each year. There's no reason this debt needs to be indexed. This is a choice Labor have made—a choice to not properly tax gas corporations but to keep your debt rising. There's no reason a uni degree should put you in debt in the first place. Labor used to support free university. Labor have also chosen not to reverse the outrageous fee hikes from Scott Morrison. Labor were happy to talk a big game about this in opposition. They opposed the legislation and said it was creating 'an Americanised higher education system characterised by high levels of private debt', but they're not touching it now they are in government. We have the Morrison-era fee hikes on top of an incredibly unfair student debt system, plus several years of indexation.”
“Instead of taxing our mining corporations, we make students and graduates fork out—in some cases for the rest of their lives. Those fossil fuel corporations are also taxing us all in another way, worsening the climate crisis. Why is this happening? Labor takes millions in donations from gas corporations. Woodside is their 10th biggest donor, and Labor literally had them in the room when they were writing reforms to the PRRT a few years ago. It's no surprise then that while students get fee hikes, Labor's mates, the gas corporations, get tax breaks. Some maths. Let's say you had a $30,000 student debt in 2022; since Labor came to power it would have gone up to $33,454. Labor's HECS reduction takes it down to around $27,000. Within a few years it will be back at $30,000. That's because Labor have actively chosen to keep indexing your debt.”
“It's an essential investment in our country's future. Our tax system is so broken that HECS collects four times as much revenue as the royalties from giant multinational oil and gas companies, and that's the PRRT. Students should not be paying four times more tax than gas companies. In 2023-24, students paid a collective $5.1 billion. In stark contrast, the PRRT raised only $1.1 billion, which is a comparative pittance for an industry that's sudsidised by taxpayers and generating $70 billion in revenue. You might say, 'Well, they pay income tax,' but so do students. Students collectively pay much more income tax and GST than the gas industry. Norway taxes its fossil fuel corporations properly and is able to offer free university, a life free of student debt.”
“They introduced a flat fee at first, which was then refined by the Howard government into tiers depending on how much they thought you could theoretically earn from your degree. If you ended up going into a different field, too bad. Then there was the Morrison era's utterly shameful—shameful!—Job-ready Graduates scheme, which caused huge fee hikes for some degrees, saddling young people with tens of thousands in debt that many will carry for their whole lives. It's not immaterial. It's deducted from your income in this cost-of-living crisis and affects your ability to buy a home, as if buying a home isn't difficult enough at the moment. But there is a better way. Germany, Austria, Finland and countries all around the world know there is a better way, as we did back in the seventies. It is possible to make university free again.”
“Labor is clearly not the party of Gough Whitlam anymore. I'd love to imagine today's Labor Party doing something as groundbreaking as making university free. In 1974, I was one of the very first to benefit from Whitlam's free university reforms. It's no exaggeration to say that it had a huge impact on my life and many others. There was a really striking difference between our cohort and the previous year. The previous year were clearly comparatively privileged families who could afford uni fees. Our year represented a real cross-section of Australian society, opening up higher education to many who could not access it before. The transformative effect of that on Australia is still being felt. The Hawke Labor government ended free university in 1989.”
“I'm sorry—a state committing a genocide is not a friend. Labor finally says it supports an end to the conflict and calls Israel's actions indefensible but has not stopped arms exports to Israel. They have not sanctioned them like we've sanctioned Russia for their invasion of Ukraine. It's not a conflict; it's a genocide. Our Labor government should call it what it is and take every possible action to stop it.”
“Let's call it what it is—a genocide. It's a genocide when half a million people are on the brink of starvation with almost the entire population of Gaza experiencing acute food insecurity. It's a genocide when they're massacring starving people lining up for food. It's a genocide when hospitals are treating children with wounds from sniper rifles. It's a genocide when the Israeli defence minister talks about forcing all Palestinians in Gaza into an internment zone along the southern border. It's a genocide when the Israeli finance minister said that Gaza will be totally destroyed. We have a duty under international law to prevent genocide. Our refusal to act will be a stain on this nation's history. When it's a genocide, you don't just say, 'We can't possibly do anything about this.' Labor still calls Israel a friend and an ally.”
“I don't think it's too much to ask that corporations who profit from exploiting Australia should pay tax in Australia—that corporations like gas companies, making obscene profits exporting our resources, should pay royalties on that gas and pay corporate tax on their income. There is an alternative. Tax the big corporations to fund real cost-of-living relief so that we can see a GP for free, wipe student debt, put dental and mental health into Medicare and build affordable housing.”
“You get a coffee a week; fossil fuel corporations get almost $56 billion in subsidies. You get a coffee a week; property investors get $176 billion in tax handouts. You get a coffee a week; nuclear submarines get $375 billion over the next 10 years. You get a coffee a week; gas corporations get billions in tax exemptions, paying even less tax than previous years. You get a coffee a week; the salmon industry gets laws rewritten so they can profit hugely while killing off a species. That's what cost-of-living relief looks like under Labor and the Liberal and National parties. They'll promise teensy tax relief in 15 months time. Meanwhile, multinationals have had huge tax exemptions for decades.”
“Nuclear reactors rely on water to cool them, meaning they're vulnerable to droughts and even water that is simply too hot to cool the reactor, as they experienced in France. Coastal reactors are vulnerable to—get this; it sounds crazy—swarms of jellyfish clogging up their intake pipes because the acidification of the oceans due to climate change has turbocharged the jellyfish numbers. This has caused plant shutdowns across the globe, from Scotland to Japan to California. Perhaps most importantly, the coalition's plan in the intervening decades before they could theoretically get nuclear going is to delay renewables and keep us reliant on ageing, expensive coal and gas infrastructure that's cooking our planet.”
“Even if we did get it, it would be six per cent of our energy needs and, as the most expensive form of energy, drive up our power bill enormously. In the real-world scenario, this just never happens. Perhaps the Leader of the Opposition knows this and is just wanting to play politics with our energy transition. The best case scenario is that in 25 years we have six per cent of our energy covered by an incredibly expensive energy source, and we've completely turbocharged climate change in the meantime. Nuclear sounds too good to be true, right? That's because it is. Nuclear is not only not as reliable as it has been touted to be by those trying to sell us this pup but is also not immune to the effects of climate change.”
“The Leader of the Opposition reckons we'll get nuclear by 2035 and that it will cost $331 billion. In the real world, however, where—hopefully—most of us reside and which it seems the LNP are increasingly detached from, nuclear in Australia will start hitting our grid only by sometime around 2050. And the cost? Triple the coalition's optimistic assessment up to $993 billion. In the real world this just ain't gonna happen. It's a pipedream. But let's say, for the sake of argument, it goes ahead: we get nuclear by 2050, while in the intervening period we will have screwed up our chance to transition to 100 per cent renewables because their plan involves delaying renewables construction and relying on ageing, expensive coal and gas in the interim.”
“The UK's Hinkley Point C nuclear energy facility—mentioned by the previous member—is costing three times more than promised and running 14 years late. In the US, there's a seven-year delay and double the cost for the Vogtle unit 3 plant in Georgia. They have essentially stopped building new nuclear plants in the US because it's just not stacking up for the government or for private investors. So, nuclear—when do we get it? The short answer is never. The Flamanville 3 station in France had a 12-year delay and quadruple the initial cost estimate. The UK's Hinkley Point C reactor had a 14-year delay and triple the cost. The Vogtle unit 3 plant in the US had a seven-year delay and double the cost. These are all countries with an existing nuclear industry.”
“The coalition wants you to believe nuclear is a magic solution that will solve both our climate and our energy woes. Here's why they're wrong: nuclear is the most expensive form of energy generation. Renewables—wind and solar backed by storage—are the cheapest, followed by coal, then gas, then by pricy nuclear. This is according to the CSIRO, whose analysis does include the cost of transition infrastructure. Nuclear plants take decades to build. Construction of new plants is frequently delayed, such as in France, where their recent Flamanville 3 reactor came online after a 12-year delay and quadruple the amount of the initial cost estimate. That's a country with an already well-established nuclear industry.”
“Apparently one of the residents asked if anyone wanted to help out over the apartment intercom. Someone had a ute, so they came down and filled up three loads for their neighbours. It was this amazing community spirit that was brought out in this disaster. This is climate change. We are living it. The science is clear: climate change is causing warmer oceans, which in turn, means more frequent high-intensity rain events, more frequent floods, and it means more intense cyclones that are fuelled by warmer waters, as my colleague from Griffith just outlined. These weather events are directly fuelled by the major parties approving more coal and gas mines that will continue to warm our planet and our oceans. That is a disaster, and we need to deal with that disaster right now.”
“But he heard that our volunteers were able to get sandbags to him, so he came back to Brisbane to place them around his property and protect the entrances to his house. There are countless other stories like that. My office alone responded to about 100 call-out requests. Some of them are still happening. We're helping with the clean-up to this day. That simply would not have been possible if the community hadn't mobilised so well during this time. There were incredible shows of solidarity as well. One example is of a woman who came back, after celebrating Iftar with her family, to give all of the volunteers sandbagging at Toowong homemade fried rice to thank them. People were so grateful. A group 30 people from a nearby apartment block came and sandbagged together.”
“Their efforts, and the efforts of other volunteers from the community, reduced the wait time from several hours down to around 30 minutes, because we got organised there. Many of those volunteers there were doing 10- or 12-hour shifts, multiple days on end. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of people in Brisbane who got sandbags thanks to the efforts of those volunteers. We also coordinated deliveries of sandbags to those who couldn't otherwise get them. I was really struck by the story of one man who lives along Moggill Creek, and who was flooded in 2022. He left his property in Brisbane a few days before the cyclone was predicted to hit—and we had more warning this time—resigned to the fact that his property would inevitably be flooded again.”
“We all pulled together, as did all of my Greens colleagues in the various adjoining seats across Brisbane. We all pulled together and helped wherever we could. We must keep working together as a community for a better future—not just cleaning up the mess, but actually striving to stop these messes happening. Let me tell you what actually happened during Cyclone Alfred. While both the Leader of the Opposition and the Prime Minister were at fundraisers in Sydney, we were on the ground in the community. I'm so incredibly grateful for everyone who helped out down at the Toowong temporary sandbagging depot. My colleague from Brisbane was there. We were able to mobilise many Greens volunteers down there for the whole time that that sandbagging depot was open. They weren't just there for the photo-op.”
“How many more times will they show up for a press conference as the floodwaters recede, patting people on the back like they're in it with us. That is just a slap in the face. That is offensive—shaking broken people's hands with their right hand, while taking fossil fuel donations with the left. It's outrageous—fitting in an SES visit between corporate lunches and new gas approvals. How many times will we have to pick up the pieces again before this government stops supporting coal and gas? We've had it. While the major party turns up the heat time and again, the community has to pull together to help each other. This year, again, that amazing and marvellous community spirit, borne out of the of the adversity of '74 and continuing unbroken, helped weather those storms. My amazing team and I helped thousands of people in Ryan.”
“That was the year of the first big Brisbane flood in generations, and there have been too many since: in 2011, when I was looking after my aged parents; in 2022; and now, just weeks ago, in 2025. Each of these floods brings their own challenges. The 2022 flood was during that election year, and now, in another election year, we have just experienced another devastating climate event. It's not a natural disaster. It should be considered an extremely unnatural disaster. We're tired. We're over it. We have to rally each time something like this happens, and it's the community that has to carry the burden of it. We knew 51 years ago that climate change was making floods worse. We knew it. What will it take for politicians to get it?”
“It produces PTSD every time we have reports that we might have another climate disaster event coming, every time that rain starts pouring down. I'm not only one in Brisbane who experiences that. In '74 it wasn't the last time that we smelt that Brisbane River mud and saw the devastation. This deep appreciation of the power of nature and the importance of climate on life in Brisbane has really been one of the drivers for me in my previous career and in this new one. Fifty-one years ago, in the face of unprecedented disaster, neighbours became friends and worked together to weather the storm. We know that, unfortunately, that '74 flood was just the beginning.”
“There have been four devastating floods in my lifetime, and it is exhausting. In 1974, much of the UQ campus went under, and in every riverfront suburb people shovelled out the mud, threw out their furniture and possessions, and started the heartbreaking process of cleaning up, repairing and rebuilding. We architecture students were dispatched—this was our first project in architecture—with clipboards to record housing type, construction materials, flood depth and observable physical damage. I went straight to an area in my electorate called Fig Tree Pocket to smell the mud, to talk to people and to see the terrible damage. What we registered, beyond the physical damage, was the personal damage, the loss and the heartbreak that such catastrophic climate events can week. It was devastating and it has stayed with me.”
“It's 2025 and here we are again—can you believe it? I realised, to my horror, last year that it was exactly 50 years since I started uni in 1974. That was certainly a big year for Brisbane and for me personally. I started studying at University of Queensland that year. The Brisbane River had flooded the week before we were meant to start university. It was the first huge Brisbane River flood that I witnessed in my lifetime and I remember it like it was yesterday. I remember just how devastating that flood was for all of Brisbane but especially for my electorate of Ryan. It was truly devastating, and the memory lingers. Those memories have lingered a long time, and little did I know then that, as devastated and exhausted as we were, we would need to experience that over and over again—three more times so far in my life.”
“My question is to the Prime Minister. Australia's biggest environmental organisation, the Australian Conservation Foundation, said that your gutting of environment laws with the coalition today is a sellout and 'means nature is more poorly protected at the end of the Albanese government's three-year term than it was at the start of it'. Prime Minister, was the environment better protected under Scott Morrison than you, and why has your government sold out the climate and environment?”
“The lawsuit alleges at least 735 violations of the US Clean Water Act over the last five years, including discharging 'blood, sea lice, disease, and undisclosed chemicals from delousing boats and barges', exceeding limits on effluents and nutrient buildup, and reporting violations.”
“It's controlled by foreign owned corporations. It was acquired by Canadian salmon producer Cooke Aquaculture in 2022. Cooke is not pure. Cooke has a history of environmental controversies. In 2017 hundreds of thousands of fish escaped one of its net pens in Washington state. This escape caused such significant environmental damage that Washington not only ceased Cooke's operations but also banned the entire industry there. In fact, net pen farming has been banned across all of the west coast of the US and Canada. Cooke is currently the subject of a lawsuit in Maine, where it operates 13 locations.”
“Is this really what Australians want—to be taken for a ride, yet again, by for-profit industries that have the government and their coalition cronies by the you-know-whats? It's not just salmon. These laws have far-reaching consequences beyond the salmon industry, creating massive loopholes for other environmentally damaging industries—loopholes big enough to drive a coal truck through. These loopholes for the other environmentally damaging industries allow coal and gas to proliferate, to keep on polluting. This is a trojan horse for that, and we should all be alarmed. Here are some facts about the foreign owned corporations—toxic, polluting multinationals—Labor and the coalition are bending over backwards for and buddying up with to protect with this bill. So-called Tassal, Tasmanian Salmon, is not in fact owned by Tasmanians.”
“Labor promised to protect our environment, and they were actually elected on that promise. Clearly, that's a hollow promise now. They have just capitulated, yet again, to industry. This is for the second time in as many months. Last month they withdrew their proposed EPA at the behest of the Western Australian mining lobby; it just took a phone call from the Western Australian Premier. That EPA, which in reality was only going to enforce existing laws, was hardly a radical proposal. This time, they're bowing to the salmon-farming industry, an industry that's polluting our waterways and sending an ancient species to extinction—a foreign owned industry that, by the way, pays no tax.”
“Well, we're noticing. Labor's hoping that you didn't notice this bill. Under the cover of the budget they've just introduced some of the most environmentally destructive laws I've seen in this place, and, sadly, there have been a lot of them. As the ACF said just today, this actually means that our environment laws are weaker than they were when Labor took office. They're weaker than under the coalition. The Prime Minister has done a deal—this happens way too often—with the Leader of the Opposition and the coalition to ram these destructive laws through in this last sitting week of the 47th Parliament. They think they can get away with it. They think they can do this under the cover of darkness. No—we're not going to let them. Australians deserve political leaders who keep their promises.”
“There is one week left before parliament dissolves, and this is how the Labor government wants to spend it—not on expanding free GP visits, cutting student debt or things that will actually help the citizens of Australia but teaming up with the Liberal and National parties to rush through environment-wrecking 'reforms', special carve-outs for multinational corporations in the salmon industry, making it, by the way, easier to approve new coal and gas. I hope everyone watching this remembers the priorities of the major parties. Are they working for the people who elected them? They're clearly working for the corporations that fund their campaigns, and they're relying on people being too distracted—so hammered and so busy trying to scrape enough cash together to see the doctor or pay the rent or just survive—to actually notice.”
“I welcome that the opposition backed the government's announcement yesterday, but still Mr Dutton doesn't want to talk about abortion access. He's told his people to stop talking about the issue, but that doesn't fix the issues of affordability or accessibility. A Dutton minority government could send us back to the Dark Ages, bringing with it the potential for Trump style restrictions on reproductive rights in Australia. We cannot afford that. Women's health care must always be a priority, and the Greens will help to keep fighting for”
“The Greens want to work with Labor in a minority government after the election and deliver critical progress for women's health care. I'm pleased that the PBS changes take effect on 1 March, but why did the other elements have to wait until after the election? The menopause assessment, the menopause national awareness campaign and more endometriosis clinics have to wait till post-election. The government's announcement did nothing to address the affordability and accessibility of surgical abortions. There are still abortion deserts right across Australia, especially in rural and regional areas. Women are having to travel hundreds of kilometres and paying thousands to get this time bound health care. It should be provided in public hospitals. The Greens will continue pushing for comprehensive healthcare access for all women.”
“The Greens-initiated inquiries and the persistent pressure from women across Australia have finally led to the government listing more modern contraceptive pills and some menopausal hormone therapies on the PBS. The Greens have already announced costed policies that would completely remove the financial burden for women and make all contraceptives free, as they are in France, Ireland and Sweden, and costed policies to make all MHT free, as it is in parts of Canada—and it's heavily subsidised in the UK. There are 4.8 million women in Australia using contraceptives, and making them free would save women hundreds of dollars a year and empower women to make decisions about bodily autonomy despite a difficult financial climate.”
“We also know that too many small businesses are struggling right now in the wake of the pandemic and with high inflation and interest rates. These important employers of so many Australians need some extra support. Extending the instant asset write-off will give small businesses the certainty that they need, as the member for Warringah mentioned, to invest in their businesses, which will have flow-on effects for their customers, workers, the communities they're based in and, indeed, the whole Australian community.”
“I rise to speak in support of the member for Warringah's amendment to the Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Incentives and Integrity) Bill 2024. The Greens support increasing and extending the instant asset write-off, which allows small businesses to claim an immediate deduction for the business portion of the cost of an asset in the year the asset is first used. The Greens understand how important small businesses are to our communities and the broader economy. I very much understand this myself from deep and long-term personal experience. For half a century, I was a director of my own practice and of small and then medium businesses. Small businesses make a huge contribution to Australian society and the economy.”
“He said it is 'shrewd', 'reasonable'. He says Trump is 'a big thinker' who brings gravitas to the Middle East. This is the politics of the modern coalition under its leader—although 'modern' is clearly a misnomer—a rapacious oligarch politics that doesn't care one bit about human lives, only profits. The modern Labor Party—well, radio silence sadly from our Prime Minister. If the Liberal-National coalition is hell-bent on bringing this Trumpian politics to Australia, legitimising it, supporting it, then we need to oppose it, not stay silent. The billionaires and big corporations already have far too much power in this country, too much influence over our major parties. Instead of giving them more power, we have to fight to get them out of politics.”
“Now, with a minority parliament likely, the Greens want to finish the job and get dental into Medicare for everyone. Back to billionaires and their influence over politics, we have seen a preview of what can happen here over in the US—the Riviera of the Middle East, with the US taking over the entire Gaza Strip against the will of its population and the forced displacement of millions of Palestinians so that property developers can build luxury hotels in Gaza. This is what you get when billionaires take control—bald-faced, self-serving, criminal. Of course this is the kind of plan Donald Trump, a billionaire developer, would come up with. Trump's top advisor on the Middle East, Steve Witkoff—can you believe this—is also a billionaire property developer, and what does the Leader of the Opposition here in Australia call this madness?”
“Australians aged 15 and up have on average 11 decayed, filled or missing teeth, and 32 per cent have untreated decay. In 2024, Australian billionaires' wealth surged by $24 billion—that is, $67,000 an hour each or 1,300 times the average wage. Millions of Australian adults would have difficulty covering a $200 emergency dental bill. Putting dental into Medicare would cost about $15 billion a year according to the Parliamentary Budget Office. It is not nothing, but, by taxing billionaires who are rapidly increasing their wealth, we can easily cover this. The Greens got dental cover for kids into Medicare in 2010 when we were in the balance of power. This is what is known as the Child Dental Benefits Schedule and it is hugely beneficial.”
“We could scrap the $368 billion we are giving massive US arms manufacturing corporations to build nuclear submarines we don't need. We could scrap the $14 billion going to fossil fuel corporations every year—every year!—in tax breaks. Big corporations and billionaires are making big bucks, while ordinary Australians struggle to pay for basic dental check-ups. Let's break this down a bit more. Oxfam predicts there will be at least five trillionaires by 2035. Sixty per cent of Australians have skipped seeing the dentist due to the cost. The wealth of Australia's richest person, Gina Rinehart, has doubled since the pandemic. In 2022-23, there were 87,410 preventable hospitalisations due to dental issues across Australia yet 204 people became billionaires in 2024—that is, nearly four a week.”