Rowan Holzberger
Forde · Australian Labor Party · Australia
“… … … "Right at the beginning, it was thought that there was an intrusion in the relationship between the doctor and their patient," AMA president Tony Bartone said. … … … At the time Medicare was introduced in 1984, the AMA was heavily influenced by developments in the United Kingdom, particularly the National Health Service.”
“During my preparation for my contribution tonight I came across an article written in 2019, at the death of Bob Hawke, by ABC journalist Norman Hermant, and I'd like to read out a bit from it. The article was titled, 'Before Bob Hawke's Medicare, a visit to hospital forced many Australians into bankruptcy'.”
“My dad met my mum in Mount Isa, and I was born in Brisbane and grew up in Broken Hill, so I'm not sure where that quite places me. I've always actually believed regional Australia should have its own state. The cities could have one state, and regional Australia could have another state—anyway.”
“Mrs Buckingham's quote on thinking twice about going to see the doctor is something that all of us in our electorates have faced and heard about from people who told us that they would choose to put food on the table and feed their kids rather than see the doctor.”
“I think that will go some way to addressing some of those shortages; 17,000 doctors is a shot in the arm to the health system. Finally, the member for Riverina talked about the NDIS, kicking the proverbial out of us.”
“Even though they gave up, I think some time after the 1993 election, realising that they couldn't do what John Howard said and stab it in the stomach, they went around and tried to stab it in the back.”
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“Finally, on disability, yet again, it took a Labor government to introduce the NDIS, and it's going to take a Labor government to fix it, because all of those problems that we saw exist in 2018 as the NDIS began to grow scaled up with the NDIS as the NDIS scaled up in itself. Problems that could have been dealt with easily in 2018 have been left to this government to deal with now, where they going to cause much more anxiety in the community than they would have if they were dealt with at the time. Again, it takes a Labor government to make tough decisions. But, with a Labor heart, they are decisions which are grounded in what's best for the community, and I think that the government's record on health is an excellent one.”
“We have in aged care one of the biggest demographic problems that an Australian society has ever faced. I don't know the numbers exactly, but these are the rough approximates to make the point. Something like 10,000 people turned 80 in 2010. This year, something like 90,000 people are turning 80, and we're going to have that number again and again and again over the next 15 years or so. This is a cohort of people that have worked hard for this country and that deserve to have good, decent aged care. I think that, with the decisions that the government has taken to see those waiting lists starting to come down in terms of assessments and the waiting lists coming down in terms of packages being funded, we are seeing some real progress there—again, founded in Labor values.”
“But I have never, in all the time that I've been a participant or an observer of Australian politics, seen a policy have such an immediate and positive impact as the tripling of the bulk-billing rates for doctors who bulk-bill. Overnight in November in the electorate I represent, Forde, the number of bulk-billing clinics more than doubled from nine to 21. It is something which is on top of a commitment to provide cheaper medicines. It is something that is on a commitment to spend more money for the PBS to fund all of the medicines which the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee suggests need to be funded. These are tough decisions that the government needs to make to be able to afford these things which benefit the whole community. Of course, it's not just in healthcare. As I said, it is in aged care and disability care as well.”
“The other thing I would say is that the philosophy of the Albanese government really, I think, is summed up by two things I've heard the Prime Minister say recently. One is that nobody is left behind and nobody is held back. But he also said, a lot more eloquently than I'm going to say now, 'When you come across a problem in policy, do you just throw your hands up and say, "There's nothing I can do about it? I'm only the Prime Minister."' And so I think it is in healthcare, in aged care and in disability care that we see a government that is prepared to make the tough decisions but makes them through Labor values, which are about making sure that our community is looked after and always kept front in mind. The decision was a tough one. It cost a lot of money to fix bulk-billing.”
“That's because it is the Labor Party and only the Labor Party and this government that really has the values which Australian people want, which is why they consistently vote for parties that that defend that defend Medicare. It is inherent in the values of the Labor Party and inherent in the values of this government. And there are two things I'd like to say on that. One is no matter how hard workers fight on the shop floor for wages and conditions, which is something that they can achieve, there are some things that you need control of the government in order to be able to deliver for your community, and having control of the government to deliver good, affordable healthcare is one of those things.”
“I would like to address a couple of things there immediately. I have five minutes to be able to talk about the government's record on health, but it's almost impossible. But I would just like to say a couple of things there. One is that the government is investing $25 billion extra in public hospitals to take the pressure off the public hospital system. The speaker before me mentioned a figure of $1,600. If you're paying $100 for a shower when you're on an aged care package, which is what some people are doing at the moment, it takes 16 showers for that $1,600 bucks to be used up. And so the government's decision to move showers from independent living into clinical care will actually save an enormous amount of money for not just pensioners but also self-funded retirees who desperately need that clinical care.”
“It's a fact they don't like to talk about, but, if you look at the last 20 years, if you retrospectively applied a system of indexation, most people would have actually done the same or better out of an index system. I urge people to support this. I urge the opposition to have another think about this. I would hope that all their shenanigans in trying to refer it to a committee is because they haven't properly settled on a position, but, when they do, I urge them and the others in the House to support this bill.”
“I implore them not to, for the sake of the community. You hear them talking about other things, like the member for Wide Bay mentioning that this is going to hurt people that are saving up, using shares as a strategy to save a deposit for a house, because a house is unaffordable for them, so shares become the only strategy. The irony in that is obvious to me, so I don't know why those on the other side keep bringing that up. The irony is that house prices have got so out of control that the only way that you can use the 10 grand that you might have disposable, which you can't now invest in a house deposit—you say you have to put it in shares. That irony is obviously missed on them, but the economics is also missed on them.”
“I credit that as the single biggest mistake they made on the other side. I can't believe it. Not only are they prepared to make that mistake again by not supporting the tax cuts in this legislation—are they seriously going to go to the next election promising to give tax breaks to property investors? I'm not sure they've really thought that through. In two years time, are all of the people, all of the first home buyers who are already starting to be advantaged by this policy—all of the people that can actually start to see this dream becoming a reality again—really going to vote for a party that is promising to bring in tax breaks for property investors? I don't know. I don't know. I hope so, because I think it's going to cost them a lot of votes. I hope so, I guess, for my benefit—not to be selfish.”
“At the same time, we are dealing with the other part of that equation—how much workers take home in their pocket. In some ways, the argument has been settled around housing, and it is very difficult now to hear cogent arguments from the other side about housing. They generally leave that alone, which I think is interesting for them, because they're creating a long-term problem for themselves again. There are many reasons, including the good policies that we had, but the one mistake that the other side made was when the now opposition leader said that they would repeal our tax cut on the eve of the election. That was the moment where I actually thought: 'You know what? I've got a chance in Forde.' I just thought it was political as well as economic craziness to take that policy to the election.”
“Today, we've seen, again, because of this government supporting a rises for minimum wages, take-home pay increase by 4.75 per cent for minimum-wage earners, which means, that since this government came to power, wages have gone up by $12,000 a year for minimum-income workers. That is a 12 per cent real wage increase. On top of that, it is not just how much people are earning but how much people are able to pocket. Once the measures contained in this bill that build on the tax cuts over the last few years are in place, the average worker's income tax cut will be about $2,816 compared to 2023. We are doing two things. We are trying to take the heat out of the housing market. As the Prime Minister says, we expect prices to continue to rise but at a moderate level.”
“You know it when you sit down, like I did over the weekend, with a 65-year-old woman whose lease is about to run out in three months time and who is desperate to find somewhere for her and her 13-year-old dog to go and live. It's broken when you look at the numbers. It's broken when you talk to talk to people. The underlying philosophy of this government is 'no more'. The status quo is not good enough. These measures deal with the taxation treatments around housing as an investment, but they also deal with the other part of that problem—rising house prices compared to median wages, which is take-home pay.”
“It has become absolutely impossible for people to think about buying a home anymore. What we've seen as a result is homeownership rates, which were, for decades, steady around that 72 to 73 per cent of the population, fall to around 66 per cent of the population today. When you look at that age cohort between 25 and 45, they have gone completely off a cliff. It is not good enough. We know it in our electorate. People are hurting. I think the Prime Minister really summed it up well the other day when he said, 'It's hard to buy a house,' and there was an interjector from the other side who said, 'It's getting harder,' and the Prime Minister seized on that and said, 'Yes, it is getting harder.' There is a recognition in this government that the status quo is broken. We know it in our communities. You know it when you look at the numbers.”
“It enacted a policy to keep the cost of medicines down, with PBS medicines at $25. I learned today that, had that policy not been in place, people would be paying $50 for those medicines. It takes tough decisions. This money really just doesn't come from anywhere. This money has been directed to the priorities of this Labor government, but it's meant that we have needed to make tough decisions in the process. And so it is that the measures around negative gearing and around the capital gains tax are designed to attack that particular problem where housing has become an investment vehicle rather than a family home, as we've seen since the capital gains tax discount at 50 per cent flat came in. We've seen values of housing rise of multiples of about four or five times the median wage to eight to 10 times the median wage.”
“We saw it under the Howard government, and it even further decelerated under the Abbott, Morrison and Turnbull governments, where they built something like 373 houses over the 10 years that they were in government. We saw—surprise, surprise!—a housing crisis 30 years later. So, while the measures in these bills will not go immediately towards fixing the central problem for first home buyers today, which is that wages have not kept up with housing, it sits within the government's wider housing strategy, and, frankly, it sits within the government's wider philosophy of just not accepting a broken status quo. Look at health care, where the government, through one policy alone, tripled the bulk-billing rate, which more than doubled the number of bulk-billing clinics in Forde overnight back in November.”
“You saw car workers and railway workers and teachers and police officers and aged-care workers all living in public housing because it was actually part of the economic design of our system that you had public housing in order to keep the pressure off wages and to help business. That's one of the reasons we had a strong manufacturing industry. If you look at the suburb of Elizabeth, public housing is built around the old Holden plant there because it was absolutely part of the charter of the South Australian Housing Trust to aid in the economic development of the state. We have seen over the last 30 years a complete rejection of those old Liberal Party values and a rejection of those Labor Party values.”
“I believe strongly that there is no greater productivity measure that a government can take than to provide affordable housing. That's why I think in postwar Australia what we saw was an investment in public housing from both Labor and Liberal governments, I've got to say. Both Labor and Liberal governments believed that by investing in public housing, not just for the people that were desperately in need of housing but for workers, we were able to keep the cost of living down. We were able to keep rents down. As a result, we were able to keep the pressure off wages, and that actually helped business as well.”
“That is going to be solved through the implementation of the most ambitious housing program that we have seen for generations—a $47-or-so billion investment to fix public housing, to create the infrastructure needed to build housing and to encourage incentives for first home buyers, such as a five per cent deposit. It is measures contained within the whole of government's housing policy, which is designed to deal with the supply problem, which will ultimately fix the housing problems. But they will mean nothing if all we are doing is creating supply for investors to just buy up existing homes. Long before I got elected to this place, long before I even thought about running in the 2022 election, housing had very much been my No. 1 priority.”
“I think it is exactly that sort of attitude that Paul Keating used to describe when he talked about the coalition as presiding over the Rip Van Winkle years, where the country just goes to sleep but slowly falls apart as the rest of the world leaves us behind. It takes a Labor government to really implement Labor values, which are about improving the economic conditions of working-class Australians. The thing that I also note about this budget is that it is very much where tax policy and housing policy come together. It is absolutely a statement of the blindingly obvious to say that. The two bills here really deal with housing and taxation, particularly the relationship between housing and taxation. The measures in these bills are not going to solve the housing problem on their own.”
“In fact, I think what this budget does more than any single act of this government is really demonstrate that at the heart of the philosophy of this government sits a rejection of the status quo. The public has had enough. The public is not going to put up with a broken system anymore, and it takes a government with guts to do something about it. I think the philosophy of this government was summed up in two things that the Prime Minister said recently. One was 'nobody held back and nobody left behind', but the other thing that he said, which really struck a chord with me—and he said it much more eloquently than I'm going to be able to say it—was: If you come across a broken system, what do you do? Do you just throw your hands up in the air and say, 'I wish I could do something about it, but I'm only the Prime Minister'?”
“I rise in support of the Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Bill 2026—which I learned today is affectionately known as TLAB—and the Income Tax Rates Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Bill 2026. In doing so, I acknowledge the work of my neighbour the Treasurer, the member for Rankin, who has led the Labor government's economic team to deliver a truly Labor budget and a budget which is aimed well and truly at the people that that the Treasurer and I represent in Logan and the people that that you represent as well, Deputy Speaker Claydon. It is a budget which speaks absolutely to the aspiration of working-class people, who have for too long seen their wages go backwards, their taxes go up, and the great Australian dream of owning their own home disappear under, effectively, 30 years of coalition government.”
“Let's make this work for the people that it was intended for. Let's make the whole system work for the people who won't be on the NDIS. To that, I commend the bill to this House.”
“Thriving Kids, for example, which the government has made a significant commitment to—and I do also hope that the Queensland government gets its act together and puts something in place—is going to tackle the problem that exists in the electorate I represent. Take the suburb of Eagleby. One in seven kids between the ages of nine and 14 is on the NDIS. One in seven kids is totally unsustainable. It's absolutely unworkable if it's going to be maintained at those sorts of numbers. I call on the opposition. I really believe that you are going to end up supporting this. I know that, quite rightly, you want to make sure that this legislation is properly examined—absolutely. But outright opposition to this legislation will, I think, mean the collapse of the NDIS. The public have had enough. We all know that the status quo is just not on.”
“The NDIA caved and gave her the dog. So many times, we see that the reports and the diagnosis that people get and then provide to the NDIS bear absolutely no relationship to the plan that they get at the end of it. I have heard from serious sources within the NDIA as well that that is true. There is no correlation between somebody's diagnosis and somebody's reports and the plan that they end up getting at the end of it. There is a lot of work to do, and there is a lot of concern in the community at the moment that this is about throwing people off the NDIS into nothing. As far as I'm concerned, nothing could be further from the truth. This is about stabilising the NDIS for people who it is meant to be for, but it is also about expanding the supports that exist outside the NDIS.”
“There was somebody who had come to us for help. She was trying to get an assistance dog for her child. The agency approved $5,000 in specialist reports. They approved another $2,000 on top of that for support coordination to get those reports together to see whether or not the child would benefit from having a dog. The report said, yes, the child would benefit from having a dog. She gave those reports to the NDIA, and what do you reckon happened? The NDIA refused the dog. So there she was—stuck in a system, going through the reviews, going through the ART. I remember when it was, because it was during COVID. After a year of fighting for this dog, she was about to go into the hearing. The night before the hearing—this is why I remember when it was—she'd had a COVID test in order to show that she was able to go to the hearing the next day.”
“Her concern before Christmas was that if she didn't get the funding to be able to put him in this specialist childcare centre then she wouldn't be able to work. She'd have to leave her job. Because she would have to leave her job, she wouldn't be able to pay her rent. She was concerned that she was going to be sleeping in the car with her severely disabled child—and you know what? That's exactly what happened over Christmas. She didn't get the funding, she lost her job and she spent time sleeping in her car with her severely disabled child. The question is whether the NDIS should be funding that or if there is a failure in the wider system that means that she is trying to jump onto the NDIS because it's the only thing available. The dysfunction of the NDIS—I think I'll finish with this story. I remember this from a couple of years ago.”
“But, of course, it's not just little Phoenix. We've all got a million stories, and there are a couple more that I'd like to talk about. One is about a mum called Alex and her young child, Hunter, who I think is four years old. When she first met me, before Christmas last year, she was desperate to get funding so that she could put him into a specialist childcare centre that would take a special-needs kid. When she sat there meeting me, he was climbing over her, biting her and hitting her. It was difficult enough for her to have the meeting with me, but I can't imagine what it must be like for her as a single mum trying to do all this on her own—trying to fight the NDIS at the same time as trying to get the supports she needs.”
“But you wouldn't know any of this if you met Phoenix. I got to meet him on Saturday. For just the smile on his face, it was such a privilege for me to have met him. But, at the moment, Rebecca can't get an electric wheelchair through the NDIS. She has been fighting for months to get this wheelchair. She's got a second-hand wheelchair, and, when Phoenix sits in it, his arms are literally scraping against the wheels, and he's got blisters on the inside of his elbows. He's got blisters on his little arms because the only wheelchair she can find for him to get about in is totally inappropriate for him. If the scheme was designed for anybody, it was designed for Phoenix. Rebecca having to fight through this system to get what Phoenix needs is exhibit A for why we need fundamental change in the NDIS.”
“He is just the happiest, most charismatic little kid that I've ever met. Despite the fact that he was born with spina bifida, they thought he would live a perfectly full and active life. But he had complications when he was a baby, and it got to the point where the illness in his brain was so severe that the doctors basically decided they couldn't operate. In fact, the advice to the mother was, effectively, to just let him die. No mother is going to put up with that news, and so she fought. In Queensland you're able to invoke something called Ryan's Rule, where you get a second opinion, and she did that. She got a second opinion and she found a doctor who would operate. It saved his life, but unfortunately it left little Phoenix unable to walk, unable to talk and unable to even roll over.”
“These are figures which I saw some years ago, probably about 2022 or 2023, but, in Forde, we've got about 8,000 people on the NDIS, and there are other electorates in Queensland where there are about half that number. If there are 8,000 people actually on the NDIS, that means there are probably another 8,000 people who really need services that would otherwise be provided if the NDIS weren't there. The idea that the NDIS should be the only lifeboat in the ocean is the reason why it has crashed, effectively; everyone has tried to scramble on board because it is the only thing available. On Friday, I got an email, and then I called Rebecca. She's the mum of a two-year-old, Phoenix, with spina bifida. By the way, if you ever met Phoenix, you would see what a perfect little child he is.”
“But I'll say what I've been saying for years, which is that the NDIS is not made for my son. The only reason he has even gone through the process, the very expensive and really quite awful process, of being diagnosed is that there are no supports that exist outside the NDIS anymore. That is what is underlying all of the changes to the NDIS. Nobody listening to my contribution should think that it is just about throwing people off the NDIS into nothing. That is absolutely not something that I would support. As part of this, I am going to be continuing to fight to see those supports established outside the NDIS for people that the scheme wasn't designed for.”
“I really implore the coalition to look inside themselves and see the importance of supporting this bill. If this bill doesn't get through, if we don't make the changes that need to be made to the NDIS, we know that the support in the community for it is going to collapse and then therefore the entire scheme will collapse. That's quite apart from the fact that the NDIS is, as it is, completely unworkable for the public, for the providers and also for the participants who rely on it. We all know that. As good local members, we all have a million stories. I have, I think, an even deeper appreciation than a lot of people because of my son, who is an adult autistic human being. He's just recently been diagnosed as level 2 autistic, which means that he is now automatically eligible for inclusion on the NDIS.”
“I'm actually glad I've had a bit of a chance to reflect on my contribution last night, which was critical of the coalition. I had sat through the member for Parkes's contribution and was surprised to hear that the coalition's position seems to be hardening against this bill, the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026. If debate is worth anything in this place, I make a direct appeal to those opposite to support this bill because it is so important that we get this right. I know that there is a lot of goodwill across both sides of the House to make this work. So, in a way, I regret my contribution because we shouldn't be politicising this issue. This is an issue which is of deep importance and deep concern in our communities.”
“Thirty per cent of those workers went and got a good job; 30 per cent of those workers went and found precarious employment—casual employment, on reduced hours; and 30 per cent of those employees never worked again. So this government's not going to accept the status quo. We're going to do something about it. Unbelievably, we are already seeing results. We are seeing first home buyers, over just two weekends in, who are able to compete against investors, as they aren't using the money that they were getting from taxpayers to prop up their bids. Already we're seeing results. It might have taken us 40 years to get into this mess, but we don't have 40 years to fix it. And so I commend the bill to this House, as part of the government's strategy to fix things up for— (Time expired)”
“It is only the Labor Party that recognises the problem that exists and is determined to do something about it, whether that be in housing, whether that be in health care, whether that be in mental health, whether that be in child care, whether that be in skills, or whether it be in industry policy. For the first time in so many years, we've got an industry policy. Do you know what free trade meant for working-class people in the communities we represented? I'm reminded of an example—of, I think, the Mitsubishi plant in Lonsdale, in South Australia. When that car plant closed down, they actually did a study of the workers and tracked them over the next few years.”
“Do you just throw your hands up when you come across a 55-year-old woman with a severe disability whose home is going to be sold by the owner, and she's not going to be able to find somewhere to rent, because how do you rent on a disability support pension? Do you just throw your hands up when you talk to working-class trades men and women who are living in two-income households, earning good money, who can't afford to buy a house? Do you just throw your hands up and say: 'We can't do anything about it, I'm sorry; you're just going to have to put up with it as it is'? I tell you what: out there in the electorate—this is something everybody in this room has in common—they are not going to put up with the status quo. The electorate has had enough—that is a message to all of us. But it is only the Labor Party that has taken that message on.”
“When there was investment in public housing, and when there was a tax system that was designed not to reward housing investment as an investment, you saw, at the high point, that homeownership was had by something like 72 or 73 per cent of the population. That has now fallen to about 66 per cent. And, when you look at that 25 to 45 age group, homeownership has completely fallen off a cliff. So, yes, this is contested. Yes, this is a tough decision. But do you just throw your hands up and say, 'We're only the government'? Do you just throw your hands up, or just sit there and nod, when you're talking to a 65-year-old woman whose lease is about to run out in three months' time and who is not going to be able to afford to find somewhere for her and her 13-year-old dog to live?”
“Shouldn't the solution be about bringing that ladder back down so that people can get their foot on the first rung? Really, it is an injustice, and it is an injustice to working class people, particularly. In 2000, when these capital gains tax arrangements were introduced, for somebody on a median income the price of a house was something like four to five times their median income; now, the multiple is eight to 10 times. How is it that house prices have become so completely decoupled from wages? It is people in the electorates that we, especially, in the Labor Party, represent—working-class electorates—that are doing it the toughest.”
“But I'm sure those opposite aren't spending any time talking through the facts with the people that email them. Again, I don't want to single out the member for Mayo, because I know that this is the line that's being trotted out by the opposition—and it is a line. In some of the emails I've got, there has been this concern that they have been using shares to save up their deposit because they, frankly, are not able to get themselves into a leveraged property. The only way to take $10,000 and make it grow is to invest in shares, with a dream, perhaps, of one day buying a house. I totally get that. But there is an extraordinary irony in the statement that you can't get your foot on the first rung of the housing ladder and so therefore you need to invest in shares.”
“To put it in investment terms, this is about trying to get that wild capital growth that we saw of sometimes eight, nine or 10 per cent a year. That's when house prices doubled almost every seven years over the last couple of decades. What we're trying to do is moderate that capital growth and actually bring it back more in line with inflation. Isn't that the whole point? Shouldn't wages and house prices be coupled together? Isn't there something broken in the system when those two things break apart? Let's take the example of five per cent capital growth and three per cent inflation—we wish! Take that example and apply that to marginal rates of tax. In that example, it's pretty easy to see that some people will actually be substantially better off.”
“I explained it to him because he didn't know it was going to be there—because it is in the interest of those on the other side to maintain these mistruths. As the Treasurer said, when you actually look at the impact that this change to indexation will have on shares, if you extrapolate that over the last 20 years, there will be either no change or, in some cases, people will be better off. They would have been better off had there been a system of indexation over the previous 20 years. When I sit down and crunch the numbers with the people that are sending me emails, as I do, there are many scenarios where people who have bought a house or an apartment are going to be better off under indexation. Ultimately, when you do crunch those numbers, what you're trying to see is government moderating capital growth in housing.”
“I've only sat here through the member for Mayo's speech, but I'm sure there's been the same half-truths and misinformation supported and trotted out as in question time. I had a conversation with somebody called Mark last night. He said to me, 'I can't support this budget because I've had a strategy to retire'—he's probably a little bit younger than me, in his 40s—'and that's all gone out the window now.' I said: 'I like to listen; I don't really like to argue and persuade, but can I just try this one out on you? You know the capital gains tax exemption discounts are still going to be there. They're going to be indexed.' He went: 'No. What does that mean?' I said it means that you're going to be able to deduct inflation off the actual capital growth.”
“We work in the aged-care centres. We work as teachers. Working class people build this nation and working class people should have a share in the wealth that's created by this nation. When John Howard became Prime Minister, Australia was one of the most egalitarian countries in the world, yet, 30 years later, we have become one of the most unequal countries in the world. That's why they shouldn't be smirking, because the backlash is going to be severe in their electorates. I think the government acknowledges that tax is the most contested area in this budget, despite the fact that we're about to see the opposition yet again vote against another tax cut. The changes around CGT and negative gearing have created a lot of conversation in the community.”
“I don't know that they really should be smirking at the moment, but they are. I guess that's the sort of attitude that's landed them in the position they're in. It's sad, in a way, to be here in the parliament to watch the demise of the once great Liberal Party, but there it is. Ultimately, it is this status quo that they have implemented over the years, with their ideology of privatisation, economic rationalism and unfettered free trade. This government is tackling the areas of housing, health, mental health, child care, skills, industry, energy, aged care, NDIS and tax. Over four years, this government's agenda has become clear. It is an agenda of sticking up for working class people again, ensuring the services that we all pay for. We dig the stuff out of the ground. We farm the fields. We work in the factories.”
“Having taken an approach—and just remember that the coalition were in government for 20 of the last 30 years—where you leave housing to the private sector and don't invest in public housing, having taken an approach where you leave energy creation to the private sector and don't invested in public energy, it is unsurprising that you end up, 30 years later, with a housing crisis and an energy crisis. I like the way the members opposite are having a little bit of a smirk at me. Is Labor really the enemy at the moment? I think that's what the opposition members need to ask themselves. As they pander to the supporters of One Nation, are they really getting any benefit by attacking us? It's not us coming for you in your seats at the moment. It's not us that are focused on ourselves, like the three parties of the right are.”
“You can throw your hands up in the air and say, 'I'm only the Prime Minister. I'm not going to do anything about,' or you can tackle it head on—be courageous, have the courage of your convictions and make the changes which you believe are going to have an impact. So let's have a look at what that status quo is. The reason why I'm so energised by what the government is doing in this budget is that we have now had decades of an agenda of privatisation, economic rationalism and unfettered free trade, which has seen the working class communities that I represent decimated in many ways. Whole industries have been decimated. The textile and clothing industry is gone, after decades of unfettered free trade. The manufacturing industry is on the ropes.”
“Fundamentally, what has become clear to me—and this is something which I have been keenly urging the government on, and the Labor Party, frankly, for many years—is that this is a government which is challenging the status quo. There was an interjection today—forgive me for not remembering the member's electorate. The Prime Minister said, 'It's hard to buy a house,' and the coalition member yelled out, 'And it's getting harder!' The Prime Minister seized on that and said, yes, it is getting harder. This is a government which doesn't shy away from the fact that the status quo is not delivering for the Australian people and the Australian community. He doesn't shy away from the fact that people are doing it tough and that in many ways people feel like it's getting even harder, and not just in housing. There are two ways to tackle that.”
“After a year in this place and after my first budget, it's time to reflect on the philosophy of this government, which, after four years, has become clear. The Prime Minister sums it up when he says his core philosophy is no-one left behind and no-one held back. He really summed up his approach the other day, acknowledging that this is a tough decision. He knows that this is well and truly contested in the community. But he said that if you see something wrong—he said it a bit more eloquently than I'm quoting him—do you just throw your hands in the air and say, 'I can't do anything about it? I'm only the Prime Minister'?”
“To Les Williams, to the assistant minister and to everybody who has helped with this legislation, to see what is at least anecdotally having an impact, all power to you and all power to this legislation. And for the sake of the mums and dads and sole traders who live in Forde, I commend the bill to the House.”
“In Melbourne, one manufacturing subcontractor invested in factory extensions based on the value of the work he subcontracted with Walton after being given assurances, and he ultimately lost over $500,000 in revenue and his factory. That's one of many stories. That is one of the things that I know provided impetus back in 2015 to the now assistant minister's work in this area with individuals like Les, who didn't give up. The end of this story is a good news story for Les. He ended up taking NAB to a class action and, only a couple of months ago, won $20 million. That's not all of it, but it is some of it. If there is a story of David taking on Goliath, it is that story—and that story hasn't quite been told publicly yet.”