Senator EDWARDS (South Australia) (12:45): I rise to speak on Australia's vital submarine capability, the procurement process for the replacement fleet and the opportunities for Australian industry if they are able to rise to the challenge. Let me begin by speaking on important work in the defence industry more generally. Such a discussion cannot occur without acknowledging Labor's terrible record in the space. Labor's neglect in government extended to national defence, including the strategically important submarine capability. On Labor's watch, $16 billion was cut from defence. Defence spending was cut to 1.56 per cent of GDP—its lowest level since 1938. Labor made the largest single cut to the defence budget since the end of the Korean War—they cut it by 10.5 per cent. On Labor's watch the Australian defence industry shed more than 10 per cent of its workforce because of budget cuts and deferrals. As a result of Labor's disregard for defence funding, 119 projects were delayed, 43 projects were reduced in size and eight were cancelled altogether. That is what we, the coalition government, inherited. We were promised an updated defence capability plan, but it never eventuated. Such was the mess in this portfolio that Labor never even bothered to produce a defence policy leading up to the election. They simply gave up.

I remind senators that defence is every government's first responsibility. Mr Shorten and Senator Conroy consistently avoid answering questions on why Labor failed to act to ensure there was no capability gap in replacing the Navy's replenishment ships. Mr Shorten claims that if the Labor Party was in government now these ships would be built in Australia. The Labor Party had six years to make that decision and did nothing. The reality is that Labor needed to make decisions two years ago to avoid job losses in the shipbuilding industry. The Senate inquiry into shipbuilding was told that Defence was ready to begin the replacements for these ships four years ago, but it appears the Labor government was not. Labor's plans were bankrupt even before they began. They were good at making promises but totally incapable of delivering on their promises. Labor's legacy of mismanagement means Defence now faces a deficit of $12 billion on current plans over the next decade. As a result, Labor left Defence $30 billion short of being able to achieve the objectives outlined in the former government's fanciful 2009 white paper, rendering it a work of fiction.

For contrast, I will give the coalition's defence story since taking government 18 months ago. In 2014 there was almost $1 billion worth of defence procurement and sustainment work being undertaken in South Australia. That includes 44 separate acquisition projects such as the work on the Air Warfare Destroyer program, the support and upgrade of the RAAF's P3 Orion aircraft fleet and the upgrades to the ANZAC class frigates and the Army's communications systems. South Australia is also home to 58 separate sustainment programs, including the sustainment of the Collins class submarine and the Jindalee over-the-horizon radar network.

The government has a plan for the future of shipbuilding in Australia. We are implementing a reform strategy for the Air Warfare Destroyer project, which was running more than two years late and $600 million over budget under Labor. In early June, the government committed $78.2 million to accelerate design work on future frigates, to keep alive the option of building future frigates in Australia.

Over the next four years, subject to the outcome of the defence white paper, there will be up to $4.2 billion in defence spending for building and sustaining defence materiel in South Australia. I will say that again: $4.2 billion in defence spending for building and sustaining defence materiel in South Australia. Senator Johnston must be commended for such a substantial contribution to the defence portfolio.

Since October 2014, just several months ago, I have been expressing the view that the Future Submarine procurement process should allow for the involvement of qualified Australian companies who can compete for the opportunity on merit. I took this view after hearing expert witness testimony at the Senate Economics References Committee naval shipbuilding inquiry, which persuaded me of two things: that there is merit in a non-targeted approach to selecting a build partner for the Future Submarine project and that the Adelaide based Australian Submarine Corporation is likely to be competitive in a merit based selection process. In any decisions surrounding the acquisition of the future submarine fleet, defence interests must come first. Responsible expenditure of such a large amount of money is also very important.

The Prime Minister recently made the assurance that qualified Australian companies can compete on merit to participate in the development of Australia's Future Submarine project. This is wonderful news for South Australian shipbuilders, indeed for the Australian shipbuilding industry and its members. Minister for Defence Kevin Andrews, accompanied by South Australian coalition MPs and senators, visited ASC in Adelaide yesterday to confirm this message: the acquisition of replacement submarines will be based on a competitive evaluation process, managed by the Department of Defence. This process will take into account Australia's unique capability requirements, as well as considerations such as cost, schedule, technical risk and value for money. Most important to me is the fact that any Australian company that can credibly meet criteria like capability, cost, schedule, technical risk and value for money can compete on merit, as can potential international partners.

To avoid the confusion and doubt that has infected some in this place—I do not mind what you call the process because such specific terminology was never important to the assurance I sought. The assurance I sought was very simple: I asked for Australian companies like the ASC to have the right to compete for the Future Submarines project on merit. That is the very assurance I got; and that is the very assurance that stands today. Navy's needs will always come first. The government's responsibility for responsible expenditure of taxpayers' money will always be taken seriously by this coalition government. And I am delighted to say Australian shipbuilders have the opportunity to put their hat in the ring. From this point on—from this day forward—the ball is in their court.

Senator LINES (Western Australia) (12:54): I rise today to try to shed some light on the healthcare disaster that the government has brought upon itself. We had commitments from Mr Abbott when he was in opposition that there would be no changes to health and no cuts to Medicare. We have had commitments more recently that the Prime Minister is listening and we have had an acknowledgement that his government since 2013 has been bad. But what we have seen on Medicare and the treatment of patients and GPs is a disgrace. It is not only disgraceful, but it is nothing short of an absolute disaster. There has been no consultation whatsoever from the government in suddenly announcing a new tax.

This was supposed to be a government of no surprises or no new taxes, but it suddenly announced a new tax on every single Australian every time they visit a doctor. Then we saw a backflip on that and then two days before Christmas we saw a direct attack on GPs themselves—again without any consultation. Then the minister was dumped and a new minister installed—she was hauled off a cruise, though I am not quite sure whether she was actually on the ship and had to be helicoptered off. The PM was so afraid of what had happened, he could not front the Australian community himself; he pulled his Minister for Health off the ship she was boarding for her holiday so she could stand before the Australian people to admit that they had made a mistake. That really was the beginning of the end for the Abbott government—they have gone too far and Australians have had enough.

What is happening now? In this place yesterday we heard the assistant health minister tell us that she was listening. Well, Madam Acting Deputy President, I am sure that you, like me and like the Abbott government, have had hundreds of emails from GPs. I know that I have received a copy of every email that a coalition senator from Western Australia has received; I know that they have received exactly the same concerns from general practitioners that I have received. I can assure the Senate today that I have responded to every single one of those GPs, letting them know that Labor is with them—that we absolutely oppose what the Abbott government is trying to do to our health system. I doubt they have had the same assurances from the Abbott government.

It does seem a little strange that Minister Ley and the assistant minister have pledged to listen. They simply need to ask their backbenchers and their ministers to give them copies of the letters they have received from GPs. I have received exactly the same letters, because I was copied into them. It seems to me that the rot has well and truly started in the Abbott government with the mess it is making of our health system. Indeed, one of its own, Mr Laming, a former GP, has come out and criticised his own government for what it was seeking to do with Medicare through its ridiculous GP tax and its ridiculous attempt to reduce the Medicare rebate for doctors. Mr Laming said that what the Abbott government should be doing is rewarding, and not punishing, high-performing doctors. He saw the Abbott government, of which he is a member, as punishing doctors.

It seems to me that it does not matter what sort of worker you are, you are in the sights of the Abbott government. Whether you are a GP, a shipbuilder, a cleaner here at Parliament House, an aged care worker, an early-childhood educator, someone who works penalty rates or someone who exists on the minimum wage, the Abbott government is determined to reduce your wage or to put you out of business altogether—like those GPs who told me and the Abbott government that their surgeries would close. Let me give the Senate a flavour of some of the emails I have received—the same emails that were sent to the Abbott government. I was very impressed by the fact that many of the GPs who wrote to me had been GPs for more than 25 years. Imagine: GPs who had never taken political action before, after 25, 30 or 35 years got really angry at what was being suggested, and started writing to all of the political parties—because they know the Abbott government is a bad government, despite what its current leader says. This is one:

I am very concerned that the co-payment is still being considered by this government. As a GP with over 30 years medical experience, I already see the difficulties my elderly, chronically ill, and disadvantaged patients face. To add an additional impost affecting their GP visits and any additional pathology or imaging requirements is both unfair, unjust and untenable. My patients are already worried about what will happen. Chasing bad debts—which is what the co-payment will amount to—will harm general practices as well.

From another GP—and the Western Australian Abbott government senators opposite have received this email—

Together with all other GPs in Australia—

quite contrary to what we heard from Senator Nash yesterday—

I was never consulted about a co-payment. It has been disastrously introduced, never seriously considered; clearly another botched government 'initiative'. Is the electorate not being taken seriously by this wanton government? Patients and doctors are offended such a combination of arrogance and ignorance.

And from another email which was also sent to Abbott government MPs:

It appears the government really has not much idea what happens at grassroots GP level.

And the last one—and there were quite a number of these—

After a lifetime of voting for the Liberal party, I will never trust them with my vote again.

And hence, we get back to that mistrust. As I have been at pains to point out, these were emails which were sent to the Abbott government; and I was ccd into them.

I am not sure if the threat about not voting Liberal has seized their attention, or whether it was the threat that Labor would disallow the harsh, cruel measures that they intended to pursue in Medicare in this place but, suddenly, two days before Christmas, they were listening. They should have been listening when they received all of those hundreds of GP emails. Something has to be a little wrong when you suddenly get hundreds of GP emails. What impressed me about those emails—and they were from rural and regional GPs; from GPs in a single-doctor practice and GPs in large practices and medium-sized practices; from GPs working with Aboriginal groups and GPs who service the aged-care sector—is that patient care was paramount. Their patients came first. That is what impressed me. They were not all the same email—and I am sure, if the Abbott government wants to be truthful about the numbers of emails it has received from GPs, the government would say that too. The emails were not carbon copies; they were GPs telling their own stories. And what has happened? They have fallen on deaf ears. I have not heard one Abbott government member—except Mr Laming—who has been brave enough to actually admit that what the government wants to do on Medicare is wrong. Susan Ley, in her own words, has said, 'we are listening'. When? When are they listening? They have hundreds of emails already that they could be reading and listening to. But she is still intent on changes. You cannot listen on the one hand and then say on the other, 'but we are going to go ahead with these changes'. What is she going to say—'Oh yes, we consulted; however, we are still doing this'.

A GP tax will not be tolerated by the Australian community. A new election to get rid of this government cannot come soon enough. It does not matter who the leader is, whether it is Mr Turnbull or not; whether Mr Hockey gets dumped as the Treasurer. They have bad policies and they have demonstrated over and over again that they are incapable of listening. They do not want to change. They have a right-wing ideology.

Senator DI NATALE (Victoria) (13:04): I rise today to discuss the future of Australia's healthcare system and, indeed, the very future of our nation. I want to start by reflecting on the turmoil of the past few days. It was only a little while ago that we had a government that promised that it would be grown up, that it would be transparent, that it would be accountable; that it would not deliver any surprises. And I have to hand it to them because they have managed to achieve, in a year and a half, what it took the Labor Party three years to achieve—they have a government that is chaotic, it is dysfunctional, it is divided, and it is confused. I keep hearing excuses from the coalition: they blame the 24-hour news cycle—it is too hard to get a message out; we hear about the 'corrosive influence' of social media, something the Prime Minister I think calls 'electronic graffiti'; we hear about the mess of the last government. The Prime Minister went as far as to say: 'It is not my fault; it is the Australian people's fault.' In Victoria, he said that the defeat of that government occurred because of 'a fit of absent-mindedness'. 'It is not my fault. It is the Australian community that got it wrong.' Well, Madam Acting Deputy President, I have to tell you that the people in Victoria—indeed, the people of Australia—know exactly what they want. There is nothing absent-minded about it. They are very clear about how they feel about this government.

It is time to stop making excuses. It is time to start taking responsibility for the fiasco that is the Abbott government. The Prime Minister could have done it last week in that landmark speech to the Press Club. Instead, what did he do? He went into his bag of tricks: fearmongering on terrorism and foreigners. He is a one-trick pony. Exploiting fear does not work forever. You can run around the country with your billboards, talking about boat arrivals; you can run around with your fluoro vests and your hard hats, talking about the impact of carbon-pollution pricing on the community—it does not work forever. The Chicken Little routine does not work forever. And do you know what? Even worse than that, on those things that they campaigned so hard on, the tide is turning. The Prime Minister must have realised, when he was embarrassed at the G20, that the show was over. Here are a few tips: start being honest. Be up-front. Be straight with people. Keep your spin for the cricket pitch! Don't promise one thing in opposition and another thing in government. The Prime Minister thinks his only job is to fight the Labor Party. He is the Prime Minister—he should start acting like it! He is not in the boxing ring at Oxford any more. That style of adversarial, negative, oppositional politics—people hate it. I hate it. We are sick of it.

Your approach to health epitomises everything that is wrong with this government. At the heart of this government is a lack of integrity. They promised 'no cuts to health care', but their first budget had a GP co-payment and a freeze on Medicare rebates—decimating and dismantling Medicare and making it harder for people to go and see a doctor. What really grates is that you spent years berating the previous government for what you are doing now. But the broken promise is not the worst of it; the policy itself is an absolute stinker. It is based on a lie, and it will not work. Government keeps talking about how unsustainable Medicare is, that we cannot afford it. What rubbish! We have a great health system—it is affordable and it is sustainable. Don't let the facts get in the way of a good story, though! We spend less on health than the OECD average. We spend about 9.1 per cent, by most recent estimates. The average is 9.3 per cent. Look at the most recent report from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare—health expenditure is growing at its lowest level since records began 30 years ago. Why does it work so well? Why have we got such a great health system? Because Medicare is a break on prices. It does not mean private health insurers set prices. It does not mean doctors set the price. Government sets the price, and it is a brake on health inflation. And you guys want to dismantle it. Talk about economic vandalism!

But why do you do it? You are a government that is dominated by ideologues, and you put your own ideology ahead of evidence. This stuff might have read well in some 1960s free-market textbook, but it does not work in health care. Look at the model you aspire to, the US. They spend 17 per cent of their GDP on health care, and what do they get for it? They get a two-tiered system. What is the biggest cause of bankruptcy in the US? Not being able to afford to pay your medical bills. They get worse health care and they pay more for it—and you want to take us there! You want to make it harder for people to see a doctor, you want to shift costs on to emergency departments, and you want to do it to those people who can least afford it. What a tragedy it is that, on Closing the Gap Day, some of the communities that will be worst affected are those Aboriginal people right around the country who are trying to access health care.

I hear these stories that millionaires should pay for their health care. Well, guess what? They do. It is called 'progressive taxation'—they pay more into the system and they are just as entitled to be bulk-billed as anybody else is. It is an efficient system—stop trying to dismantle it! And then I hear the Prime Minister talk about being the best friend that Medicare has ever had. It is a reflection of a man who is so isolated that his best friend right now is a government institution. That says it all. Perhaps even worse for a government that prides itself on competence is that not only did you lie about the policy, not only is it a bad policy, but you cannot even get it right. We are up to version 3. We had version 1. We had version 2 over the summer. Version 3 has been announced by the Prime Minister and we are going to be up to version 4 soon. This is not a health policy; these are a series of thought bubbles dreamed up by a bunch of blokes smoking cigars and drinking Grange. That is what they are.

What do we do from here? There is an opportunity for the Prime Minister right now if he wants to salvage his leadership. He has got to press the 'reset' button and ditch these reforms. He says he is going to listen. Well, guess what? There is a wealth of information out there. There are inquiries, there are reports, there are recommendations. There is a Senate committee talking to experts and looking into what other reforms will improve an already terrific health system. That is going on right now. Let's look at addressing the cost shifting that goes on between state and federal governments rather than making it worse—which is what this plan does. Let's look at reforms around the private health insurance industry and stop this massively inequitable, unfair and ineffective redistribution that is going on right now in the health system. Let's get primary care working better. Let's complement fee-for-service by paying doctors for achieving good outcomes. We can do that. This is a conversation that the AMA, the medical community in general, are up for. Let's start closing not the gap but the chasm that exists between Indigenous people and non-Indigenous people. Today we have heard that we are not doing enough to get that right. Let's start looking after people in the community and providing the supports and structures that mean simple things do not end up in a hospital where it costs us all more. Let's reduce some of the wasteful spending that currently occurs in the health system.

These are all positive reforms. Our door is open. Come and talk to us. Talk to the experts. At the very least, you would think that a government with a bunch of crossbenchers in the Senate would pick up the phone and ask, 'Is there anything we can agree on?' Well, guess what? Not one phone call. Not one approach from the previous health minister. I hope things will be different under the new health minister. I am not optimistic, though. The government is now on borrowed time. The Prime Minister has his last chance. He can start listening to the Australian community—he can listen to doctors, to experts—and he can start doing the things in health care that will take us forward, not backwards. If he does not do that, it will be either his own colleagues or the Australian community who make the decision for him.

Senator POLLEY (Tasmania) (13:13): What a week it has been! The Australian people were not shocked at all when they heard from the Prime Minister's lips on Monday that 'good government starts today'—520 days after taking office, and we are still waiting. I can assure the Prime Minister today that the Australian people are in agreement that every day of your prime ministership has been bad government. The Prime Minister's days may be numbered, but I have been saying all week that the Liberal Party may take Tony Abbott out of the Lodge but you cannot take unfair policies out of the Liberal Party.

Whether the Leader of the Liberal government is Malcolm Turnbull or Julie Bishop, it is still the same dysfunctional government. It does not matter who leads this government, because they all voted for the unfair budget and the attacks made on the unemployed, older Australians and pensioners and because of all their broken promises. The Prime Minister promised the Australian people a stable, mature and adult government, but he delivered exactly the opposite. How can the Australian people trust a government that said it would not cut education spending? How can the people trust a government that said it would not introduce any taxes? Yet it has done just that.

Australians know this government is not working for them. They know that this government cannot be trusted because it is a government built on lies. Tony Abbott promised the Australian people so much. He promised stable government, but the Liberal government's disunity and chaos make this commitment by Tony Abbott his biggest lie yet. Yesterday, respected former Premier of Tasmania, Tony Rundle, said that the leadership spill on Monday was amateur hour from a government that is in trouble. Mr Rundle, I actually agree with you. He went on to say:

Abbott is a fighter and survivor but he’s swimming against an ebb tide that may be too strong for even his iron man skills.

The Australian people know too well the record of this heartless and arrogant government. The evidence was the proposed GP tax, $100,000 university degrees, cuts to pensions, $80 billion of cuts to schools and hospitals, a petrol tax, and cuts to the homeless and domestic violence prevention services. The Liberals' unfair budget and their broken promises are hurting Australian families to the tune of $6,000 a year, and not one member opposite will acknowledge just how unfair their budget was. The finance minister, Senator Cormann, said on Insiders on Sunday that not one member of the Liberal Party believes any aspect of the budget is unfair. That shows how deluded and out of touch they really are.

Take the government's attack on Medicare. Let's be honest: it is in their DNA to destroy Medicare. They have a record of tearing up good public policy. Even the AMA and GPs across the country have slammed their proposed new tax on doctor's visits. But we have to give them credit: this is a government that has energised the GPs in this country to mount a campaign. That is how concerned GPs were about this heartless and out of touch, arrogant government. This Liberal government fails to understand that the Australian people want a government that supports their community, that cares for the people and invests in people and jobs. Australians do not want a government that leaves people behind.

In my home state of Tasmania, Liberal member for Bass, Andrew Nikolic, has supported every single harsh measure handed down in this budget. In the last two weeks alone during the ongoing leadership instability and chaos of this Liberal government, he spent his time leaking stories to the media which have revealed him to have been begging his colleagues to stay united. Instead of working for the people of Bass, Andrew Nikolic has been feeding the Liberal instability. The saddest aspect of Mr Nikolic's contribution to his community is the fact that he has stood by while his own government has delivered harmful policies to the people of Bass. Where was Mr Nikolic when the government closed the Launceston tax office and cut 20 jobs? He could not be found.

Why isn't Mr Nikolic standing up for the people of Bass and for the great state of Tasmania? He has sat back while the University of Tasmania has contemplated raising student fees, slashing courses and abandoning research. Mr Nikolic has stayed silent. Tasmania has said 'no' to the government's attacks on the universities, attacks that Mr Nikolic is supporting. Where was he when the communications minister, Malcolm Turnbull, pulled the plug on local businesses and households receiving world-class broadband? Where was Mr Nikolic when the government decided to cut funding to homeless and drug addiction services at Anglicare, Colony 47, UnitingCare and Mission Australia in my state? Where was Mr Nikolic when Tony Abbott vowed to close the National Joblink? Where was Mr Nikolic when Tony Abbott came to Tasmania and told young Tasmanians to leave the state if they could not find a job? He was silent. Obviously, he was in total agreement with this arrogant and out of touch Prime Minister. No wonder the knives are out for him.

Where was Mr Nikolic when the country was debating a fairer pay deal for the armed forces? He remained silent. At every event in his community he is espousing his great record within the Defence Force, but he failed to stand up for those men and women. Where was Mr Nikolic when the government handed down a budget which took away pension concessions and changed the indexation of the pension so that pensioners received less support to deal with the costs of living? He continually attacks me in the local media, saying that I am lying and misleading the community, but we know, and so do Australian pensioners know, what they did. If it were not for the state Liberal Party coming in to do a patchwork to try and help Tasmanian pensioners, they would be in even worse dire straits.

Mr Nikolic has stood silent while this government has continued to hurt the people of Tasmania. Although Mr Nikolic has obviously been out there supporting the Prime Minister in their chaos and disunity this week, he also has stood up in his community and said that he supported the Prime Minister giving a knighthood to the British Royal Family. That is how arrogant and out of touch Mr Nikolic is. We also know that he is obsessed with anyone in our community that challenges his view and expresses a different view about this unfair budget that they brought down. He has been unrelenting in his personal attacks and putting pressure on people who dare to critique this budget. One example was that, as we know, there was a Facebook page where people were expressing their views about his performance, and what did he do? He threatened those individuals that he would go to their employers and complain. That is what he did. What is even worse than that is that now he has actually done that to a constituent, a well-respected member of our community, Dr Michael Powell, who is a well-respected lecturer at the University of Tasmania. He dared to write letters to both the North Eastern Advertiser and the local newspaper in Launceston to question Mr Nikolic on what this government has been doing. So what did our federal member do? He went and tittle-tattled to the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Tasmania. What was he expecting the vice-chancellor to do? Slap him on the wrist and say, 'Naughty boy; stop writing letters and challenging the federal member for Bass'? How outrageous. He also grapples with the concept that three decades ago—that is 30 years ago—this particular gentleman ran for the Labor Party in the state election. Oh, my goodness! He is not allowed to challenge the unchallengeable member for Bass! How outrageous. What a glass jaw this member has.

But it is even worse than that. Mr Nikolic has been challenged to debate Dr Powell in any public forum anywhere in the electorate. But, no, he is not prepared to do that because he knows the policies the government are bringing down through their budget, even though they are backflipping and doing whatever it takes to get some of their budget through this place, are unfair. He will not turn up to a public debate, because he knows he does not have a leg to stand on, and so do the people of Bass.

Further, Mr Nikolic is out there every other day claiming credit for what the former Labor government did and what the former member for Bass, Geoff Lyons, a hardworking member who actually contributed to his government, did. Mr Nikolic went up to the DSTO in Scottsdale. Once again, it was former Labor minister Snowdon and Geoff Lyons who brought that redevelopment funding to Scottsdale. And on he goes.

Today, Mr Nikolic showed his lack of respect for the people in this country when he walked out while the Leader of the Opposition was giving his speech on Closing the Gap, following the Prime Minister's and by all accounts paying him credit— (Time expired)

Senator CANAVAN (Queensland) (13:24): I want to talk today about tax policy and families. In the last few months, the Prime Minister has indicated that the government will focus on developing a policy for a fairer go for families in 2015, and I welcome that focus because one of our core objectives should always be to support families and make it as easy as possible for people to have kids. I know—and I presume a lot of others would be in the same boat—that having children is the best thing that ever happened to me. The more barriers we can remove to people having children, the better, I think. One of those barriers at the moment is of course the cost of child care and there should, rightly, be a strong focus on that. Childcare fees, as most in this chamber would know, have risen considerably in the last few years. In The Australian on the weekend, there was a big write-up about childcare fees, and apparently they have risen by around 50 per cent since 2007. So it is a substantial increase and a large barrier for many families to having more children.

I do note that, despite those costs, we already spend $7 billion a year to help families access early childhood education or child care in the preschool years of children's lives. In a recent draft report, the Productivity Commission did make some recommendations to adjust or change that system; but, even with their adjustments, which according to the PC would cost about an additional billion dollars a year, it would only encourage an additional 47,000 mothers or fathers to enter the workforce. In other words, it would cost us around $20,000 per extra person in a job. In my view, such a high cost would be wasteful if the objective were solely to encourage more women or men into the workforce. Of course, funding for child care and early childhood education have broader objectives as well, and additional funding may be merited if we want to particularly focus on that early childhood education element.

But today I mainly want to talk about another form of child care, a form of child care that is often ignored, and that is the child care provided by stay-at-home parents. While childcare costs, as we know, are increasing, few recognise the fact that stay-at-home parenting is the most costly form of child care. It is a burden when two-income families today must pay 60 per cent or even more of their second incomes to put their child in child care, and I recognise that. But, by definition, a single-income family gives up 100 per cent of their second income to stay at home to look after their child.

Our tax system does not recognise these costs—or not as much as other countries do. Unlike many other developed countries, our tax system provides little recognition of the higher tax rates paid by single-income families. Currently, half of all OECD countries treat spouses separately for tax purposes or have joint taxation or some joint elements that provide tax relief and tax credits that are transferable between partners. We do not in our system, not at all. In our tax system, single-income families are the heavy lifters, because a disproportionate burden falls on them.

A single-income household with two kids, with an income of $120,000 from the one earner, pays tax of $34,700 currently. In contrast, a double-income household where each parent is earning $60,000 pays tax of $24,200 a year in our tax system. That is a difference of $10,500 per year, every year, between a single-income family and a double-income family. These two families have the same number of kids, the same household income and essentially the same cost-of-living pressures, yet the single-income family contributes $10,500 more every year to fund government services. The disparity carries right through all income levels. With a household income of $100,000, a single-income family pays $26,900 in tax, while a dual-income family pays only $17,000. With an income of $80,000, a single-income family pays $19,100 in tax—these are all with two children—whereas a dual-income family pays just $9,800 in tax. That is unfair. That is unfair because it breaches a basic tenet of horizontal equity which all tax systems should aspire to, and that basic principle is that people in similar circumstances should pay similar rates of tax. The two families I have mentioned here are in very similar circumstances but pay vastly different rates of tax. In my view, a fairer families policy needs to at least respond to this inequity. I have mentioned some of these figures before in the Senate but I wanted to restate them because the government is developing this policy.

I want to mention something additional, though, today, because I think another consideration in the development of that policy is that things have got worse for single-income families in the past few years rather than better. And when you think about those disparities in tax that I mentioned earlier, one of the key reasons for those disparities is the fact that a single-income family has access to just one tax-free threshold whereas a double-income family gets access to two tax-free thresholds, by merit of two people working. Until a few years ago, Australia had a tax-free threshold of only $6,000, so the disparity in that regard was not all that great. But a few years ago, when the former Labor government introduced the carbon tax, they increased the tax-free threshold substantially. It went up from $6,000 to $18,200, and in July this year it will rise again, to $19,400. The new government has kept those thresholds that high. That means that by the next financial year a double-income family can earn $38,400 a year before they pay any tax, whereas a single-income family will start paying tax after earning just $19,400.

This change has widened the gap between double-income and single-income families. And you can actually quantify that, because if we instead apply the old tax scales we had before 2012, before the carbon tax to people's income today—and I use that $120,000 family that I used initially—then the gap between the single-income family and the dual-income family would be $1,300 less. So, changing these thresholds, increasing them, is a move that this government supports. It has made the disparity between single-income and dual-income families $1,300 a year higher in the case of the $120,000 family. And of course that goes through all the income scales I mentioned before, and it is about $1,000 difference for most families by increasing the tax-free threshold.

And I think we should deal with this disparity, not make it worse. On this side of the chamber, we are the party of choice. We want people to be able to make their own choices in life about how they want to have a go in life. We want to support people who want to have a go, who want to have a family and start a business, who want to go out and develop new skills and go into new industry. We should promote that choice, not discriminate against it. But at the moment our tax system does discriminate against families who want to make the choice of stay-at-home parenting. And I do want to ask the question: what exactly is wrong with choosing to stay at home and look after your own children? To me, it is the most important job anyone can do, to look after their own children and have them develop. I do not spend enough time with my children—I recognise that—but I am lucky to have a wife who is happy to stay home and spend time with them. Regardless of what we do in our own lives, it is the most important thing we can do. Stay-at-home parenting does not necessarily reduce the amount of work done in the economy, either. That is often a basic error, because while more child care and more paid work lifts GDP, it does not necessarily change the amount of work done. Particularly if people just employ nannies, it just changes the mix of work, and whether it is paid or unpaid. A basic problem with economics is that GDP does not measure all the things that go on in our economy, but sometimes in this place we focus on it far too much.

There is also ample evidence that stay-at-home parenting improves child development outcomes, and the Productivity Commission mentioned those considerably in its paid parental leave report. And we spend billions of dollars on schools every year, sometimes on things that do not have a lot of evidence at all, particularly IT at schools. But we do not seem to want to spend any money on something that has clear evidence, and that is that stay-at-home parenting does deliver benefits.

But even with all the discrimination I have mentioned today, even with the tax system being so far against single-income families, there is still the fact that a third of families with children today rely on just one income, and more than 40 per cent of families rely on one person for more than 90 per cent of their income. We cannot have a fair families policy if we ignore a full 40 per cent of families and the inequitable burden that is currently placed on them. (Time expired)

Senator LUNDY (Australian Capital Territory) (13:34): As I near the end of my time in this place I recognise more than ever before just how lucky I have been to be nearly 19 years a senator for the Australian Capital Territory—lucky because I have never had to be at work too far away from my family and friends, and I empathise deeply with my colleagues who find themselves travelling vast distances to be here every sitting week. But I am also lucky because I am privileged to live in such a beautiful city. You only need to look out of the outer-corridor windows in this building to see the most beautiful surroundings and take in that breathtaking view across the lake and towards the mountains. In fact, wherever you look here in Canberra you cannot help but soak in the splendour of what it is to live in the 'bush capital'. Again, I have had many opportunities to interact with those of our community who are passionate about our natural environment, be it flora or fauna, over many years now, and I certainly feel it, live it and breath it as I continue to choose to live my life here in this beautiful city.

Any Canberran who takes the opportunity to explore the hills around this city is greeted every time by a unique and special view. From Mount Ainslie, for example—which happens to be my favourite summit—what is laid out before you is the wonder of the Griffins' visionary plan of a century ago. You only need to turn your eyes south to see, right there in front of you, Marion Mahony Griffin's extraordinary satellite snapshot of what Australia's national capital might become, based on her husband, Walter's, ideas. These ideas were magically formed—and I say 'magically' because they did it without actually coming to Australia, in a very grey and chilly Chicago suburb in the winter of 1911 and 1912.

The Griffins, of course, should not get all the credit for what we see here in 2015 in our national capital. In fact, it was Prime Minister Robert Menzies who made a crucial intervention in our capital city's grand narrative through the 1950s when he provided the necessary funding and patronage. Decades earlier, John Christian Watson, Labor's first Prime Minister, also made a significant contribution to Canberra. And like so many of the stories of early Canberra, Watson's is nearly lost, but has been reinvigorated through the course of the National Capital Centenary. And I would like to just reflect on it a little. It was a tricky and contested time, when the nation's capital might have been marooned forever in Melbourne or relegated to some other less elegant location in New South Wales. But it was Chris Watson who visited the Monaro region in 1906. He stood, it seems, right on    top of Mount Ainslie and allowed himself to dream an identifiably Australian dream. He spoke about it later:

There is a plain in the centre, and foothills all round, varying the general appearance of the country; and beyond that, after further rolling foothills, we have, on the south-west and south, the Murrumbidgee mountains, towering as a background and proving a most effective foil to the other scenery ... In the vicinity there are mountain gorges, which afford every diversity of scenery … full of beauty and within a short distance of the suggested [capital] site. I do not say that picturesqueness alone should decide the question; but, other things being equal, I think that the beautiful ought to turn the scale.

Watson, like so many to follow him, was in an elevated mood—so too the Griffins, without even seeing the place.

As I mentioned, Walter Burley Griffin had his own dream: a democratic dream for a country that he had grown to admire for what he called its 'most democratic tendencies'. Griffin wanted to give Australians a capital to suit their egalitarian character. I have quoted his memorable words in this place previously, and I would like to again:

I have planned a city that is not like any other in the world. I have planned it not in a way that I expected any government authorities in the world would accept. I have planned an ideal city—a city that meets my ideal of the city of the future.

I think that this is the stuff of inspiration, and there is no doubt that many since have found similar sustenance when applying themselves to the Canberra project. When Aldo Giurgola, one of this city's most treasured citizens, began to design this Parliament House—surely destined to be World Heritage listed in the coming years—he said that he constantly felt the illuminating presence of the Griffins on his shoulder as he sketched preliminary plans in his New York office in the late 1970s.

It is troubling that many of our representatives and leaders have somehow—and I do not know how—formed a somewhat negative view of this city. There were recent comments about the location of Australia Day celebrations by the Northern Territory Chief Minister, Mr Adam Giles, where he referred to Canberra as a city of 'just beige buildings'—a very naive view of someone who has obviously not spent any time to take in the natural beauty of the nation's capital or to appreciate the substance of its plan and surrounds.

I am well known for criticising previous Prime Minister John Howard for refusing to make the capital his home. I believed at the time that it showed a great disdain for the status of the national capital. Former Prime Ministers Mr Malcolm Fraser and Mr Paul Keating have also, in a more recent public appearance, expressed a mutual dislike of Canberra, suggesting that the capital should have been in Melbourne or Sydney. I love both Melbourne and Sydney; it is true. I was born in Sydney, and I have grown to love Melbourne very much. So it is pitiful that people find it necessary to reflect on the national capital in a negative way, somehow comparing it to two extremely large and very successful state capitals who form integrated parts of our economy and are, of course, esteemed capitals of their respective states. A like for a city does not diminish the role or status of the national capital in any way; in fact, in many ways it underscores the uniqueness and importance of this place.

I would argue that these narrow views not only ignore the genuine beauty of the capital but show an ignorance concerning our national capital's foundation story—in point of fact, a story rich with a set of international connections embracing the best of what humankind was thinking one hundred years ago. Many of the people who inspired the then fledgling Labor Party in the Federation era were the very same people who inspired Canberra to be conceived as an ideal capital.

I chaired a joint standing committee inquiry into the role of Australia's national capital in 2008, entitled The way forward. I wrote in that foreword:

The challenge for all Australians is to ensure that Canberra as our national capital continues to be planned with the high ideals first articulated by the Griffins.

In the seven years that have passed since then, I believe it is fair to say that this challenge has become even more pressing and ever more urgent. We have had two more inquiries since then: one chaired by Senator Louise Pratt, entitled Etched in stone?Inquiry into the administration of the National MemorialsOrdinance 1928; and the other, overseen by Dr Allan Hawke, entitled Canberra a capital place:Report of the independent review of the National Capital Authority. All three of these enquiries produced a raft of sensible and well-researched recommendations for Canberra during the 21st century, and yet few of these bipartisan recommendations have been implemented, partly because of the leadership volatility that has engulfed parties in recent years, but also because of the prevalent belief that nothing is worth spending taxpayer dollars on that is not cost neutral or moneymaking. I think that, if you value the role of the national capital in the context of the part that it plays in our collective Australian story, it is important to make the investment in the national capital to ensure that all Australians have the opportunity to feel that they are part of it.

Canberra is in essence a public asset. It demands our careful attention. Our national capital is too precious to be marginalised and subject to a hundred lazy and ill-informed cuts. It is not good enough to have only the national cultural institutions, along with the National Capital Authority, doing the hard yards developing the cultural fabric of our capital city. They find themselves often friendless, cash-strapped and forgotten. The load must be shared, and proudly showcased by the Australian people through the vehicle of the appropriate federal government department and with financial support.

There are many things about Canberra that I love. One of the most important is that it is our national capital. I am here on behalf of the people of the ACT, and Canberra is here on behalf of all Australians.

Senator LAZARUS (Queensland—Leader of the Palmer United Party in the Senate) (13:44): Today I am speaking about a matter of national importance and an issue which affects every Australian: the issue of smoke alarms, also referred to as smoke detectors. Smoke alarms are one of the most important health and safety devices in this country. Every household across Australia should have smoke alarms installed, and they should be fully functioning and regularly tested. Despite this, every year, Australians die in household fires or are severely injured as a result of fire related burns or smoke inhalation. The sad truth is these deaths are preventable and would be prevented if every household across Australia had photoelectric smoke alarms installed instead of ionisation smoke alarms.

What most people do not realise is that smoke detectors come in two main types: ionisation and photoelectric. In lay terms, ionisation smoke alarms detect fire, and photoelectric smoke alarms detect smoke and smouldering activity. To give you an example, photoelectric alarms go off when a certain amount or level of smoke is detected in the air. Typically they will activate when smoke obscuration is between three and 20 per cent per metre. Twenty per cent per metre is considered the maximum save level of smoke. Therefore, a photoelectric alarm certified to this standard can be expected to give early warning of a smoky or smouldering fire. Ionisation alarms, however, are not based on smoke obscuration; they are based on measuring the level of small particles typically given off in a fast-flaming fire.

If I were to go to the shops or my local hardware store, I would find that the most common type of smoke alarm available for purchase is the ionisation smoke alarm, and it would probably be the cheapest, so it is no wonder that many households across Australia have ionisation smoke alarms installed. They are the most common and the cheapest. Unfortunately, the cheapest is not always the best; and, based on the view of many, ionisation smoke alarms should not be available for purchase or installation in Australia at all. They should be prohibited. But that is something I will talk more about in a moment.

What I would like to do first is explain how the two different types of smoke alarms operate in practice—that is, in the case of a fire. I will use my wonderful next-door neighbour in Brisbane, Gary, as an example. Gary is safety oriented and has installed photoelectric smoke alarms throughout his home. One night while Gary and his family were sleeping an electrical fault in a small bar fridge started to smoulder and eventually developed into a full-scale raging fire. The photoelectric smoke alarms in his home would detect the smoke activity before the fire took hold and activate, which in turn would wake Gary and his family, giving them time to escape the home. As a result of having photoelectric smoke alarms installed in his home, Gary and his family would survive the fire. It is estimated that, on average, a photoelectric smoke alarm can provide up to 30 minutes warning before a fire takes hold and envelops a home.

What would have happened if Gary did not have photoelectric smoke alarms and instead had ionisation alarms as many Australian households do? During the night, while Gary and his family were sleeping, a fire would have broken out in his home. The fire would have produced toxic smoke and fumes, which would have filled the home and would have been inhaled by everyone sleeping. Due to the toxic nature of the smoke and fumes, anyone inhaling the smoke would have either died in their sleep or been rendered unconscious while sleeping. Eventually the fire would have grown to the size where the heat and flames would have reached the ionisation smoke alarms. At this point—the point at which practically the whole home was engulfed in flames—the ionisation smoke alarms would have gone off. The problem is that by this time Gary and his family were either already dead due to the inhalation of toxic fumes and smoke or they were unconscious, which means they would not have been woken in response to the alarm. If Gary and his family were lucky enough to have avoided smoke inhalation due to bedroom door closures et cetera, the size of the fire would have made it nearly impossible to escape the burning house without sustaining significant injury through burns or death trying to escape.

So why, given that photoelectric alarms are considered by virtually everyone involved in the fire emergency prevention and safety industry to be the safest and most appropriate fire safety and prevention devices, are Australians still able to purchase and install ionisation smoke alarms? The reason is that the Australian government has failed to act. Companies selling ionisation products in Australia have wielded too much influence over our country and our decision making. Test data since 1993 shows ionisation alarms fail to activate in Australian standards testing until more than three times the maximum safe limits set for the photoelectric alarms. In 2004, the Australian Building Codes Board approved changes to the Building Code of Australia to make photoelectric smoke alarms mandatory in commercial buildings. In 2008, Standards Australia amended the Australian standard in relation to smoke alarms, which should have been adopted by the Australian Building Codes Board, requiring photoelectric smoke alarms to be installed in all new homes. As at today, the Australian Building Codes Board has not acted, and Australia's national building code has not been amended or updated to reflect Standards Australia's critical amendment which would mandate that photoelectric smoke alarms be installed in all new homes. While recommendations have been made to the Australian Building Codes Board to amend the Australian building code to make it mandatory for photoelectric smoke alarms to be installed in new homes, to date the Australian Building Codes Board has failed to do this.

Despite this, in response to growing concerns across the world with problems associated with ionisation smoke alarms, the Northern Territory government has shown great leadership. Northern Territory regulations were recently amended in the form of the Fire and Emergency Amendment (Smoke Alarm Regulations) 2011 to require existing ionisation smoke alarms that stopped working to be replaced with photoelectric alarms. This became effective from 1 November 2011. As a result, photoelectric smoke alarms must now be installed in all new homes built in the Northern Territory.

Overseas, an increasing number of US states and cities have legislated to mandate photoelectric smoke alarms. States with state-wide legislation include Iowa, Massachusetts and Vermont; other states are also following suit. In some European countries the sale of ionisation smoke detectors is prohibited; these countries include Cyprus, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Switzerland. This is not only due to issues regarding their effectiveness but also in relation to concerns around the emission of radiation.

In recent years my home state of Queensland suffered one of the most horrific house fire tragedies in the country. Eleven lives were lost, including eight children. The coroner involved in the case recommended that every area of a house where people sleep have a photoelectric smoke alarm installed. Every year across Australia people are still dying or suffering horrific injuries as a result of house fires. These injuries and this loss of life is preventable and could easily be avoided if the Australian Building Codes Board would amend the Australian building code to require that all Australian households have photoelectric smoke alarms installed. Australia relies on the Australian building code and it is crucial that it reflects life-saving requirements. We also note that industry experts, supported by a growing body of evidence, suggest that not only should photoelectric smoke alarms be installed in all homes but that they should also be interconnected to ensure maximum response and minimise occupant response time, and that alarms should be located in all sleeping areas.

In raising the issue in the Senate today I am putting up my hand to be a champion for Australians and ensure that change is brought about in this country. We must stop preventable house fire deaths and house fire injuries in Australia. I am determined, on behalf of the people of Australia, to bring about change to a smoke alarm laws and to stop the wasteful and preventable injury and loss of life associated with house fires.

Senator URQUHART (Tasmania—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (13:54): Over the past few weeks we have seen those opposite return to tried-and-true scaremongering tactics in an attempt to distract from their own internal chaos and to try to justify their vicious attacks on low- and middle-income Australians. It is a fairly simplistic plan which basically consists of pointing and shouting, 'Look! Look over there! Labor!' and screeching, 'Budget emergency!'

Of course, it is not a new strategy. In fact, those opposite have irresponsibly been trying to misrepresent Australia's financial situation for years, especially in the period directly before the 2013 election. While the rest of the world was lauding Australia for getting through the GFC with solid growth, low inflation, low unemployment and a AAA credit rating from all three ratings agencies, those opposite were busy talking our economy down. While the International Monetary Fund recognised that it was the Howard government, not a Labor government, that was the wasteful government, those opposite were continuing their economic fearmongering for tawdry political reasons. While it was clear that, under Labor, Australia had a relatively low debt of 12.7 per cent of GDP compared to an OECD average of 74.7 per cent of GDP, those opposite blundered on—either completely ignorant of, or completely misrepresenting, the facts.

After all the hysterical screeching about the debt and deficit before the election, it is not surprising the Australian people actually expected those opposite to do something about it when in government. But the financial statements prove that this is not what is happening. Joe Hockey's mini-budget clearly showed that the Australian economy has suffered since the Abbott government's damaging and unfair May budget. Unemployment is up, the deficit has spiked and confidence has fallen in a hole. The deficit ballooned by 70 per cent to $40.4 billion and net debt increased by 15 per cent to $244.8 billion. This is a government that promised to improve the budget bottom line—but instead tens of billions of dollars have been added to debt and deficit, all while hurting Australian families, pensioners, students and job seekers.

Do not get me wrong—Labor has supported billions of dollars of budget savings and we will continue to support savings that are fair and sensible. In fact, when we were in government we made $180 billion in savings which contributed to long-term budget sustainability without the attacks on low- and middle-income earners. But we will never support $100,000 degrees or the trashing of Medicare which will only serve to make us less healthy, less educated and less able to grow the economy in the future. The truth is that, while those opposite screech that we need to tighten our belts, it turns out that the 'we' they are referring to is only the poor, the sick, the young and those who rely on government services. Almost unscathed by those so-called belt-tightening measures are high-income earners, the wealthy and the powerful. This is a government that uses debt merely as a self-serving political strategy which is constantly parroted by the member for Braddon, Mr Brett Whiteley.

They talk about reducing debt but, as we all know, their words and their actions are worlds apart. These actions tell the story of their absolute rank hypocrisy. They talked about reducing debt while putting in a request for a $200 billion hike to the nation's debt limit. They said they could not afford to maintain university funding while they gave the Reserve Bank a reportedly unsolicited $8.8 billion gift. They cut $80 billion from health and education while dumping Labor's plans to ensure multinational companies pay their fair share of tax. They plan to cut pensions and leave young job seekers with no source of income for six months at a time, while repealing billions of dollars of tax revenue.

Clearly this is not a government that cares about reducing debt. They are merely using it as a political smokescreen to ram through their longstanding plans to turn Australia into a two-tiered society of haves and nave-nots. The savage budget tells the story, with massive hits to low- and middle-income Australians while the well-off will barely feel the impacts. Treasury analysis found that lower-income households would lose an average of $842 a year while high-income families with barely feel a $71 hit to their bottom line.

Clearly, this is a government that has no plan to address Australia's economic situation beyond hysteria and blatant attacks on those who can least afford to be hit. The Abbott government has been in government for 16 months now, and their trite slogans and shallow platitudes are starting to wear a little thin. Quite frankly, the people of Australia are waiting for those adults that we were promised would turn up.

The PRESIDENT: It being 2 pm we go to questions without notice.

Senator CONROY (Victoria—Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (15:02): I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Employment (Senator Abetz) to a question without notice asked by Senator Conroy today relating to the manufacture of the next fleet of Australian submarines.

This chaotic and dysfunctional government is all at sea on the issue of submarines. It is chaotic and dysfunctional.

Senator Cash interjecting—

Senator CONROY: You have just been rolled by the High Court; I would sit there quietly! Let us be clear, we now have a Prime Minister who is reduced to trading votes for submarines. How low has he sunk when he is trading our most lethal defensive asset for a vote to shore up his leadership. He is a man bereft—

Senator Abetz: Mr Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. What Senator Conroy has just said is clearly a reflection on motives and a reflection on the Prime Minister, and it needs to be withdrawn.

Senator Cameron: On the point of order, all that has happened here is that what Senator Edwards has put on the public record as a matter of fact is being proposed here: that the Prime Minister did trade the votes.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Cameron, that is debating the point. I have taken advice. I think you are very close to the position of reflecting, Senator Conroy. I remind senators that they ought not reflect adversely on members of either house. Senator Conroy, you can continue.

Senator CONROY: I appreciate your advice, Mr Deputy President. What we are seeing here is submarines for votes. If you have not seen it yet—I am sure you circulated it to the South Australian branch members, Senator Ruston—I recommend that all senators view the interview that Senator Edwards gave on Sky News yesterday. The smile that you are seeing today on Senator Brandis's face as he skipped around the chamber was in the knowledge that there is now a worse political interview than his own on metadata. He can now say, 'I was not the worst this government has produced,' because Senator Edwards gave an interview that was excruciating. In fairness to Senator Edwards, though, we know that he was sent out last weekend by the Prime Minister's office to prop up the Prime Minister. He was sent out to do a job on behalf of Mr Abbott. All he did was tell the truth. He told the truth about his conversation with Mr Abbott. At no stage in the past, tawdry, five days has Senator Edwards contradicted what he said on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. Not once in the spiel we had from him earlier today did he deny what he said. He was sent out again, yesterday, to try to clean up the mess that the Prime Minister has caused himself. Just so you can get it accurately for your letters to your members, Senator Ruston, let me quote what Senator Edwards said. Mr Speers asked him:

So I just want to be clear, that’s not happened. The PM never said the word tender to you?

Senator Edwards:

No. I’m not going to represent what the PM said to you. You ask the PM.

…   …   …

I'm telling you, I used those words.

Mr Speers:

But did the PM use that rhetoric? Did he use that word?

Senator Edwards:

I believe he did because when I asked him, 'Now can I confirm that the ASC can compete in this tender?', he said: 'Yes, you can.'

That is the Prime Minister of Australia trading away $20 billion of Defence acquisitions—just trading it off.

Today we have had more attempted damage control from this shambolic government. We see reports, which are not denied, that junior Liberal frontbencher, Mr Briggs, we are told, in an expletive filled phone call to Senator Edwards accused him of 'lying and deliberately misrepresenting the Prime Minister's position to bolster his Senate preselection chances' against you, Senator Rushton, or against Senator Fawcett. And now, just before question time, the Prime Minister finally crawls out from hiding and this is what he had to say about Senator Edwards:

The term I have used in public and in private is a competitive evaluation process.

So he has accused Senator Edwards of lying about what the Prime Minister said. There it is: we wait till after we have sent Senator Edwards out into the chamber to try and clean up the mess, and he still does not because he is not going to lie for the Prime Minister. We go out and dump and cut him up. We leave him hanging out to dry. The Prime Minister got you both last Monday—(Time expired)

Senator McKENZIE (Victoria) (15:08): I too rise to take note of answers. What a pleasure it has been to listen to the diatribe of the last five minutes from the shadow Defence minister—the captain of designing policy on the backs of slips of paper—Senator Conroy. When we look at the previous government and their capacity for decision making in this particular policy space, it is a blank piece of paper. Instead of providing Defence with the capacity to purchase and procure, they rip $16 billion out of the budget—that makes it a little difficult to get on with the job of purchasing.

When it comes to submarines, we are determined to take action on this particular issue—to get the best value for money and capacity for our Defence forces. Having participated in a procurement inquiry last year, I find that the ALP is quite strong on the rhetoric but quite weak on the action. We had very strong advocacy from the CFMEU around paper procurement. For six years, if the Labor Party was actually interested in ensuring the jobs of workers, particularly in regional areas—and I think about the Maryvale pulp mill in my home state of Victoria—then they would have done something. Instead they sat on their hands, as with this particular example, and now they are braying from the sidelines like the donkeys that they are, complaining rather than using the time they were in government to show leadership and make decisions.

When this issue needed to be dealt with in a timely manner, more than two years ago, where was the Labor Party? You were MIA—missing in action—on productive decision making in Defence for the entire time you were in government. In September 2013 the Australian people did vote for strong, united leadership and that is what they got after six years of debacle from the previous government—

Senator Cameron: A strong, united leadership!

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Order!

Senator McKENZIE: to take the tough decisions, Senator Cameron, because it is not easy. It is very easy to sit there and not make decisions that would actually bring budgets back into surplus over time or that will help economies to transition. That is the tough work of government. You are very strong on the rhetoric, but very quiet when it comes to making the tough decisions. We need shoulders to the wheel right now here in the Senate to assist fix the train wreck that is our budgetary position and that you are in denial about. Again, where is the Labor Party? MIA. You are even blocking savings you identified when you were in government. You sit here day after day refusing to help us to put this budget back into the black over time. It is a travesty for the Australian people and it is a travesty for future generations that are going to have to deal with paying that back—particularly when you look at the demographic tsunami that is approaching and the constraints that will impose on the health budget, on the aged care budget. But where are you? You are much more prepared to carp from the sidelines than get on with the real job, the hard lifting and the heavy lifting.

When I think about the Labor Party in government, I think about the billion dollars a month in debt they have left us. That is a lot of hospitals; it is a lot of nurses; it is a lot of teachers; it is a lot of infrastructure for universities; it is a lot of roads; it is a lot of ports—it is a lot of infrastructure that would assist in creating jobs for Australian workers as the mining boom comes off. That is why we put that program in place so that there would be jobs for those people to go to and to ensure that the economy continues to grow. You just do not understand; it is not part of your DNA. The last time the ALP delivered a surplus in government, 'Wind Beneath My Wings' was a top hit and the Berlin Wall came down—it was 1989. There are people in this parliament right now who were not even born when you, as a reform party, had a reform agenda that recognised that debt was a problem for government. It is a very sad case—(Time expired)

Senator CAMERON (New South Wales) (15:14): This really is a dysfunctional, chaotic government. This is a government who would rather stand up and argue ideological rhetoric than actually worry about jobs for Australian workers. This is a government that would sacrifice the car industry in Victoria, sacrifice the submarine industry in South Australia for the sake of their ideology. I saw that Senator Edwards was going to make a statement today and I said: 'This is great, Senator Edwards is actually going to stand up for himself. He is actually going to tell the truth.' But what did Senator Edwards do? He lost all courage and he simply read a speech, prepared for him in the PM's office to try and save the Prime Minister's skin. That is what he did today.

Senator Edwards is a guy who has gone from a rooster to a feather duster in 24 hours. He was boasting about his great victories in his local news, The Flinders News, saying that he told the Prime Minister that there had to be a competitive tendering process for the submarines. He said: 'I scored a big win for South Australia with an assurance from the Prime Minister that the Australian Submarine Corporation and South Australian shipbuilders will be given the opportunity to tender for the Future Submarine contract.' This is his hero position in the local newspaper: 'What a great job I did, I got Tony Abbott re-elected, and I gave him my vote in return for the submarine contract being a competitive contract.' Then it all crashed down around Senator Edwards, because the competitive tender suddenly became a 'competitive evaluation process' that nobody understands—nobody understands what it is. Yesterday, Senator Abetz made a pathetic attempt to try and tell people what a competitive evaluation process was—nobody knows what it is! It is an absolute joke. Mr Deputy President, let me tell you what happened with Senator Edwards. He then went from 'a competitive evaluation process' to 'an opportunity to participate'. South Australia has an opportunity to participate! These weasel words are not good enough. We are talking about jobs in South Australia. We are talking about the future of one of the biggest contracts ever in this country—and yet Australian industry is not being allowed to tender because a deal has been done—a handshake has been done—between the Prime Minister of Australia, Tony Abbott, and the Prime Minister of Japan—to build the subs in Japan. That is what this is about, and that is why we have the weasel words. We do not have one South Australian senator who had the guts to stand up and take the Prime Minister on—or take this leadership on, in this rotten government—and say, 'We want jobs in South Australia'.

Senator Edwards claims that he has always been a supporter of South Australian jobs. Well, that is not true—because when we had the former defence minister, Senator Johnston, saying they could not build a canoe in South Australia, what did we hear from the South Australian senators? Not a word. Not a whisper. They sat back, with their jelly backs and their weak knees, and they just let the South Australian manufacturing workers and the South Australian industry be trashed by this government. This is a rotten government. This is a government that would send jobs to Japan. This is a government that chases the manufacturing industry and the car industry out of this country. And the South Australian senators are being trashed by their own people: Mr Jamie Briggs said that Senator Edwards was lying and desperately misrepresenting the PM's position to bolster his preselection chances. What a rotten mob they are—they would sell Australian workers out for their preselection! They are dysfunctional, chaotic and absolutely hopeless.

Senator REYNOLDS (Western Australia) (15:19): I too rise to take note of this issue. Mr Deputy President, for the benefit of Senator Cameron, I would like to clarify some of the issues that he raised. First of all, he might be interested to know that yesterday, the Premier of South Australia welcomed the federal government's approach. If Senator Cameron does not understand what the competitive evaluation processes are, I would like to remind him that they are processes that his own government used in 2010 to do an evaluation process of the MH-60 naval helicopter capability, after undertaking a competitive evaluation of the respective offers. So not only has the previous government used this process, the South Australian Premier has commended the government for this approach, and he has commended the minister for his comments yesterday.

I would like to remind those opposite about the facts. Instead of a lot of overblown rhetoric, I would like to take them back to the facts of this issue. Under Labor, defence spending fell to 1.6 per cent of GDP, its lowest level since 1938. In 2012-13, Defence suffered the biggest single cut to its budget—10.5 per cent—since the Korean War. Under Labor—not under the coalition—200,000 jobs were lost, and defence industry under Labor had to shed over 10 per cent of its workforce. I have to wonder, listening to Senator Cameron, where was he then? Where were the unions then, when the defence industry had to shed jobs? The fact is that the Defence Capability Plan under Labor was never affordable or deliverable. It was $18 billion underfunded to deliver Force 2030. Here are some facts that demonstrate just how bad it was under the previous government: 119 projects were delayed, 43 were reduced, and eight projects, all up, were cancelled. In 2007, in relation to the submarines, Kevin Rudd said that Labor would ensure the submarines were built by the ASC. He said the process would begin in 2017 so that it could go out for contracts in 2011. Still nothing had been done by 2013, but the Labor government promised that 12 new submarines would be built. But again there were no plans and no funding. Not only did Labor not fund the submarine project; they took $20 billion out of forward estimates and beyond for the project. Where were the Labor senators from South Australia then? Where was the AMWU then—when they were not only losing jobs but the future submarine program was never funded? In six years under Labor not a single ship was commissioned.

I would also like to address a bit further Senator Cameron's comments in relation to this government and jobs—in particular, that we are 'ideologically focused'. Absolutely we are! We believe in jobs and we believe in supporting small business. Again, there are some rather inconvenient facts for those opposite: in 2014 alone 213,000 new jobs were created under this new government. That is 585 new jobs every single day last year—a new job every 2½ minutes, every single day. Job creation is actually running at triple the pace it was under Labor. Where were those opposite, where were the unions, when this was occurring last year? In fact, 223,000 new companies were registered in Australia in 2014, an increase of almost 10.2 per cent. Where were the trade unions? Where were the senators opposite in encouraging and supporting new businesses, which meant new jobs all around the country? This current government is ideological. We do believe in investing in infrastructure and we are getting on with the projects. There are 85 projects currently under construction and another 94 in development. (Time expired)

Senator GALLACHER (South Australia) (15:24): I too rise to take note of the answer from Senator Abetz to Senator Conroy. I got a bit of a chill out of the last two contributions from the other side. I mean, you are in government, and you are promising to deliver, but you are breaking those promises and regurgitating five years of history about what some other government is alleged to have done. It is not all that comforting to the hundreds and thousands of working men and women in South Australia who simply want to contribute to the best of their skill and ability, nor to the small businesses surrounding those manufacturing jobs who want to participate in the economy to the best of their ability, the small to medium enterprises and the large businesses that this huge expenditure hangs off. What they got from the other side in contributions from Senator McKenzie and Senator Reynolds was absolute rubbish.

I want to put this on the record: MPs who conscientiously listen to their electorates—who think about policy—are assets, not inconveniences. They are worth a lot more than those who toady up to the media with the latest line approved by their leadership and reflect back what they think it wants to hear. That comes from an article not from Labor but from the Hon. Peter Costello. It was free advice to the Abbott government. The 'woodchucks' that he refers to in that article—I did not know what a woodchuck is; I had to Google it; it is a sort of a rodent, also known as a whistlepig—are eager for promotion and will say and do anything the leadership wants. That is where we are today. Someone on the other side had a little bit of intestinal fortitude and tried to stand up for his electorate because they are invading his space. He said: 'What are you doing about securing our small businesses, our small to medium enterprises, our big businesses and our jobs?' He stood up and tried to get a commitment.

Australian companies can tender for the biggest procurement decision in Australian defence history, and a government owned asset can tender for the biggest procurement contract in Australia's defence history Heaven forbid! If you approached voters in the street and said 'Do you think it's appropriate that Australian businesses and Australian government enterprises tender for the biggest defence contract in Australia's history?' I am not sure you would find anyone who would say 'No, we shouldn't. We should restrict it to a select group of international partners who we think we have more confidence in'—none of which has actually built the submarine that we need or operated a submarine under the same conditions as ours. And there is an abundance of evidence coming into the Senate economics committee inquiry and this parliament from all sorts of people with an interest in this area. They are all saying, 'It's a pretty simple process. We should have a complete competitive tender, and the assets the government owns would be foremost in that tendering process.'

We know from the Collins class submarine and the Navantia design that there have been huge problems with submarine plans drawn up in other languages. We know this from our learnt and lived experience. We know from the Australian National Audit Office reports that there is an average of 2.75 revisions to every drawing that is put in front of a tradesman, and we know that they have had to rebuild the work. And we know through the Auditor-General's contribution to the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit that the productivity has been mainly about revision of drawings, a lack of clarity of drawings and doing the work twice.

I want to finish with this: we have many thousands of South Australian voters, many thousands of South Australian skilled workers—union members, and proudly so, some of whom were in this place yesterday—who simply want a fair go. And it really is beyond me that any government of any colour or any persuasion cannot see the clarity of letting people compete for the work and give a damn good result.

Question agreed to.

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (15:29): I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Assistant Minister for Health (Senator Nash) to a question without notice asked by Senator Siewert today relating to funding for services for Indigenous Australians.

For a start, it is quite obvious from the minister's response—although she tried not to say it—that, no, the government will not be returning the funding that they cut. The position that she took was, 'We are putting all this money in.' Yes, that is great, but there is still a cut. There is still $168 million being taken out of the health budget. There is still $534 million being taken out of Aboriginal programs. You can talk all you like about the money you are investing, and that is great—it is helping—but there has been a cut. I will talk about this in more detail when we address the Closing the Gap annual report.

I want to refer to the Close the Gap Campaign Steering Committee's progress report. When you read that report, the point that comes out really clearly in that we need to make a long-term sustained commitment to funding, because the target we are aiming for is to close the gap in life expectancy by 2030. Therefore we need to make sure that we provide that funding. But, no, the government have cut funding. They have taken $168 million out of the health budget. That will have an impact on our ability to close the gap.

When I asked about the co-payment, the minister was talking extensively about the fact that they have consulted. Well, I have spoken to a large number of Aboriginal medical services, and guess what? No, they have not been consulted about the impact of the co-payment on their clients. No, they have not been consulted by the government on the co-payment. We did hear, through the Senate inquiries into inequality and into the impact of the cuts, that the co-payment will have an impact on the clients of Aboriginal medical services. But that was through the Senate inquiry process; it was not through the government's consultation process. So for the government to say they have been consulting Aboriginal medical services about the impact of the co-payment on their clients is in fact a nonsense.

In terms of the minister making any long-term commitment to long-term funding for Aboriginal medical services, again she would not answer that question. She said, 'Yes, we are talking about it.' With the current turmoil surrounding funding for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander programs, including health programs, Aboriginal medical services are deeply concerned about the future of their services. Apparently they have been able to engage with the government on that. The minister did say that they have been engaging with the sector, but in fact they have not been able to resolve that. They were given a 12-month contract but they still have no guarantee that they will have long-term funding.

That takes me back to the issue I started with—that is, it is quite obvious that, if we are going to close the gap by 2030, we need sustained long-term investment in health programs. But here we are, stumbling at the first hurdle, when we are not even prepared to make sure that we are committed to long-term funding of Aboriginal medical services. We absolutely need to increase our investment in primary health services, but AMSs also work with other programs. While we have got turmoil in the grants program from the Department of Social Services and absolute turmoil with what is happening with the Indigenous Advancement Strategy—where, on the current timetable, organisations are not even going to know the outcomes of that until the end of March—those funding decisions also impact on the ability of Aboriginal medical services to deliver ongoing health services to clients and, in particular, to address the issues around poor chronic health outcomes. The Closing the Gap reports particularly highlight that chronic health outcomes are going backwards.

How can Aboriginal medical services plan for the long-term if they do not know what their funding is going to be from year to year? How can they keep top-quality medical specialists if they do not know what their funding is going to be? The money that has been taken out of their budget—$168 million—is a huge whack to delivering Aboriginal medical health services. It should be reversed. Any commitment by the government is undermined by their failure to do that.

Question agreed to.

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (15:40): At the request of Senator Milne, I move:

That the Senate—

(a) welcomes the Egyptian Government's decision to unconditionally release and deport Australian journalist, Mr Peter Greste;

(b) recognises the tireless work of the Greste family, the Australian Government, the Ambassador and embassy staff in Cairo, and supporters of free press in Australia and around the world in advocating for the release of Mr Greste; and

(c) calls on the Egyptian Government to uphold freedom of the press and ensure the just and timely release of Mr Greste's Al Jazeera colleagues, Mr Mohamed Fahmy and Mr Baher Mohamed.

Question agreed to.

Senator O'SULLIVAN (Queensland—Nationals Whip in the Senate) (15:41): I move:

That the Senate recognises Australia's ability to develop and expand the kangaroo meat and hide industry, which can create jobs and build wealth for communities across rural and regional Australia.

Question agreed to.

Senator URQUHART (Tasmania—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (15:41): I indicate that I will be adding my name and that of Senator Moore to this motion. I, and also on behalf of Senators Bilyk, Polley and Moore, move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes:

(i) that February is Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month, which aims to raise awareness among Australian women of the symptoms of ovarian cancer,

(ii) that each year 1 400 Australian women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer, and more than 1 000 will die from the disease – that is one woman every 8 hours, and

(iii) with concern, That the prognosis for women diagnosed with ovarian cancer is generally poor due to the advanced stage of most ovarian cancers at the time of diagnosis;

(b) acknowledges that there is no screening program or detection test for ovarian cancer, and That the Pap smear will not detect the disease;

(c) recognises that:

(i) ovarian cancer is not a silent disease and that all women experience symptoms, even in the early stages of the cancer, and

(ii) the four most common symptoms are:

   (A) abdominal or pelvic pain,

   (B) increased abdominal size or persistent abdominal bloating,

   (C) needing to urinate often or urgently, and

   (D) difficulty eating or feeling full quickly;

(d) understands that every Australian woman needs to know the symptoms of ovarian cancer; and

(e) notes the need for greater focus on education and additional research funding to help Australian scientists to find early detection markers and more effective treatments for this disease.

Question agreed to.

Senator BUSHBY (Tasmania—Chief Government Whip in the Senate) (15:42): At the request of Senator Cash, I indicate that I will be adding the name of Senator Waters to the motion. I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) February 2015 marks Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month,

(ii) Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month is run every year by Ovarian Cancer Australia and its purpose is to raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of ovarian cancer and to offer support for the women, their families and friends affected by ovarian cancer, and

(iii) Teal Ribbon Day is commemorated on Wednesday, 25 February 2015, and is a day when all Australians are invited to wear a teal ribbon to show support for ovarian cancer awareness, support and research;

(b) recognises that:

(i) ovarian cancer is one of the most commonly diagnosed gynaecological cancers in Australia, with more than 1 300 Australian women diagnosed with ovarian cancer each year, which equates to almost four women each day,

(ii) ovarian cancer has a low survival rate compared to other women's cancers, with more than two thirds of ovarian cancers being advanced at the time of diagnosis and therefore being difficult to treat,

(iii) there are no screening tests for ovarian cancer that provide early detection and many Australian men and women remain unaware of the symptoms of this insidious disease, and

(iv) from 2000 to 2014, the National Health and Medical Research Council allocated over $97 million in funding for research into ovarian cancer, and over $11 million is to be allocated in 2015 to 2018; and

(c) commends Ovarian Cancer Australia for its continuing efforts to raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of ovarian cancer, and to provide support to those Australians affected by ovarian cancer.

Question agreed to.

Senator URQUHART (Tasmania—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (15:43): At the request of Senator Wong, I move:

That—

(a) the Senate—

(i) notes the Abbott Government's failure to keep Parliament and the public informed of the nature and progress of its trade negotiations,

(ii) expresses concern that the Abbott Government's lack of transparency diminishes industry and community engagement and undermines support for trade liberalisation,

(iii) draws to the attention of the Minister representing the Minister for Trade and Investment the order of the Senate of 11 December 2013 requiring bilateral and plurilateral trade agreements to be tabled at least 14 days before signing, and

(iv) requires the Minister representing the Minister for Trade and Investment to make a statement in the Senate on the status of negotiations on the proposed Trans Pacific Partnership no later than 4 pm on Thursday, 12 February 2015;

(b) at the conclusion of the statement a senator may move to take note of the statement; or

(c) if no statement has been made by the Minister representing the Minister for Trade and Investment by 4 pm on Thursday, 12 February 2015, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate (Senator Wong) may immediately move a further motion relating to the Minister's failure to comply.

Senator PAYNE (New South Wales—Minister for Human Services) (15:43): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Is leave granted? Is leave granted? Leave is granted for one minute. It does help me if someone gives me that indication fairly quickly.

Senator PAYNE: The Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement negotiations are at an advanced stage and only the most difficult issues remain. Australia is working hard to conclude negotiations as soon as possible; however, we will not sacrifice a comprehensive, ambitious TPP outcome in order to obtain a quick deal.

TPP countries, including Canada, Mexico and Japan, accounted for a third of Australia's total trade in 2012-13.

The 12 TPP parties have agreed to keep the negotiating documents, including the text, confidential. Pre-emptive and unilateral release of such confidential information would damage Australia's standing as a negotiating partner. Australia will be in a position to publicly release the text when all parties agree to do so, not before.

The Senate can be assured that, once the text of trade agreements is ratified between parties but before it is ratified by the Australian government, it will be made public and it will be subject to parliamentary scrutiny through the well-established review processes through the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties.

I note the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has provided over 700 public consultations on the TPP negotiations and is open to receive further submissions. (Time expired)

Senator WHISH-WILSON (Tasmania) (15:45): Mr President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator WHISH-WILSON: We do not necessarily support the wording of this motion, but we do support the intent to actually get debate in this chamber and some transparency around what is the biggest trade deal in this country's history, totally negotiated in secret, behind closed doors, and pushed by special interests in both the US and other countries around this region. It is totally unacceptable to Australians in this country that a trade agreement that will change the laws in this country, that will impact on significant matters of public interest, is being negotiated behind closed doors by DFAT officials where only one or two senior ministers on this government's front bench know the details of this deal. This is a huge issue around the world. It is in the US, as it is in Europe. The European Parliament has recently voted to give the text to the public before it is signed. This will be signed by cabinet. Parliament will not be able to change it. You vote for or against it. It is simply unacceptable and the Australian public are starting to make their voice heard. (Time expired)

The PRESIDENT: The question now is that the motion moved by Senator Urquhart on behalf of Senator Wong be agreed to.

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (15:53): I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) the Western Australian Government has implemented a new catch and kill policy which applies to the International Union for Conservation of Nature red listed and federally protected white sharks, and

(ii) the new 'Serious Threat Guidelines' (the guidelines) enable a shark to be caught and killed simply for being detected in a location over a number of days, without requiring other preventative actions to be implemented first, such as closing beaches, and allow the continued use of indiscriminate capture measures such as baited drum lines;

(b) condemns the guidelines of the Western Australian Government; and

(c) calls on the Minister for the Environment (Mr Hunt) not to grant any further exemptions to the Western Australian Government under section 158 of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 that would allow Western Australia to instigate the guidelines.

Senator FIFIELD (Victoria—Manager of Government Business in the Senate and Assistant Minister for Social Services) (15:53): Mr President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute, Senator Fifield.

Senator FIFIELD: On behalf of Minister Hunt, I should point out that this is another example of the Greens ignoring the facts and wasting the Senate's time. An exemption is not required under national environmental law. It is up to the WA government to determine whether implementing their shark policy would have a significant impact. This has been the case since the Australian parliament established the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act in 1999, into law in 2000. The Australian government's one-stop-shop policy continues to maintain these high environmental standards. We suggest that the Greens take the time to properly research the EPBC Act before moving motions in the future. This government is committed to ensuring a proper balance between protecting public safety and protecting the environment.

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (15:54): Mr President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute, Senator Siewert.

Senator SIEWERT: This is another example of the Minister for the Environment, Minister Hunt, seeking to wash his hands of his responsibilities under the EPBC Act for the protection of white sharks. The implementation of serious threat policies or guidelines could in fact result in more deaths of white sharks—

Government senators interjecting—

Senator SIEWERT: President, the people on this side of the chamber are speaking so loudly I cannot hear myself think.

The PRESIDENT: Order!

Senator SIEWERT: More sharks could end up being killed under this policy than could have been killed under the shark cull proposal of the Barnett—

Senator Ian Macdonald interjecting—

Senator SIEWERT: Senator Macdonald, could you please be quiet!

The PRESIDENT: Order, Senator Siewert. All senators, especially senators not in their seats, should not interject at any time. Senator Siewert has the call and she has the right to be heard in silence.

Senator SIEWERT: More sharks could end up being taken under this policy than taken under the cull, when the WA EPA clearly said that the cull should not go ahead. So here we have a policy, endorsed by the federal government, that could see more protected sharks being killed than under the revolting cull policy. It should be condemned by this chamber. (Time expired)

Question negatived.

Senator SCULLION (Northern Territory—Minister for Indigenous Affairs and Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) (15:56): On behalf of the Prime Minister, I table the annual report on Closing the Gap and accompanying ministerial statement. I seek leave to move a motion relating to the consideration of the document.

Leave granted.

Senator SCULLION: I move:

That the speaking times related to a motion being moved to the document shall not be more than 10 minutes.

Question agreed to.

Senator SCULLION: I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

The Closing the Gap report is both a lesson in how bad things have become and a vindication of how necessary the changes are that we are making for the future of each and every Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and family. When we compile these reports year after year we are reminded of the systemic failure, as was stated in the national apology, of the laws and policies that inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders over generations. Although there have been some improvements in education and health outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, the report shows, frustratingly, that most of the targets are not on track to be met. Indigenous life expectancy and mortality rates have improved slightly, but we are still not on track to meet the 2031 target. Progress has slowed on the Indigenous child mortality target, but it is broadly on track to be met by 2018. We continue to roll out access to early childhood education in remote communities and all jurisdictions have committed to achieving 95 per cent enrolment this year. Whilst we are on track to halve the gap in year 12 attainment by 2020, no overall progress has been made on the target to halve the gap in reading, writing and numeracy achievements for Indigenous students by 2018. It is further proof that we must get children to go to school.

There has been no progress so far on the employment target and I worry that we may be going backwards. In 2008, both sides of parliament committed to redress the inequality and disadvantage in the daily life of many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders and their communities. We are all committed to a future where we would harness the determination of all Australians, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, to close the gap and a future where we embrace the possibility of new solutions to enduring problems where old approaches have failed. Despite the goodwill of all sides of politics, old approaches have failed. So, for the past year we have been living up to our commitment to continue our efforts to close the gap by putting in place something better.

To get greater traction on longstanding challenges in Indigenous affairs, investment needs to be focused on priority actions. It needs to be better targeted on doing things that have been proven and on measurable impacts on Indigenous outcomes. The Indigenous Advancement Strategy focused government investment on the priority areas of getting kids to school, getting adults into work and making communities safer. I have no doubt that getting traction in these areas will help deliver real, practical, demonstrable improvements in the lives of Aboriginal and Islander people, their families and their communities.

We have significantly changed the approach to the Indigenous affairs policy. The new Indigenous Advancement Strategy is designed to be nimble, taking away the silo effect and the ineffectiveness and confusion for users of 150 programs. More importantly, it is responsive to community needs and does not impose directives from this place. The whole structure of the bureaucracy is being overhauled, so the IAS is supported by a new network of regional offices and staff located in strategic locations across the country, and bureaucrats work with locals so that there are agreed rather than imposed outcomes. Results from the first Indigenous Advancement Strategy funding round will be made known in March this year. We are involving Indigenous people in the design and delivery of local solutions to local challenges. But some of these issues that affect communities across the country cannot be fixed in isolation or, in fact, single-handedly, thus requiring all of us to give a maximum effort, especially school, education and jobs.

Children must go to school. The school attendance statistics are variable, as you would expect them to be, but truancy is an issue right across Australia. Indigenous attendance rates at government schools are currently lower than for other students for years 1 to 10 in all states and territories. Non-attendance is more acute in remote and very remote locations. The Remote School Attendance Strategy has made an important start on this. More than 410 school attendance officers and more than 100 school attendance supervisors now operate in the 69 priority RSAS communities and 73 schools. I frequently walk out with the school attendance officers and see how it all works in a community. I did it with the Prime Minister when we were in Arnhem Land last September, and I have done it in several more remote schools in January.

The Remote School Attendance Strategy is continuing to show promising results in the Northern Territory and Queensland. In term 3 of 2014 there was a 13 per cent rise in the number of children attending school across 29 Northern Territory government RSAS schools and an eight per cent rise in the number of children attending the 11 Queensland government RSAS schools compared with term 3 of 2013. Good education is a stepping stone into a job. Whether you live in a city, a town, a regional area or a remote or very remote area, we acknowledge that we must help adults and young people move successfully from school into either higher education or training and into stable meaningful work.

The key aim is to provide real pathways to employment. This is particularly necessary in remote areas. Over half of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in remote areas are welfare reliant. Too many people simply do not have enough to do. It is worse in very remote areas, with nearly two-thirds of people reliant on welfare. To give these people a chance for something better, Work for the Dole will be introduced into remote communities from July 2015, with the majority of job seekers to undertake work-like activities five days a week.

Guaranteed employment and job-specific training is the aim of vocational training and employment centres—VTECs—which build on the GenerationOne model. There are 28 VTECs around Australia and another VTEC in the pipeline. VTECs end the training for training's sake cycle and will provide guaranteed jobs at the end of training for over 5,400 Indigenous people across Australia. Even since July, over 1,300 people have commenced with VTEC, with 921 Indigenous people now in jobs at the other end of the VTEC process. We are on track to more than 5,000 individuals trained into real jobs by the end of this year. VTECs are part of the government push to create jobs for Indigenous Australians, as is Work for the Dole.

Just as going to and talking with communities, in my view, is far more instructive than reading a report, stories about people are more poignant than any statistic. Last year I visited Real Futures, the provider of the Kempsey VTEC. Real Futures is an Indigenous business that is proving to be successful at getting people off welfare and into valuable, meaningful work. One of those people who is getting trained and is getting a job is Pam Matheson. Pam has partly completed her Certificate IV in Community Services. Now, while she does that, Pam is working to train and coordinate volunteers to yarn with isolated, disabled or lonely Aboriginal people, encouraging them to reconnect with their community. This is part of the TeleYARN program. Training and a job are the two things that have changed Pam's life. Those two things will also change the lives and the future for her three daughters, and because she is motivated to be the very best role model she can be these two things will also change a community.

Pam's story is one example of what we want for every Indigenous Australian who is out of work. We are working with providers, businesses and big corporates across Australia to increase the number of available positions for Indigenous people, and we are leading from the front. As the Prime Minister announced in that other place as part of the government's initial response to the recommendations of the Forrest review, we aim to increase Indigenous employment in the Commonwealth public sector. The government will also strengthen the Commonwealth's Indigenous procurement policy, using the Commonwealth's $39 billion procurement budget to encourage Indigenous businesses in employment. In two multimillion dollar contracts the Department of Defence has engaged Indigenous owned company Pacific Services Group Holdings to refurbish existing marine infrastructure and buildings at HMAS Waterhen in Sydney and as the managing contractor for stage 1 of the planning phase of the critical infrastructure recovery project at Garden Island. Such massive contracts and job opportunities are a sign of how serious we are about including Indigenous people and businesses in the economy.

As the apology said, it will take both mutual respect and mutual responsibility to close the gap. This last year has been about getting the foundations of mutual responsibility right and further developing the mutual respect. It is too soon to quantify the impact of the changes we are making. As I travel around the country and I talk to Aboriginal and Islander people I am reminded that they each deserve our respect and our attention. Whilst we may want speedy statistics, speedy statistics actually represent people—people who need a sustained change over time. For each of these people we must stay the course, get children to school, adults into work and make our communities safer so Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have the chance to build better lives for themselves and their families.

Senator WONG (South Australia—Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) (16:07): Let me begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet today and on which this parliament sits. I pay my respect to elders past and present. I welcome Prime Minister Abbott's statement and his presentation of the seventh annual Closing the Gap report to the parliament, and I also acknowledge the role of former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in establishing the Closing the Gap process and the role of prime ministers Rudd and Gillard in presenting these reports in earlier years.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have been grievously discriminated against since Europeans arrived in Australia more than 200 years ago. They have been dispossessed and disempowered. They have had their land, their languages, their culture and their children taken from them. They have suffered deeply entrenched systemic disadvantage for generations. Overcoming the terrible legacy of disadvantage is an urgent national project. It requires the marshalling of significant resources and a strong, consistent and focused effort. It is also a long-term project; it must be sustained and maintained for years to come. And it is a project for all of us; it requires commitment across the political divide and across the community.

Our nation prides itself on an egalitarian spirit, on its notion of the fair go and its sense of decency. But this is no egalitarian land when there is an unemployment rate of 21 per cent for our Indigenous people. This is no egalitarian land when the median household income of Aboriginal and Islander adults is half that of non-Indigenous adults. And this is no egalitarian land when Aboriginal juveniles are 24 times more likely than non-Aboriginals to be in detention. There can be no fair go that excludes the original inhabitants of this country. And there can be no sense of decency when Aboriginal children are nearly twice as likely to die before the age of five as non-Indigenous children.

This is why the Closing the Gap reports are important. They represent an annual stocktake of progress towards achieving a fair go for our first Australians.They provide a yardstick against which we, as political leaders, must measure ourselves.They require us—all of us—to match our words with deeds, our aspirations with actions and our sentiments with policies and programs that are welldesigned and which deliver real outcomes. This is why Labor has urged, and will continue to urge, this government to reverse the $500 million which was cut from Indigenous programs in last year's budget.These cuts have real effects on existing services in areas like preventive health, legal aid and family and children's centres.

The Closing the G ap approach owes a great deal to form er Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who opened the 42nd Parliament in 2008 with an apology to the stolen generations and who delivered the first Closing the G ap report a year later. In 2008 the Council of Australian Governments established a series of targets to reduce the gap in Indigenous disadvantage. As we all know, o ne of the most important aspects of this approach is the focus on evidence and data to monitor outcomes. At COAG's request, the Productivity Commission has been producing regular Overcoming Indigenous Disadvantage reports, which collect mountains of data on our progress in closing the gap.

The latest Overcoming Indigenous Disadvantage report was released in November last year. It contains both positive news and sobering news. The positive news is that the efforts of recent years are resulting in improvements in the areas of health, post - secondary education and employment. The gap in life expectancy between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians has narrowed over recent years. Yet, it is still too wide. In 2010-12 life expectancy for Indigenous males was 69.1 years compared to 79.7 for non-Indigenous males. Life expectancy for Indigenous females was 73.7 years , but for non-Indigenous females it was 83.2. Fewer Indigenous children are dying. Mortality rates for Indigenous children have improved significantly over the period 1998 to 2012. For infants under 12 months of age, mortality rates have more than halved from 14 deaths for every 1,000 live births in 1998 to five deaths per 1,000 births in 2012.

The Overcoming Indigenous Disadvantage report also shows that post-secondary education outcomes have improved , with a marked increase in the proportion of young Indig enous people who are finishing y ear 12 and going on to further education. It is also heartening to see basic economic outcomes improving—higher rates of full-time and professional employment, higher incomes, lower reliance on income support and increased home ownership for many Indigenous Australians. And that is good news. It also shows that the national effort that has been underway for the last decade or so is achieving results.

But, as I said, the report has sobering news as well. It found that in some areas we are not improving but just marking time, and that i n other areas the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians is actually growing wider. Despite the improvements in post-secondary education, in schooling there has been virtually no chan ge since 2008 in the proportion of Indigenous students achieving minimum standards in reading, writing and numeracy. Despite the improvements in life expectancy and child mortality, rates of chronic disease and disability remain high amongst our first peoples. Mental health outcomes have not improved and the incidence of self-harm has increased. And l egal and justice outcomes for our Indigenous people have deteriorated. Imprisonment rates for adults increased by 57 per cent between 2000 and 2013 , and juvenile detention rates have increased sharply. So the news is indeed sobering. It also provides an indication of where we need to focus and redouble our efforts and to re-evaluate existing policies.

These statistics and many more are an essential part of the C losing the G ap approach. By measuring outcomes , all of us are held accountable—policymakers, governments and legislators. We are also provided with information that should ensure that the design and implementation of policies can be improved. But just as important as the quantitative data is the qualitative data. A valuable feature of the Overcoming Indigenous Disadvantage report was its focus on the things that work—case studies of individual initiatives which have been rigorously evaluated and shown to be successful. What these show us is that well-designed programs can and do make a difference. We can make a difference.

But behind the statistics, behind the case studies and, indeed, behind the speeches today there are so many individual stories of people across this nation making a difference—whether it is the hundreds of thousands of community leaders, health workers, teachers, social and community workers and others around Australia, whether it is my friend and colleague Senator Nova Peris or whether it is people like Tanya Hosch and Tim Gartrell from Recognise Australia and people like Tom Calma and Melinda Cilento, the co-chairs of Reconciliation Australia. As I have said, there are so many people who work in our communities to redress this disadvantage. There are so many Australians who work to improve the lives of our Indigenous people.

The Prime Minister said today: 'We know that, until Indigenous Australians fully participate in the life of our country, all of us are diminished.' And the Leader of the Opposition said: 'A great nation includes everyone, and a good society leaves no-one behind.' I endorse the sentiments of both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition and I again reaffirm in this place the opposition's commitment to the great national project of Closing the Gap.

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (16:15): I too rise to make a contribution on the Closing the gap report. Much is made in this place of bipartisan or, as I like to call it, multipartisan support for closing the gap in Aboriginal life expectancy and disadvantage. While we the Greens are fully committed to that, that does not mean that we cannot and should not uncritically accept what is happening and the policy in this place that the government of any persuasion develops to address the gap on life expectancy for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. It is in that context that I make my contribution to this debate, because we do not think that the current government has the policy settings right. The Prime Minister himself said that much more work is needed because this seventh Closing the gap report is profoundly disappointing. I very rarely agree with this Prime Minister, but I do agree with him on that point, because it is profoundly disappointing. But, more importantly, the policies that this government have put in place are profoundly disappointing.

We have already heard some of the statistics, and I will probably cite a few more. But statistics can be used to blind people to what is actually happening out there. The Minister for Indigenous Affairs said that the government are trying to do something better. I question whether things are being done better. I think that people are being kind when they say, 'We've seen a year of turmoil in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander issues.' We do not know what is going on with the funding. We have seen funding cuts. They can quote all the figures they like, but the simple fact is that funding has been cut from Indigenous programs. What is more, in many cases we do not actually know where those funding cuts have happened because we will not know the outcomes of the Indigenous advancement strategy tender process until March. The government would like you to think that there has been a considered approach to the way the funding has been cut. There has not been. There have been cuts across programs.

We have already seen some significant cuts that we do know of, and that includes the $534.4 million in cuts overall that has come out of the programs. There has been a $168 million cut out of health programs alone. I know that my colleague Senator Wright will have a lot to say around this issue in particular when she makes her contribution, but we have seen $34 million worth of cuts to legal aid and policy reform programs. There have been cuts to the national Aboriginal Family Violence Prevention Legal Services program of $3.6 million over the next three years.

The government claims that in fact there have not been any cuts there and that those services can tender through the IAS. The simple fact is we do not know. Those services and those programs are suffering now. Certainly the legal aid programs are being cut. In fact, when I asked in estimates about the cuts to those legal aid programs and reforms, particularly of policy, of course the government said that they would not affect frontline services. But I asked the Social Justice Commissioner Mick Gooda about that, and he said, 'Yes, of course it will affect the delivery of legal aid on the ground, and I am getting feedback constantly about the impact those cuts have had.'

As evidenced from this Closing the gap report, some things have got worse. I will address the issue around chronic illness later. Many things have got worse. We are not on track for progress on closing the gap in life expectancy in a generation. Yes, there has been some small progress, but clearly we are not on track to meet that target. We are on track—thank goodness!—to halve the gap in mortality rates for Indigenous children under five within a decade. We are on track for that. That is great. We have not met the target to ensure access for all Indigenous four-year-olds in remote communities to early childhood education. We are not on track to halve the gap in reading, writing and numeracy achievements for Indigenous students. We are not on track to halve the gap in employment outcomes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. We will not meet our commitments to close the gap unless we significantly change what we are doing.

I put to this place that going to a billionaire, Mr Forrest, to ask him what we should be doing is not the right thing to do either. That is a wish list from a billionaire about what we should be doing. Outsourcing policy development in that manner is not the approach that we should be taking. He—surprise, surprise!—recommended more of what the government wants to do—for example, income management. We do not need ideological beliefs rather than evidenced based policies. Income management does not work. We have had report after report about the fact that it does not work. The latest evaluation could not find any substantive evidence of the program causing significant changes relative to its key policy objectives, including changing people's behaviour. There is no evidence of an overall improvement in financial wellbeing, including reduction in financial harassment or improved financial management skills. More general measures of wellbeing in the community show no evidence of improvement, including for children. Rather than building capacity and independence, for many, the program has acted to make people more dependent on welfare. It does not work, yet we are still doing it. That is not doing something new; that is in fact a continuation of more failed programs. We have not managed to progress cooperation between the states and the Commonwealth after the end of the national partnership agreements.

One of the areas where we have made progress, thank goodness, is in cutting smoking—and what have the government done? They cut funding to address smoking, and they will come back and try and tell you, 'We haven't cut funding to smoking.' Well, they have cut funding. You go and talk to any of the services that are delivering that program and they will tell you what impact that is having. They have cut that particular program.

The impacts of the funding cuts compound other cruel government measures, around income support, for example. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, when he delivered his report last year, did not pull his punches when he made comment about the impact of these cuts. He talked about the lack of consultation, where the Assistant Minister for Health claims there is significant consultation. In answer to my question earlier this afternoon about the health budget, she said there was a lot of consultation. The commissioner for social justice found that there was not. He found that the consultation on the government's Indigenous Advancement Strategy had been scant, with minimal involvement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. The lack of a consultation process, he said, was concerning. He described the first year of the Abbott government in Indigenous affairs as a year characterised by deep funding cuts, the radical reshaping of existing programs and services and the development of new programs and services, and said that the lack of clarity and muddled narrative was deeply concerning. It is no wonder that we have gone backwards in closing the gap.

Every year, I table in this place the Close the Gap steering committee report. It used to be called the 'shadow' report, but now it is called the Progress and priorities report 2015. They make a number of recommendations in their report that I recommend that the government take on board and read very carefully. If you read it, the key narrative that runs through it, besides the issues around not meeting the Close the Gap targets, is the need for long-term, sustained commitment to funding. That is what we need in this place, not cuts—not having Aboriginal medical services that have to work out, year by year, whether they will have funding, whether they will be able to keep their staff, whether the programs that are working will be kept going and whether they are going to be chopped and changed. We need long-term, sustained commitment to address closing the gap. We need to address the soaring incarceration rates—not build prisons but invest in alternative approaches such as justice reinvestment, which, again, Senator Wright will address. We need to be addressing the issues around cognitive impairment and people with cognitive impairment in indefinite detention.

These are all issues that the government is not addressing and that need to be addressed if we are going to genuinely close the gap. We are committed and will continue to be committed to close the gap, but we will not stand by and let policies stand without criticism that are not going to close the gap. We will continue to hold the government accountable. I seek leave to table the Progress and priorities report 2015of the Close the Gap Campaign Steering Committee.

Leave granted.

Senator NASH (New South Wales—Deputy Leader of The Nationals in the Senate and Assistant Minister for Health) (16:26): As minister responsible for Indigenous health, I rise to make a contribution to the tabling of the Close the Gap report. Before I do so, I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we meet and pay my respect to their elders past and present.

It is a very important day today in terms of the bipartisan nature of the day and of us all towards the sector—and I do indeed take Senator Siewert's point about it being multipartisan. I think we are all focused on ensuring that we get better outcomes for the Indigenous communities right across this country. It is really important that we look forward. We know where we are at this point in time, we know what has happened over time and it is really important that we focus on the future—on improvement, getting things right and, from this day onwards, making sure we do things as government better even than we have done before. I would particularly like to take the opportunity to thank all of those in the Indigenous sector who have given me such great advice over the time I have been in this role in terms of the Indigenous health policy for this government. I really do very much appreciate it.

As has been said by many today, we still have a long way to go. There is a lot yet to achieve, but I think it is really important that we acknowledge the things that have been done and the improvements that have been made. Within health, we have seen an increase in life expectancy overall, a decline in Indigenous death rates from chronic diseases, notably cardiovascular disease, and improvements in child and maternal health. We are on track to achieve the target to halve the gap in child mortality rates by 2018 and, while it has been small, there has been a reduction in the life expectancy gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians by 0.8 years for men and 0.1 years for women. The reason I make those points is to acknowledge all those people in this sector, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, who have worked so hard for such a long period of time to make those improvements. While I know we need to focus on what still is yet to be done and what has to be done, I think it is very important for those people who have worked so hard, day in, day out, out in our communities to make things better for the lives of Indigenous people that we do acknowledge the improvements and the gains that have been made.

In health, one of the major pieces of work we are doing at the moment is working on the implementation of the health plan. I acknowledge all of the work that went into the health plan, which was done under the previous government, by those across the sector particularly in the wide consultation that took place. What we need to do now is turn that document, which is a good document and an aspirational document, into action, which is what we are doing now as government with the implementation plan. We need to turn that health plan document into tangible outcomes on the ground, through the implementation plan, that will improve health outcomes for Indigenous people. I am very pleased that there has been a lot of collaboration on that. I thank the National Health Leadership Forum for the contribution they are making in that process. I believe that at the end of this long process we are going to have an implementation plan that will truly make a difference for health outcomes for Indigenous people.

I note the work of the Aboriginal community controlled health organisations and NACCHO, their peak body, but particularly those organisations out on the ground. Comprehensive primary health care is so important if we are going to improve health outcomes for Indigenous people. Community controlled health organisations play a significant role and are going to continue to play an important role in ensuring that we close the gap. As I travel around these communities, I am continually impressed by the work of the AMSs. Some of the work they are doing is simply extraordinary. Their focus, the work they are doing and the exceptional way that they are showing leadership in their communities and delivering health services is extremely impressive. Having said that, there are organisations that can do better. My task is to work with a community to look at ways to improve those that are not doing as well as others so that across the sector we can improve the work of those organisations, ensuring that we get better health outcomes right across the board for our Indigenous communities.

The government is investing $3.1 billion in health over the forward estimates, but funding does not of itself lead to better outcomes. I think we all recognise that. No bucket of money is going to change anything in this world. It is only what you can do with that bucket of money. That is why the government is so focused on making sure that we get it right, that we have the right policies and programs in place, so that that money makes a difference and actually leads to better health outcomes for Indigenous people. That means making sure that we improve our data levels, that we improve assessment, that we look at the programs and policies that are being rolled out and that we ensure that we get the outcomes that we want. That is why the government is focused on making sure that we review some of the policies and programs that are in place and that we target better health outcomes by making sure we have the right policies and programs in place. It is about ensuring we are focused on preventive health. It is about ensuring we are focused on the management of chronic disease. It is about ensuring we are tackling smoking. It is about those issues amongst a range of other things. We have to look forward and make sure that we keep focused on doing better in the future. It is about culturally appropriate delivery of health services. It is about ensuring that we eliminate racism in the health sector for Indigenous people. Without those two things, I truly believe we will not make the progress we want. It is something that I as the minister responsible for Indigenous health am very focused on. I will continue working with the sector to ensure that we achieve both of those things.

There has been a lot of commentary about statistics. We do need to pay attention to them. Through statistics the report shows clearly where the improvements, although small, have been and what we still need to do. But it is not just about statistics. If we are going to close the gap on health we need to ensure that we focus on what is going to work. Particularly in the health area there is not necessarily a one size fits all policy. What we need when it comes to improving health outcomes of Indigenous people in Mossman Gorge is different from what we need in Sydney, from what we need in Wilcannia, from what we need in Kintore and from what we need in Fitzroy Crossing. It is really important that we have flexibility, so that communities can deliver services targeted at how they are needed in those communities.

So often Indigenous leaders and Indigenous people in the communities actually have the solutions to so many of our health problems. We need to listen to our Indigenous leaders and, indeed, all those in Indigenous communities about how they see the future being better, about how they see us being able to improve health outcomes and what they see as their contribution. This is going to be a collective. The government cannot do it on its own. We cannot do it sitting here in this chamber with the opposition and those on the crossbenches. We can do it only if we work together in this place as government, as opposition, as crossbenchers with those in the community, and we need to meet halfway. We are going to work together only if we have mutual trust. We have so many working in the health sector in our Indigenous communities. We need to trust them to deliver those health services where they can do such great improvements working with their own communities. We need to trust that they have the judgement do the right thing. I certainly do. It is very, very important that we continue to focus on the future, that we work collectively and that we work with Indigenous communities, because every single person in this place and across the communities wants to see better health outcomes for Indigenous communities and see us close the gap.

Senator PERIS (Northern Territory) (16:36): I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the Ngambri-Ngunawal people, on whose land we stand today, and acknowledge my ancestors past and present and our future leaders. Today is an opportunity for all of us to speak out about reality. It is a day on which I stand here as an Aboriginal woman with the inherent responsibility to fight and sustain our culture for future generations. Unless you are on some other planet today what is being echoed in the walls of Parliament House by Aboriginal people who have gathered here today is that there are a lot of unhappy people out there.

Whilst a lot of people come to Parliament House to talk about Closing the Gap and walk away with a warm and fuzzy feeling about what it means to them and think that we are progressing, the gap in fact is not closing. People reflect on Australia as a nation of hope and a nation of opportunity, but we are a nation that continually lets down Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples—we are failing citizens of this country. We are not on track to close the gap on life expectancy, and the gap is not closing because things that work are being ignored. I have been listening to Senator Nash—and I have the greatest respect for her—and she understands what she says. But here is big difference between actually understanding it and wanting to implement what people are saying out there in the communities.

I have been around a long time, and Aboriginal people feel that what we say is falling on deaf ears day in and day out. Today we heard the Prime Minister claim that he is profoundly disappointed that the Closing the Gap has stalled. It is great that he has said that, because today we have heard truth in this place. That is what happens when you cut the funding from frontline services that have been proven to work. It is simple: Closing the Gap has fallen through the cracks of a divided and dysfunctional government. When we heard the opposition leader talk about cuts to frontline services, I saw 10 coalition members just get up and walk out. We heard Senator Nash talking about that this has to be a bipartisan approach, but to sustain lives everybody needs to be at the table to give hope and to implement the right things that Aboriginal people need. That walkout showed a total disrespect not only for leaders of this country but for a race of people—the oldest collective race of people in this world whose lives we are trying to enhance and for whom we want to make things better. I just do not get that you have people walking out of the chamber.

I had a speech prepared, but I am not going to read a speech, because I should be able to speak from my heart to tell it how it is. When I see things like that, I think to myself: 'Why did I put my hand up for parliament?' Because I wanted to make a difference in the lives of the people who paved the way for me today.

All this rhetoric about how we have to get it right and we have to listen to people. There are so many times you see Dr Yunupingu and all these talking politicians—it just has to stop. Senator Nigel Scullion knows the Northern Territory very well—it is his backyard. He has respect for the people, and people respect him in the communities. But, Nigel, we cannot be serious about getting kids to school while your government closes 38 childcare centres. There was a report from Twiggy Forrest. Why do we have a wealthy man, who has never worked a day in the life of an Aboriginal person—he does not know what it is to live in poverty or how you get out of poverty—so why are we asking him to tell us how to live our lives? I do not get it. We are only talking in circles and using Aboriginal people—our lives and our disparity—as political footballs. I said that earlier today and it has got to stop. It really has to stop.

When we talk about constitutional recognition, there is the whole fear factor: what are we recognising? What have we got to fear? Every day we acknowledge the Ngambri-Ngunawal people. We exist. We acknowledge it here, and so what is so scary about acknowledging it in our Constitution. We cannot change the past. I said that in my maiden speech. We cannot change what has happened; we cannot drag the chains of this black history that this country has in order to move into the light. We talk about 600,000 Aboriginal people in this country, and yet every single day in the newspapers there is a story about an Aboriginal person. You do not see that about any other race of people in Australia; it is only Aboriginal people. It is almost as if we are a product of disparity. You talk about people coming in and walking together, but I have been to so many communities—and Senator Scullion knows this too—and how do you expect 25 non-Indigenous service providers to be delivering programs to a community of 200 or 300 people? There is not one Aboriginal person delivering those services. We have been oppressed and we continue to oppress citizens who have survived the 40,000 years in spite of continuous failed policies.

We cannot just keep talking about it. Every election cycle we make these promises; we say we are going to give you this and then, when we get in, we backflip on health and education. It is not rocket science. If you want to engage a child in primary school—to get them into school—they have to have a profound love of education. You cannot just say that it is about jobs; it is about housing. They are the basic fundamental things that we take for granted—every single one of us—but that is like asking a hen to have teeth. You are just asking for the basic fundamental human rights for people to have an opportunity, and we are denying the opportunity when we cannot get the basics right. It upsets me that Aboriginal people are coming to this place and begging from money to drive programs in their community. They should not have to do that. I do not tell anyone how to run their lives and so why are people telling Aboriginal people how to run their lives?

There is story I would like to tell, because it is important. We are Catholics and my grandson, who is 5½ years old, went to his first day of school this year. The principal, after welcoming everyone, talked about Jesus and God and then he said, 'And don't forget; let's us all be like Jesus.' My grandson turned to his mum, my daughter, and said, 'Well, who is Jesus?' The thing is that everyone has a religion, everyone has a spiritual belief, and this country is a multicultural country. We as Aboriginal people have our spirituality and our religion. We know what we want.

It is almost like our dreams and aspirations are continually controlled by the dollar factor. And it goes back to a Country Liberal government who wants to dilute the Heritage Act and the Land Rights Act. You have 35 per cent of people in the Northern Territory owning 50 per cent of the land. When you see incarceration rates escalating, not decreasing, what does that say about society? You just want to bulldoze the people out of the way who have control over what other people want. And that is not even telling a lie; that is telling it how it is. We heard a great speech by Joe Morrison today who said: 'We are not part of the problem. We are part of the solution'. If you want to progress this country for what it is meant to be—what other countries see it for—you need to bring Aboriginal people with you. And it is not by continually taking the top-down approach. To say that an Aboriginal kid has no dreams and aspirations is wrong. To tell an Aboriginal parent, 'you don't want your children to go to school'—that is absolute rubbish. We have the same dreams and aspirations. We should be allowed to flourish as human beings and as equal citizens in this country. This whole place needs to change.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Smith ): Thank you, Senator Peris. Senator Milne.

Senator MILNE (Tasmania—Leader of the Australian Greens) (16:46): I rise this afternoon to make comment on the Closing the Gap report but, before I do that, I just want to say thank you to Senator Peris. That is exactly what we need to hear in this parliament. Like Senator Peris, Senator Siewert, my colleague Senator Wright and others, I was there this morning at the talks that were given and I can tell you, Mr Acting Deputy President, it was like being in a parallel universe. We had the Prime Minister standing there making his speech, and people were being polite, because he is the Prime Minister, but I can tell you that the allied health workers and the people who are working with and in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities were frustrated to death. I can tell you that that the fact is, they are living a different reality from what was being talked about—and everyone was clapping politely. And it just is not true. What was being said is just not true.

I think we need to listen. Senator Peris has spelled it out, but so too did Mick Gooda. Speaking last year about his Social justice and native title report last year, he said:

It is not okay that in 2014, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, of all Australians, are the most vulnerable, the least healthy, the most imprisoned, the most likely to die in prison, the most at risk of child abuse or neglect, the most likely to be homeless, the least likely to be educated or employed, or the most at risk of domestic violence

That is the reality. It is no use standing up and saying that you can take more than half a billion dollars out of support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and programs and suggesting that you are not undermining the capacity for people to bring about change. That is the hypocrisy. Everybody in the room this morning knew full well what had happened in the budget. They also knew full well that it had been a year of trauma, of upheaval, of uncertainty; of tearing down of long-term thinking, programs, and evidence-based work. And I can tell you, people still are saying, 'exactly what happened with the budget last year?' Mick Gooda went on to say:

It is not okay that our communities' views are ignored in decisions that affect their lives and their land. It is not okay that our communities are not equal partners in the decisions made to better improve their own lives. It is not okay that our peoples are not the recognised custodians of, and remain separated from, our land. And it is not okay that racism still defines many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people's daily lives.

He went on to talk about his report at the end of last year, but he also said that he had spoken extensively about what he was calling 'the muddled narrative' of the Australian government's approach; and about how we are now experiencing one of the largest upheavals in Indigenous affairs and how this upheaval is causing immense anxiety and stress amongst our communities. He went on to talk about how over 150 programs and activities have been transferred to the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet—involving over 1,400 organisations with nearly 3,040 grants and contracts—and about how these 150 programs will be collapsed down to five, whilst dealing with a budget cut of over $400 million across the next four years. Now, how can you expect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to know what is going on! Nobody knows what is going on with the collapsing of all these programs and the taking of money out of these programs; nobody knows how they are to be supported. Mick Gooda went on to say:

I would argue that the more far reaching the change and the more drastic the budget cuts, the more engagement is needed with the community and its representative organisations.

He went on to say that engagement has been conspicuously absent, before and after the announcement of these changes.

How can they possibly create positive outcomes when the government is determined to slash these programs—to slash the money supporting them; not to consult with or even talk to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who are going to be impacted by them; and then to stand up and make motherhood statements about 'going to govern the country from East Arnhem Land'? Frankly, if the Prime Minister thinks it is enough to say he is going to East Arnhem Land, he is going to observe the disaster that he has put in place. He is taking away, for example, programs to assist people in not smoking—and I could not help but pick up the irony this morning. What was being bragged about is what is a very modest improvement, but nevertheless an improvement, in life expectancy—of 1.6 years for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men and an improvement of 0.6 years for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women—yet of course, it is a 10-year gap when compared with the non-Indigenous population. There is a slight improvement in life expectancy. And there have been reduced rates of smoking during pregnancy and, in terms of smoking overall, there has been a reduction in the rate of 10 per cent over the last decade. Might you not think that a program that had resulted in a reduction in smoking of 10 per cent in the last decade, a reduction in the number of women smoking during pregnancy and so on, might have contributed to the modest life expectancy improvement? Yet we still have abolition of preventive health care services. All the Allied Health people—the doctors—who were there this morning were saying: 'We need preventive health care. We need assessment. We need not only acute care for heart disease, kidney disease and diabetes, but preventive health care as well.' They were talking about assessment and assistance in those communities.

We have also given Rosie Batty the Australian of the Year award to highlight the issue of domestic violence, family violence. I am really proud of the fact that Australia has done that. But, at the same time, this government has slashed funding to legal services for violence in Aboriginal communities. Why would you take away the legal support services for people who need them the most? This makes no sense. It suggests a government that is completely out of touch with what is required in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. Of course, there are many other things in the report that are well worth consideration, but, from the Greens' point of view, this has to be long term. There has to be national leadership. It was done before through COAG, but now nobody knows who is leading this program. You have to have buy-in from the states and territories, and it was there. Far be it from me to praise COAG—let me tell you, it is a black hole that nothing ever comes out of. Nevertheless, in this sense, it at least got buy-in to a national program, a national plan, where states and territories had some buy-in, some contribution and some consistency.

But now we do not even have that. We need a long-term national plan. But no national plan can work unless it is funded. You cannot stand up and say you are doing everything to close the gap when you are taking more than $500 million out of programs that support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and collapsing them into the Prime Minister's office under five programs that nobody understands and without any consultation with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. That is a recipe for complete failure. In this year's budget the government must, first of all, restore funding to the National Indigenous Drug and Alcohol Committee and reverse its cuts of $130 million over five years from the Tackling Indigenous Smoking program. As I said, there are a number of other areas that they need to put money into to address—preventive health care, chronic disease, more assistance with numeracy and literacy and putting in targets for justice. Why wouldn't you, in Closing the Gap, have targets for justice? I will finish by asking people to reflect on something Mick Gooda said:

It is shameful that we do better at keeping Aboriginal people in prison than in school or universities.

This is something the whole country needs to think about. We need justice targets to get Aboriginal people out of prison. If as a country you do better at keeping Aboriginal people in prison than in school or university, the system is broken. That is what we need to be thinking about on this day of Closing the Gap.

Senator IAN MACDONALD (Queensland) (16:56): I want to thank Senator Scullion and Prime Minister Abbott for their statements today and for their genuine care and empathy for Indigenous people. I also want to thank them for the mature way in which they have dealt with today's report and, indeed, all issues around Closing the Gap. We would have hoped for a tripartisan approach to this issue, but the Greens had to make a political statement. They simply cannot help themselves. I might say to Senator Peris that the reason people left the other chamber when Mr Shorten was talking was not to show any disrespect to Indigenous people but to show that they did not like Mr Shorten making politics—as Senator Milne did—out of a very serious issue.

I do not want to go too much into the report today, but I do want to use this opportunity to again repeat something that I and Indigenous leaders in Queensland have long called for—that matters relating to Indigenous people and their welfare should be dealt with by elected Indigenous leaders. I have said on many occasions previously that we have too many bureaucrats—and politicians—who, with the very best intentions, are trying to do the right thing by Indigenous people. We form advisory groups of high profile Indigenous people who are in the paper all the time. But, frankly, these are academics who do not have skin in the game. I will name Indigenous leaders in Queensland—and I am sure there are others in the Northern Territory and Western Australia—who are there as Indigenous leaders not because they have been appointed by anyone, or because they have written fine articles for The Sydney Morning Herald, but because they have been elected by their fellow citizens in these communities. And they are accountable to those citizens—unlike these advisory boards who, frankly, though well-meaning, are accountable to no-one.

Elected Indigenous leaders are accountable to their constituencies every three or four years. And all of the money that comes through their hands is audited by the state auditors-general. We know exactly where the money has gone and we know what good it has done. These Indigenous leaders are mayors; they are local government leaders. But they understand education issues in their own community. They understand health issues in their own community. They understand not just how to fix roads, rates and rubbish in their communities; they understand how their communities work.

I again express a plea to my government, the Abbott federal government, and to the relevant state governments, that they should make more use of those people who are on the ground. They do not need advisory bodies; they have elected people that are accountable every three years to their constituency and they have people whose funding is audited. I have met with the Indigenous leaders forum, albeit before the last election, where we spoke about this. I did not have to say those things; they told me that they get offended, having been elected by their people to these leadership position, that they are then often ignored by federal and state governments when it comes to wider issues.

Quite frankly, I know the bureaucrats and politicians and academics from the south all have the best interests of Indigenous people at heart—I am not in any way suggesting they do not—but they are not with it; they do not have skin in the game. There are leaders like Councillor Fred Pascoe from the Carpentaria Shire; Councillor Dereck Walpo from the Aurukun Shire; Councillor Ken Bone from Cherbourg; Councillor Fred O'Keefe from Doomadgee; Councillor Greg McLean from Hope Vale; Councillor Robert Holness from Kowanyama; Councillor Wayne Butcher from Lockhart River; Councillor Peter Guivarra from Mapoon; Councillor Philemon Mene from Napranum; Councillor Bernard Charlie from the Northern Peninsula Area Regional Council; Councillor Alf Lacey, my good friend from Palm Island; Councillor Richard Tarpencha from Pormpuraaw; Councillor Pedro Stephen from the Torres Shire; Councillor Frederick Gela from the Torres Strait Island Regional Council; Councillor Terry Munns from Woorabinda; Councillor Cliff Harrigan from Wujal Wujal and Councillor Errol Neal from Yarrabah—all very mature, sensible leaders, elected by their people every three or four years. If they are not doing the right thing by their people, they will vote them out at a democratic election. If they are not spending the money properly and efficiently, the state Auditor-General will quickly expose any misspent expenditure. I plead with my government and the various state governments to use these people more rather than getting academics, well-meaning bureaucrats and advisory boards from the south to advise on these particular issues.

These elected leaders come to me and tell me the sorts of things that I am saying in the Senate today. They are concerned that they are being bypassed and ignored, when they are the people who should be listened to and taken into confidence. It is not that I am for a moment suggesting that doing what I suggest would close the gap tomorrow, but I do think it is a far better way. I again make this plea to my own government, to Minister Scullion, who I know understands these things. You have to take these people into confidence, because they are the leaders of their communities. If they do not do the right thing by their communities, they will not be there after the next election. Please, Senator Scullion and Mr Abbott, I know your commitment to Indigenous people. I know your genuine concern and interest. But can I say, with all due respect, that you are not getting the right advice from people with skin in the game. That is why people like those mayors I have mentioned—and I am sure there are others in the Northern Territory and Western Australia who I don't know as well as this group of Queensland mayors—could really, really make a difference to closing the gap. If I can achieve anything in the next few years, it will be to convince governments everywhere that these are the sorts of people who they should be taking advice from, not from southern politicians, bureaucrats and academics—well-meaning all—from far away, people who really do not have skin in the game.

Senator O'NEILL (New South Wales) (17:05): As I commence my remarks, can I pay particular respect this afternoon to the traditional owners of this land, the Ngunawal and Ngambri people. I pay particular respect to my colleague in this chamber, the first Indigenous woman in the Senate, Senator Nova Peris. Can I hazard a guess that, on reflection of the speeches today, the truth and the passion of Senator Peris's articulation of the plight that faces our first peoples at this time will be something that people will put down as a marker in this nation's history around truth-telling with regard to the oppression that continues of the first peoples of this nation.

Senator Peris made some very powerful remarks, that there are very many unhappy people here today—unhappy people who are here on this annual occasion in which closing the gap is reported. They have a right to be unhappy, not just because of the ongoing situation in which they continue to find themselves but because of the regression that has been the marker of this particular year's report. As Senator Peris said so clearly, and as has been echoed in most of the speeches today by members of this place and the other place, on both sides of the chambers, today we say that we are not on track to closing the life expectancy gap

That is a fact. We cannot turn away from that reality. As Senator Peris said, there has been a lot of articulation about understanding of the problem, but she questioned the amount of action to change it.

I have noticed that, in the many comments that have been made in this debate, there has been some faux outrage over a loss of bipartisanship on this day. But we cannot allow bipartisanship to become the silencer of fulsome and honest communication. Bipartisanship should not be a cloak for inaction and a pathway for platitudes. So it is very important that we hear what has been said here this afternoon. We continue to hear the rhetoric about consultation. But the fact that we are talking in circles must become apparent to us at some point today. Senator Peris talked about the 25 service providers in the Northern Territory, of which not one is an Indigenous group. She talked of oppressed citizens. Yet the outrage here—fake outrage—is about the loss of bipartisanship in the discourse! We are talking about people, the first people of our nation, and how they have been abandoned. That is on the record today, and the regression in our efforts to close the gap.

The main messages from the Close the Gap report are devastatingly bad. The only good thing we can say is that life expectancy has improved very slightly over the past year. Outcomes fell short of the early childhood target. No headway has been made in halving the reading and numeracy gap for Indigenous students. We looked for any signs of hope. There is a small indication of progress in halving the gap for Indigenous employment. We do have some students staying on to year 12. Also, infant mortality rates continue to decline, and that record has been steadily improving.

But all of the people who have experienced these small improvements are caught up in our health system. The government's priorities as articulated—to improve education and employment and to provide safe communities—are not much use if the community is unhealthy, so I really want to address my remarks to the health of the Indigenous community. It is such a vital aspect of a community. Health should and must be the most urgent priority in the Close the Gap campaign if the gap is to be closed. If you are not healthy, you cannot work. If you are not healthy, you cannot go to school. If you are not healthy, it is difficult to look after your family and their health will then suffer. The circle of disadvantage is expanded again and again.

The elephant in the room is that Indigenous people are still dying today from treatable, preventable illnesses due to the lack of detection of these conditions in their early stages. That is why the life expectancy gap continues to be as enormous as it is. The best way for us to interrupt that and detect these chronic diseases earlier is by providing access to a good primary health system. That way, all the various blood tests are readily available for things like cholesterol levels and blood pressure levels. The best form of prevention that we can get for our Indigenous people is regular check-ups.

We know that the best form of primary health care, the one that is most focused on issues that are endemic in Aboriginal communities, is carried out by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health services. In that context. cuts to their budgets have a powerful impact on the Aboriginal community, because they affect the provision of primary care. Any imposition of a GP tax—which, we have been hearing over and over, is the intention of this government—would be a cost hurdle in the way of primary health care for all Australians but would be particularly devastating for Indigenous Australians, with impacts flowing on to the disease rate and the death toll, while employment and literacy rates will all stagnate and fall away.

The issue of health must become a greater priority of the Close the Gap campaign. It is vital that the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan, which was set out in 2013 by Warren Snowdon in partnership with Aboriginal people, is carried out. This plan is regarded not only as a progressive and comprehensive plan for Indigenous health in the future but also as a model for effective, inclusive partnership—in consultation with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

The reality today, though, is that we have a government that has cut $500 million from essential services to Indigenous communities. You cannot cut money for such services from a community in such dire straits and not expect it to be a setback on the path to trying to close the gap. Right now, a range of key organisations that support and work within the community do not know whether their funding is going to continue or be withdrawn. As Senator Peris said, and she has a right to express it in these words:

It upsets me—

and it should upset every single one of us, to the point where we are quivering with despair—

that Aboriginal people are coming to this house begging for money to drive programs in their community.

And these are programs that have proven to be successful. That is what is going on this building today. Indigenous people who know the answers to the problems, Indigenous people who have set up and run very successful programs, are at risk of having those programs collapse in a matter of weeks. This government pretends that consultation is its first order of business, but its Prime Minister is now renowned for the absence of a capacity to consult. Preventative health programs are helping. They help tackle smoking and substance abuse in all communities, but they matter particularly in Indigenous communities. Cuts of $165 million to the Aboriginal health budget are going to smash those essential initiatives.

In the Leader of the Opposition's response to the Close the Gap report today, he raised the issue of justice, which I know Senator Milne also spoke about and I know is of great interest to Senator Peris. It is something that has been missing from the Close the Gap reports to date, and the call today for a justice target has echoed, I think, around this chamber and, I hope, around the country. Three in 100 Australians are Aboriginal, but 25 in 100 prisoners in Australian jails are Aboriginal—25 in 100. There is something wrong with those numbers. We should be ashamed that we have allowed that to be. We spend nearly $800 million on the imprisonment of Indigenous Australians. But it is not just the dollar cost. What is the cost—the human cost, the community cost? It is a tragedy that we are participating in allowing it to continue.

Half of the young Australians in juvenile detention—50 per cent—are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth who are, as we heard from Senator Milne, in Mick Gooda's words, better at staying in jail than they are at staying at school. This is a tragedy of monumental proportion. And it is so important that we have this day to discuss these issues. (Time expired)

Senator LAZARUS (Queensland—Leader of the Palmer United Party in the Senate) (17:15): The Abbott government is worsening Indigenous disadvantage in this country. Despite all the flowery words delivered by Prime Minister Abbott this morning regarding Closing the Gap, the reality is that the Abbott government has cut funding to Indigenous programs, initiatives and events across the country without regard for the impact, consequences and harm caused to our country's first Australians.

Let me cite an example from my home state of Queensland. The Arthur Beetson Foundation Murri Carnival is an annual event which is fully endorsed by the Queensland Rugby League and is the only indigenous Rugby League carnival in Queensland to be accredited by the games' governing body. The carnival is a Rugby League competition for Indigenous men, women and 15-year-old boys representing Indigenous communities from across rural, urban and remote Queensland. Funded by the federal Department of Health through its Tackling Indigenous Smoking and Healthy Lifestyle Program since 2011 at a cost of $160,000 per year, the carnival is a smoke-, alcohol- and sugar-free event which requires all players and officials to complete a preventive health assessment at local Aboriginal Medical Services or participating private-public primary care services. Mandatory checks are important for the competition as they ensure that players receive a comprehensive assessment of their health prior to taking the field. The checks also encourage better health-seeking behaviour within first Australian communities more broadly.

With preventable chronic disease the largest contributor to the gap in life expectancy between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, the competition is helping to improve first Australian communities to take responsibility for their own health, resulting in the overall improvement of Indigenous health generally. The carnival is held in September each year and is televised live on National Indigenous Television. In fact, it is one of the highest-rating telecasts on the NITV channel. The carnival is one of Queensland's largest in the Rugby League community and is considered to be the flagship for Indigenous sporting competitions across the country. Over the last three years, this competition has seen the completion of over 8,000 health checks delivered to Indigenous players and officials; enjoyed the participation of some 5,000 Indigenous players from 207 teams from across Queensland; witnessed a significant increase in school attendance for Indigenous boys; supported the placement of over 30 Indigenous trainees with the Australian Federal Police; been attended by over 100,000 spectators, all of whom have been exposed to the good health messages; had over 2,000 spectators participate in health education and screening at this event; witnessed a significant increase in enrolment of first Australians on the Australian electoral roll; and supported 15 Indigenous boys being placed on fully funded scholarships with Ipswich Grammar and Nudgee college.

Despite the outstanding outcomes being achieved by the annual Arthur Beetson Foundation Murri Carnival—and the persistent approaches by the management of the Arthur Beetson Foundation to the Abbott government for continued funding—the Abbott government, I am sad to say, has failed to commit to further funding for this carnival. As a result, the carnival will be cancelled this year and will not be held again. The funding equates to $160,000 a year. The Abbott government has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars—in fact, millions of dollars—trying to sell higher education cuts, even though the people of Australia have already said no. My message to the Abbott Government is this. Give back the money you spent on the higher education propaganda advertising campaign—without a mandate—with interest, and put the money into the Arthur Beetson Foundation Murri Rugby League Carnival. Start doing something good for this nation instead of cutting, slashing and burning everything that moves. This will help close the gap, and, importantly, it will help our first Australians, the people of Queensland and all Australians.

So, I call on—in fact, I am begging—Prime Minister Tony Abbott and the Minister for Health and Sport, Sussan Ley, because I know how important this carnival is to so many Indigenous Queenslanders and Australians, to immediately, with haste, commit to a new equivalent or improved funding arrangement for the carnival this year and for future years.

Senator MOORE (Queensland) (17:21): I know that in this place we begin every morning with an acknowledgement of country—an initiative that we are proud of and that we will continue—but I feel that at the beginning of this contribution I would like to make a personal acknowledgement of the traditional owners of our land, particularly as we are talking about such an important element: closing the gap. Senator Lazarus, I am a huge fan of that carnival. I was unaware that its funding was not secure, and I think that we can share in working towards securing funding. We cannot lose that event and all that feeds out of it.

This morning we heard the Closing the Gap program being introduced again, with the presentation of the seventh annual report. The Close the Gap Campaign Steering Committee, which has been working since 2006 in this area, puts out its own report, which Senator Siewert tabled earlier. At the conclusion of their shadow report, which I think is essential reading in terms of looking at engagement with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community in our nation, they say that the report that they have prepared:

… affirms the need to stay the course with the Closing the Gap Strategy and to be patient for improvements sought to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health and life expectancy—progress which many indicators suggest will be seen in time.

I endorse so much that is in this report and I know there is a need to stay the course, but I am not sure whether I share the concept of patience in trying to ensure that we get greater results against the initiatives that were clearly identified seven years ago—issues that were brought forward to this place and throughout the community; issues that need to be addressed to ensure that we can genuinely have an Australian community which is equal. This morning, in the Leader of the Opposition's speech in the other place, he said that a true community shows equality and that we must have that.

I am not sure whether patience, in this case, is such a virtue. I know that we need to have commitment. I know that the bringing down of this report is an opportunity for all of us to review what has occurred, to look back and, in particular, to pay credit to so many people who have worked so hard in this area for generations. It is an opportunity to acknowledge their contributions but also to take a serious and—I think—a critical strategic look at what has been achieved. The news is not good. Of course we need to celebrate where there have been some advances. We see advances in the area of halving the gap of life expectancy. There has been a very small increase there. We need to acknowledge it; we need to celebrate it. But we also need to understand that, continuing at the same rate, we will not meet the goal, which was set seven years ago, to halve that gap. But I think that we have to acknowledge that something has been done.

We also looked very clearly at halving the gap for Indigenous Australians aged 20 to 24 in year 12 attainment or equivalent. That is an area where the education programs—over years, and working effectively with states and territories—have led to a more positive result. But on so many of the other areas we are not on track. So that must lead to the consideration of what we should do and what we could do differently. In that sense, the government has support to look at ways to change the way that we operate, but that support needs to be endorsed by the wider community and, in particular, by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community. We cannot impose policy or implement policy which is not accepted by those whom it is intended to serve.

In my short contribution today I want to talk about two things that I think need to be added to the considerations in looking at closing the gap. One of these has been mentioned by many speakers, and that is around the call to include a justice target in our Closing the Gap strategy. This has been talked about for many, many years. At the end of last year, my friend Mick Gooda, who is the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, made a formal call to the government to look at including a special justice goal in the Closing the Gap strategy, because of the horrors of the inequitable involvement of people who are Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander in our corrections system.

The statistics are extraordinarily confronting. We have heard them in previous contributions. The Productivity Commission released figures in November last year indicating a 57 per cent rise in incarceration rates amongst Indigenous men, women and children over the previous 15 years. That statistic alone demands action from governments across this country. There is no way that a statistic showing a 57 per cent increase in jailing rates in the juvenile justice system and in the open justice system should be considered to be acceptable in our community—and it is not. No-one accepts that particular finding.

The important thing is that we have the opportunity to make change. We know that there are projects that have been put in place all over the country—relatively small projects which have identified a need at a local level and looked at what can actually be implemented cooperatively to ensure that there are other options than incarceration and that there is identification of what causes Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to end up through the court system and then—at such a significantly higher rate than the mainstream community in Australia—end up with jail sentences, which tend to then lead to a sequence of being in and out of prison with no chance to build better lives. There are all kinds of reasons that have been clearly identified—education opportunities, health opportunities, employment opportunities—all of which are in the Closing the Gap strategy. So actually implementing a particular justice goal in our closing the gap process is not such a big stretch, because the need and the engagement are already in place across the country.

Mr Gooda made a quite straightforward recommendation that we revise the current targets in closing the gap to include holistic justice targets aimed at promoting safer communities. We also suggest that the Australian government consult and work with the National Justice Coalition, which has been so active in this area and shows examples of where local community work has led to a change. We also suggest that the Australian government take a leadership role on justice reinvestment and work with the states, territories, and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities to identify further trial sites along the way that has been led by the National Justice Coalition.

I think we have the opportunity to make the Close the gap report a dynamic document that responds to the needs of the community and is not set on something that was determined seven years ago. I think there is an opportunity today, when we are looking at the Closing the Gap program, to say that there should be a justice strategy implemented that can be agreed on across whatever will take the place of COAG.

The other thing I want to throw in is the issue of mental health. This particular report actually calls for the development of a national strategy specifically looking at mental health in Aboriginal and islander communities. Again, confronting and horrific statistics show that the impact of mental illness in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities has a stronger impact in terms of non-diagnosis, effective treatment and also the ongoing issues around substance abuse and violence, which all coalesce to ensure that the community is not receiving equitable services and that we cannot say that we are closing any gap around making our society better and more equal.

I commend the committee that actually put together the progress and priority report. I again say I am not sure whether I can share their call for patience to ensure that we can make more progress, but I can say that I commit with them to staying the course so that, when we have the eighth report next year, hopefully we will see more progress.

Senator WRIGHT (South Australia) (17:31): I rise to add my remarks on the Close the gap: progress and priorities report 2014 too, and I want to start by saying that I feel proud and privileged to live in a continent where the first peoples have one of the longest continuous human cultures on this earth.

All senators in this place, as leaders in this country, have a shared responsibility to address Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander disadvantage in a real and meaningful way. If we fail, we must share that shame. While some progress has been made, it is clear that there are still significant and distressing differences in health, education, employment and social outcomes between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and other Australians. Given that reality, this government's funding cuts to a broad range of Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander services and organisations are baffling and, more than that, seriously damaging. If we are all committed to closing the gap, we should be able to agree that taking huge amounts of funding—over $500 million—out of the sector is not only illogical but unconscionable. Add to this the fact that this is being done in a way that has left many in a state of continuing uncertainty and anxiety about the programs they are to administer, the jobs that are available and when the certainty will be clarified, and I have to say: don't judge us by what we say; judge us by what we do.

I also say that, despite protestations of some who would say it is not polite to name these realities or get too angry about this, when we are talking about these matters which are indeed a matter of life and death, the time for politeness is over, and I think it is really important that we actually say: look at what is happening and let us actually act and not just speak.

As the Greens spokesperson for mental health, I am glad to have the opportunity to speak about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mental health specifically and I am heartened to see that addressing mental health and suicide prevention has been included in the Close the gap report as a new priority focus. Poor mental health has huge costs—human, social and economic—for the whole nation. The levels of mental ill health and suicide among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are absolutely distressing. The statistics tell us that and the stories tell us that. The grieving grandparents, aunts and uncles, mothers and fathers tell us that their young people are losing hope and ending their own lives before their lives have really begun. Some even speak of a contagion effect or suicide clusters in particular communities, which broadens the ripple of grief and has a devastating and enduring impact on the lives of so many people. As the Close the gap report states, mental health problems, including self-harm and suicide, have been reported at double the rate of non-Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people for at least a decade. Over the two years from July 2008 to July 2010, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander males were hospitalised for mental health related conditions at more than twice the rate of non-Indigenous males. Over the decade from 2001 to 2010, the overall Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander suicide rate was twice that of non-Indigenous Australians.

While travelling in rural Australia to consult about mental health, I spoke to people about particular challenges for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mental health, and those I met with talked about the importance of culturally appropriate care and the desirability of growing their own mental health workers—that is, training and skilling people from their own communities to work in mental health, because they are more likely to understand the needs and experiences of their clients and to stay and provide continuity for clients and service providers. I also heard that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health workers are instrumental in breaking down barriers and developing community acceptance of non-Indigenous mental health professionals. We need so many more of them, and that will require skilling, training and supporting those people in communities. There is so much that can be done, particularly in rural areas, to start addressing the mental health crisis among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

The funding uncertainty plaguing the mental health sector at the moment is also deeply troubling and something that is directly within the government's control. Releasing the National Mental Health Commission's Review of mental health programmes and servicesreport must be a priority, as must subsequently consulting respectfully and fully with the mental health sector and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mental health sector in particular about the recommendations of this report. Instead of using the review to justify cuts to critical mental health services as this government has done across other policy areas, they must be willing to canvass more funding within a system that enhances mental health and wellbeing rather than only reacting—and inadequately—to manifestations of mental ill health.

One important aspect of this is to acknowledge the trauma and intergenerational trauma that underpins patterns of mental ill health that we are seeing today. Dispossession and stolen children—so many wrongs lie beneath the surface and they must be acknowledged and addressed if we are to have real change.

In a different policy area I note that incarceration rates—and this has been discussed by many other contributors today—are soaring. Yet the government has cut legal aid to Aboriginal legal services and family violence prevention legal services. My questions at estimates have revealed $42 million will be cut from Indigenous legal aid, yet there has been no modelling by the government as to the likely and logical consequences of this in terms of incarceration rates. I welcome recommendation 8 of the report, which recommends that Closing the Gap targets to reduce imprisonment and violence rates be developed and activity toward reaching the targets be funded through justice reinvestment measures. The need for justice targets—to name the size of the problem, to track it and to reduce the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in prison in Australia—is long overdue. Along with many others, the Australian Greens have advocated for both justice targets and justice reinvestment—investing in communities to reduce crime rather than investing in prisons—for many years. Earlier this year Indigenous Affairs Minister Scullion backflipped on justice targets, even as the Overcoming Indigenous disadvantage report revealed a horrifying 57 per cent jump in imprisonment rates for Indigenous Australians.

We cannot truly close the gap anywhere without confronting this issue head on. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians make up only 2.3 per cent of the adult population in Australia but make up more than a quarter of the adult prison population. The statistics for Aboriginal young people are even more shocking, and now the imprisonment of Aboriginal women is rising. The establishment of national justice targets will provide a clear framework for all governments to work with Indigenous communities. It will ensure Indigenous incarceration is not swept under the rug and it will force our governments, and us, to be accountable. I urge the federal government to adopt this recommendation without delay.

I would like to finish by acknowledging the strength and agency of this nation's first peoples. I do not profess to stand here and pretend to have all of the solutions. In so many ways Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander individuals and communities are leading and showing the way, taking charge of their lives and communities. They know what they want and they know what they need. I think of the Aboriginal women of Fitzroy Crossing who have done so much to protect their children and culture by addressing the pervasive alcohol abuse in their community. Indigenous leader June Oscar has spoken of the tsunami of funerals which prompted their response—50 alcohol related deaths in a year and 13 suicides in as many months. By restricting alcohol and raising awareness about the risks of alcohol consumption, the women achieved a 45 per cent reduction in hospital admissions, a 27 per cent reduction in alcohol related violence, a 14 per cent increase in school attendance and 88 per cent reduction in takeaway alcohol sales. In South Australia, the Aboriginal women elders known affectionately but respectfully as 'the Grannies Group' visit young men and women in prison, offering them support, connection and humanity. And in their strong, proud and persistent way they are changing the culture of the prisons they visit, both for the prisoners and the custodians.

Community responses are powerful and effective. They must inform and be an integral part of closing these shameful gaps in Australia's social fabric.

Senator LINES (Western Australia) (17:40): I acknowledge the Ngambri and Ngunawal peoples, the traditional custodians of the land on which we meet, and I pay my respects to elders past and present and any elders in the Senate today. It is with great sadness that I rise today to acknowledge that we, as a nation, have failed to close the gap. Even where we have made gains, these gains have been very small. I note, too, that we continue to ignore justice. Without justice as a measure, it is hard to truly improve outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. This must be addressed.

I acknowledge the heartfelt speech given by Senator Peris today, and I think we would be wise to listen to her and enact some of the points she made. In speaking today I acknowledge my Gidja granddaughter. I, as a white grandmother, want the best for her; but I know that as a young Aboriginal child the outcomes for her are lesser than they are from my grandson who is non-Indigenous. Within my family I struggle to understand why the colour of her skin means that her outcomes are much lower. That is completely unacceptable. Of course, as my granddaughter, I love her to bits and I want the very best for her—but I know the odds are stacked against her.

As a West Australian I continue to be saddened by what is happening in my state. I say again: we have to have justice. Justice must be a measure. We have the highest juvenile incarceration rates in the country in Western Australia, and they continue to get higher. Deaths in custody are a tragedy in Western Australia and I have spoken in this parliament on two occasions about the tragic death in custody of Miss Dhu.

About eight weeks ago I attended an Aboriginal deaths-in-custody meeting on a Saturday afternoon. There were mainly Noongar people there—southwest people. Every person in the room—every single Noongar person—had a death: an unusual death, a harsh death or a suicide. All were related to justice. I could not help but note the fact that if that had been gathering of non-Aboriginal people it would have been a very different gathering. The sorrow in that room was overwhelming. I was determined as I left that meeting. You could easily get caught up in that sorrow and be completely ineffective, so we need to be warriors as parliamentarians—warriors along with the leaders of the Aboriginal community.

The time for listening and consultation is long gone. The time now is for action. In this place, a couple of months back, we heard about the homeland communities. Yes, they have their troubles; but there are less suicides on homeland communities in Western Australia than in non-homeland communities. But they are to be defunded and the premier of our state just announced, without any consultation, that they would be closed. This would be a tragedy. Many of them have microbusinesses operating on them and to just close them, because that is the easiest thing to do, would again be a great injustice to Aboriginal people in those communities.

In Western Australia towards the end of last year we had an 11-year-old Yamatji boy commit suicide. Imagine if he had been a white child. There would have been immediate action—and yet nothing has been said; nothing has been done. I cannot imagine the tragedy of finding an 11-year-old who has suicided.

In the Kimberley we continue—every single week—to have suicides. The highest rate of suicide in the world now occurs in the Kimberley. You only have to visit the Kimberley and move beyond Broome to see the abject poverty and disadvantage, to see many Aboriginal people living in towns but not employed in the local supermarkets, not employed in the tourist destinations. They are left to sit under trees or work for Aboriginal organisations.

We had a Kimberley elder, about four weeks, ago commit suicide. He was a person held in high regard in the Kimberley. He was so depressed and lacking in hope that he simply took his own life. There is much for us to do. I am pleased that the Prime Minister has said we have to move forward, but the time for talking is done. It is now time for action.

Senator LAMBIE (Tasmania) (17:46): I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land, past and present. Why are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander babies dying at a rate greater than non-Indigenous Australians? Why are not Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples living for as long as non-Indigenous Australians?

On 13 February 2008, seven years ago, then Prime Minister Rudd said:

This new partnership on closing the gap will set concrete targets for the future: within a decade to halve the widening gap in literacy, numeracy and employment outcomes and opportunities for Indigenous children, within a decade to halve the appalling gap in infant mortality rates between Indigenous and non-Indigenous children and, within a generation, to close the equally appalling 17-year life gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous when it comes to overall life expectancy.

In another seven years, will a future Australian Prime Minister deliver a speech which contains words that hold the same meaning? I would like to say, 'No', but the sad reality is that if a drastically different approach is not taken by Australian politicians to solving the problem of the disadvantage gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians then it is likely that a Prime Minister of Australia in 2021 will be talking about closing the gap with the same sense of helplessness, frustration and anger that many caring Australians, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, feel today.

I offer to this chamber a different approach to closing the gap between the first people of Australia and those who have joined them from all over the world. This parliament that we serve in can be overwhelming if you let it, because of its size and grandeur. This Senate can intimidate and frighten, with its complicated rules and procedures. However, stripped away to its bare essentials, this is a place where we make decisions on how to share Australia's national wealth and prosperity with its people, through argument and debate.

Put simply, we sit at our nation's table, have a conversation and carve up a pie. That is putting it quite simply. We decide how much of the pie each Australian receives and how it is going to be eaten. How can Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians ever have a chance of receiving a fair share of the pie and determining how it is eaten if they do not have a permanent voice at our nation's table?

My message today is simple: if you want Australia's first people to have a fair share of our national wealth and a proper say in how it is spent, every piece of legislation that passes through this parliament must be scrutinised and spoken to from an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander point of view. It is as simple as that. This democratic objective can be achieved in a number of ways. We could establish parliamentary committees that review all legislation and ask these questions: (1)    Will this be good or bad for First Australians?; (2) How can we improve this legislation to help indigenous people?

The other way to guarantee that every piece of Australia's national wealth wrapped up in documents we consider in this Senate is spoken to by an Indigenous voice is to establish dedicated Indigenous seats in this parliament. This is not a new concept. A number of progressive countries have established dedicated Indigenous seats in parliament. Our brothers and sisters across the ditch, in New Zealand, established dedicated Maori seats in 1867. Importantly, the gap in the mortality rate between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in countries that have dedicated Indigenous seats is lower than Australia's gap. It is much lower.

An International Health and Human Rights research article in 2007—which examined the Human Development Index of Indigenous people in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States—showed that Australia was the worst performing country. We should be ashamed of ourselves for that. We were the only country that did not have dedicated Indigenous seats. The study confirmed that the gap between Maori disadvantage/mortality of 8.5 years, and closing, is not as large as Australia's first people of 23.2 years, and widening.

If two or three per cent of Australia's population is Indigenous, then I cannot see any good reason—and there is not one—why two or three per cent of our seats in parliament cannot be dedicated Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander seats. This one change—dedicated Indigenous seats—while not a silver bullet, if international experience is to be valued and respected, will do more to close the gap than any other symbolic or practical measure that has been previously put before the Australian people. I will never understand in this nation why we see other nations doing so much better. It is such a simple procedure, but we refuse to follow it. We refuse to even debate on it, and we refuse to talk about it. And that is half the problem in this Senate chamber. We keep going over old ground, and we keep using old material. It is time to look forward to the future, and it is time to do things very differently in this chamber. Until we start doing so nothing will change. The Indigenous issues will never get better and the gaps will continue to widen. I ask the people in this chamber, for once in their lives, to have a good look around the world and see how others are doing it and how their performance is standing up against ours, because ours is bloody dismal. Our performance with Indigenous people and how we treat them is dismal. That is all I am asking for. Have a look at it; bring it in. I want it debated. I want it looked at.

Question agreed to.

Senator SIEWERT (Western Australia—Australian Greens Whip) (17:53): Mr Acting Deputy President, earlier today there was a vote taken on my sharks motion which I do not believe reflected the will of the Senate, and the President undertook to recommit that vote. I am just seeking clarification about when that will happen?

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Edwards ): Senator Siewert, we will seek clarification from the President.

Senator SIEWERT: That would be appreciated. Thank you.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Edwards ) (17:54): The President has received the following letter from Senator Moore:

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

"The impact of the Abbott Government's chaos, dysfunction and division on business and consumer confidence" .

Is the proposal supported?

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

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

Senator BILYK (Tasmania—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (17:55): This Abbott government's infighting, chaos and dysfunction not only is hurting the increasingly embattled Prime Minister and his hapless Treasurer but has also destroyed business and consumer confidence in Australia. This confusion grips the government on so many fronts that it is hard for business to be able to grow and to have any faith in them. And for businesses to grow and keep Australians employed they need strong consumer confidence. It is a measure by which they themselves can be confident that consumers will buy their products and services. However, this shambolic, dysfunctional government has lurched from policy crisis to policy crisis, giving no-one confidence it knows what it is doing. So much for Australia being 'open for business' under this government.

All of us in this place know that damage to consumer and business confidence means damaging our economy, leading to job cuts and the ensuing suffering that that brings. Australian families do not deserve to suffer because of division and dysfunction by this government. Australian mums and dads do not deserve to lose their jobs, have their hours of work cut or be unable to afford health care for their children because this government just wants to help the big end of town rather than supporting jobs and growth for all.

Consumer confidence and business confidence have crashed since leaks about last May's budget emerged. Consumers and businesses know this government is dysfunctional, and it is making everyone very nervous. According to the Westpac Consumer Sentiment Index, consumer confidence was at a level of 99.73 in April 2014 before crashing to just 91.1 in December 2014. That drop in consumer confidence is because of the actions of this chaotic government, whose policies have attacked those on pensions, students, public servants and the unemployed, amongst others. How do they expect consumer confidence to stay high when they produce policies that make sections of the community fearful for their futures? Similarly, business confidence has crashed from plus 10 in July 2014 to a level of plus two in December 2014, rebounding slightly to plus three in January 2015. It is likely that big business confidence will crash further in the next index, as they are fuming about this Prime Minister's plan to axe his promised Paid Parental Leave scheme for millionaire mums but keep the tax that was meant to pay for it. Business leaders have very publicly shown how upset they are about the Prime Minister's decision to keep the PPL tax.

Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry Chief Executive Officer Kate Carnell said

If he didn't ditch the levy and wanted to keep it, we'd be horrified … If that is the case it is just a tax.

It does not matter what they might want to call it; it is just a tax. I seem to remember from the 2013 election campaign that Mr Abbott promised 'no new taxes'—just one of very many broken promises from this inept, dysfunctional government.

The Abbott government are so dysfunctional they are unable to keep a policy position for two days running, let alone keep a promise made before the election. There is still lack of clarity on their position on building subs at ASC. It was quite unequivocal before the election. They said that they would build at ASC in South Australia. The government then reversed that policy after the election. Just yesterday, Minister Andrews was joined at ASC by Liberal MPs Andrew Southcott, Matt Williams and Rowan Ramsey and Senators Sean Edwards and David Fawcett to announce—I might say—a rather confused position on the matter. They left parliament to fly to Adelaide—at a cost of who knows what, but thousands of dollars—for a press conference that did not really clarify the government's position and that in fact, I would say, added further to the confusion. It would have been better for them if they had not had that conference at all.

Last night I met with Australian shipbuilders and submarine builders in this place. They were extremely concerned that this government refuses to support Australian shipbuilding and submarine building. They were extremely disappointed that this government refuses to protect Australian jobs in an industry that develops important skills in the wider community. As an aside and as a senator who comes from a state that has a shipbuilding industry, I call upon this government to look to Australian shipbuilders before going overseas. Tasmanian-built ships have been used by both the Australian and US defence forces and I hope they, too, have a part to play in the future of Australia's Navy. But back to the matter in hand.

The low consumer and business confidence has forced the Reserve Bank of Australia to cut interest rates to stimulate the economy. After staying on hold for the longest period since 1990, the Reserve Bank has had to act for the first time since August 2013. AMP chief economist, Shane Oliver, outlined some of the reasons why the RBA needed to make the cut, saying:

Growth is too low, confidence is subdued, prices for key commodities like iron ore and energy have collapsed resulting in a much bigger hit to national income than expected a year ago …

I am astounded at how the Treasurer, Mr Hockey, appears to have done a backflip on the meaning of a rate cut.

In May 2012, the then shadow Treasurer, Joe Hockey, said the rate cut was a sign that the government had lost control of the economy. He also said:

So of course, interest rates on average should be lower but if interest rates come down today, it is because the economy is struggling, not because it's doing well.

However, this week Mr Hockey has been saying:

This is good news for Australian families and it's good news for Australian business …

There does seem to be some hypocrisy and some conflict in these two positions. Interest rate cuts under Labor, bad; interest rate cuts under the coalition, good!

Under the watch of the government, unemployment hit a 12-year high in December 2014. Before the election of the dysfunctional government, they promised two million jobs over a decade. They are not off to a good start.

Unfortunately, tens of thousands of extra people have joined the unemployment queue since the last budget. While those opposite have been busy infighting and while they spent the first 520 days of their government in a dress rehearsal, waiting for the real show to begin—which I thought was going to begin on Monday, but I am still waiting for evidence of that—thousands of Australian families have lost their primary source of income. And young people are finding it harder and harder to find work as well. The Reserve Bank said in their rate cut decision:

Youth unemployment, which tends to be particularly sensitive to the business cycle, has increased notably; 270,000 people aged between 15 and 24 years are now unemployed, 20,000 more than a year ago.

This dysfunctional government has failed young people, whether they are unemployed or students. It really needs to get its act together. It has no plan to create jobs for young people, just cut pay and conditions, saddle them with higher university debt and make it harder for them to enter the property market.

I have spoken to a number of small businesses in Tasmania and they are extremely concerned about the slowing economy. Some people are unable to sell their businesses. They are just closing them and walking away from them—and that is happening just near my office. Small towns are becoming concerned about their viability.

Public servant job cuts by the Tasmanian state government has also depressed business and consumer confidence in my home state.

As can be seen from consumer confidence figures, Tasmanians are concerned about the future of the economy and are saving more and trying to write down debt. As can also be seen from consumer confidence figures, they do not believe that this government's cruel, heartless budget is the solution to the budget's woes. They reject the assertion that this government's vicious attacks on pensioners, the sick, the unemployed and students will lead to a better economy and a more prosperous future. And, as we saw from Monday's leadership vote, a large proportion of the Liberal caucus agrees.

This government is a bad government for Australia. Its own Prime Minister admitted as much when, on Monday, he said, 'Good government starts today.' I think the Australian people would be extremely disappointed to hear that good government was to start last Monday because, as I said before, Mr Abbott and his Liberal Party have been in power for 520 days. I ask again: what have they been doing in those 520 days? How come it has taken them so long to realise what a terrible government they have been, when the Australian people have been saying it for so long and when Labor, the crossbenchers, charities, NGOs and doctor groups, to name a few, have all criticised the government's policies? They obviously have not been listening, even though they say they do. The problems with their policies at heart are caused by their own incompetence and ineptitude. The instability of this government is evident. They are divided, dysfunctional and chaotic. Unfortunately, this dysfunction has led to a weaker economy, high unemployment and the destruction of business and consumer confidence. No wonder the Liberal backbenchers want to get rid of the dysfunctional Prime Minister and incompetent Treasurer.

Senator CANAVAN (Queensland) (18:05): As you know, Acting Deputy President Williams, I am only new to this place, so I am not sure if there is provision in the standing orders for the Labor Party to withdraw a matter of public importance after it was submitted in the morning before we start business, but I think they might have wanted to withdraw today's. I was listening to Senator Bilyk's contribution very closely and she failed to mention one very important thing. Let's just look at what this matter of public importance, which the Labor Party would have submitted to the President at around 8.30 this morning, says:

The impact of the Abbott Government's chaos, dysfunction and division on business and consumer confidence.

The implication there, and certainly the implication in Senator Bilyk's contribution, is that business and consumer confidence is down. I am not sure that Senator Bilyk has kept up with the news today or if she just wanted to ignore it, but consumer sentiment came out today in the Westpac-Melbourne Institute Consumer Sentiment Index. Senator Bilyk mentioned the series in her contribution but failed to announce what happened today. She mentioned the figure for December correctly, but she failed to mention that last month it went up slightly to 93.2 and today it surged by eight per cent to 100.7, the highest level since January last year. Senator Bilyk failed to mention that.

I would like to ask the Labor senators who are following. Who do we have next? We have Senator Dastiari next. He is on the economics committee. He should have seen that release today. I would like to hear him explain that anomaly, because their whole matter of public importance is about trying to say that consumer confidence is down somehow because of this government. But it is not down, and if it is not down the whole argument falls down. It is gone; it is all over. Do I have to keep speaking for eight minutes? I suppose I will. It is gone. There is no argument for them to prosecute. Later I will go through some other economic stats which show the economy is actually quite strong. There are certainly challenges. We have gone through a terms of trade boom not seen since the 1850s, and that is slowing down, so there are clearly going to be challenges. But, all things considered, the economy is doing quite well.

I take you to the first half of the matter of public importance, which talks about chaos, dysfunction and division. If any party could help us identify chaos, dysfunction and division it would be the Labor Party. They are pretty good at it. I think they would be able to spot it if we needed them to. The last time they were in power and on this side, their mistakes were not as inconsequential as just a matter of public importance; their whole government was a running saga of chaos, dysfunction and division. I know you remember that, Mr Acting Deputy President Williams, and I certainly do. Right from the beginning it was a matter of chaos, dysfunction and division. Mr Acting Deputy President, you probably remember the 2020 Summit that they started. The Prime Minister was sitting on the floor with his notepad, looking very earnest and taking notes. All the best and brightest minds came to this place to try to find out what we should do for the nation, and they came up with one idea that they implemented: a tax review. So they had a tax review and then they came up with one idea to implement, and that was the mining tax. They implemented the mining tax. We spent all that money and we implemented a tax. It was the first tax I know of in history that actually cost the government money. The Labor Party found a way to implement a tax that actually cost them money—not just a small amount of money but a lot of money.

I remember when it was announced. I was in the lock-up. Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swan announced it, and it was going to raise almost $50 billion in its first four years. It was not in the forward estimates at the time, but later, through a committee process, we found out that Treasury estimated that in the first four years of operation it would raise $50 billion. It fell a little bit short of that figure. They wanted $50 billion. We know now that in net terms it raised $300 million. They wanted $50 billion from the tax and it raised $300 million in net terms, and that is just what it raised for the Commonwealth Treasury. At the time they announced the tax, they announced all these weird and wonderful other spending programs with it. They announced mining exploration, tax credits, small business asset depreciation write-offs, an infrastructure fund. They announced all these different spending initiatives. The superannuation guarantee increases were probably the most costly. All up, they locked in $17 billion of spending with this tax. It was going to raise $50 billion and they locked in $17 billion of spending. They thought they had plenty of room but, in fact, they did not.

That is just one example. I am not sure that I will have time to go through all of these. I will focus on some that hit regional Australia, coming from this end of the chamber. Senator Nash would remember quite clearly the night that Four Corners ran a program about the live export trade. There was some very horrific footage and there certainly needed to be a policy response. Indeed, the first instinct of the then agriculture minister was right: he shut down the abattoirs. But that was not good enough for the Labor Party. They wanted to do more and, because of a TV program, they shut down our exports of food to our closest neighbour—more than 250 million people—overnight, without even the courtesy of a phone call. The Indonesians found out about it through the news. It was an absolute disgrace.

I will go through these. I like these ones. Remember they had all the wars, Senator Nash? They had the war on inflation and the war on obesity. Whatever happened to the war on obesity? I do not think we were successful on that one, Senator Madigan. Then we had a war on the greatest moral challenge of our time. We lost that one. After wars come coups and revolutions, and for good measure they had two of those. They backstabbed two sitting prime ministers and now they come into this chamber and try to lecture people about chaos and division.

I recognise that the Liberal Party have had a tough couple of weeks. I have publicly said that I hope they do not change aeroplanes mid-air, because I do not think it is a good idea. The example of the Labor Party is pretty clear. Once you go down that bloody path, it is pretty hard to come back from it. It has been a tough couple of weeks, but there is a difference between that side and this side. That side did it twice. That side unleashed the faceless men and executed two prime ministers in the space of three years; we did not. That side wasted billions of dollars and racked up $300 billion of debt; we did not. That side shut down an industry based on a TV program; we did not. There is a big difference to that side. That side weakened our border protection laws and let in 50,000 unauthorised arrivals; we have not. There is a big difference. That side, right up to today—Senator Nash, you would like this one—want to allow foreigners to buy farmland without any restrictions. They opposed the announcement today that we would reduce the threshold down to $15 million. We think there should be more review of those purchases.

I started this debate—and Senator Dastiari was not in the chamber for it—by saying their whole notion has no basis, because consumer confidence is actually up, not down, and it is the highest it has been since January last year.

Senator Dastyari interjecting—

Senator CANAVAN: In my final minute or so, I will go through that, Senator Dastyari. ANZ job ads have gone up 13½ per cent over the past year, and that has been the fastest growth in 3½ years. We created more than 200,000 new jobs last year, and that is at the rate of about a job every 2½ minutes. Senator Bilyk's contribution was that four jobs were created. In the year before that, when Labor were in power, just over one job would have been created.

Business expectations are up. The Dunn and Bradstreet business expectations survey found the employment outlook right now is the strongest that it has been in 10 years. Our retail trade numbers have risen for seven consecutive months. Last year there were more than 200,000 new companies created, and that is a sign of confidence if nothing else. That is the highest level on record since ASIC started registering companies in 1999. The dwelling approvals are up 8.8 per cent in the past year. The consumer price index rose by just 0.2 per cent last quarter, after rising 0.5 per cent in the quarter before that. It is going at an annual rate of 1.7 per cent, well below the RBA's target band of two to three per cent. Electricity prices were flat in December, after falling by a record amount the quarter before, thanks to the carbon tax. These are the facts. We cannot take credit for all of them, but the economy is much stronger than it was when we came to power 16 months ago.

Senator WHISH-WILSON (Tasmania) (18:15): While we are talking about business, I noticed that so far we have not had any speakers talk about the difference between small business and big business.

Senator Back: Be patient!

Senator WHISH-WILSON: I think it is a really good place to start, and I am sure Senator Back will look forward to telling us about his small business experience, which I respect. But let's look at this. There are two million small businesses across this country. They make up the backbone of the Australian business community. Everybody knows someone who runs a small business. My wife and I have run two small businesses. They are the lifeblood of our communities and our economy.

What action has this government taken to help small business in this country? We have had an announcement of a 1½ per cent tax cut, which the Greens support. Before the federal election we brought in a policy to cut small business tax rates across this country by two per cent. We also wanted to increase the depreciation allowance for small businesses to $10,000. At that time the depreciation allowance in this country was $6,500, which allowed small businesses to go out and spend money in their economy, buy capital and immediately depreciate it to help their cash flow. It was very useful. We wanted more because we feel small businesses in this country deserve more.

What has happened to that $6,500 that these small businesses relied on? It has gone. That depreciation allowance was removed when this government scrapped the mining tax. The revenue that was going to be raised from the big end of town from some of the wealthiest companies in the world was going to go towards supporting small business in Australia. Because a lot of small businesses have what we call 'lumpy' cash flows, the loss carry-back provision allowed small businesses to write their losses off against incomes in different years. It was also a very useful strategy for helping small businesses thrive. That was also taken away when this government arrogantly and stubbornly removed the mining tax without any thought for small businesses.

Senator Back aside, why is it that the LNP take small business for granted in this country? Do they really think that small business owners will only vote Liberal at the next election? I have got news for you. The Greens have the best small business policy of any party in this parliament. We have had for a while. I will admit it is sometimes hard to get that message out there, but eventually people will understand that we have been out there leading on small business. That is why Senator Milne came out this week and said she was happy to support a small business tax cut in this country because it has been our policy, supported by our members, for over two years now.

We want to see a bigger cut to small business. We are happy to see a two per cent cut. It is still only two per cent, but it makes a big difference if your cash flow is only $50,000 or $60,000 a year. While we are talking about business confidence, we have had the FoFA debacle, the attempt to repeal laws in this country for the big end of town and the damage that has done to a lot of small businesses in the financial services industry. Then we have these information leaks about tax evasion, private individuals and corporations. We have a set of laws that supposedly we are tackling through the G20, through APEC and through other forums to get rid of tax dodging by big, wealthy corporations. Where is the information-sharing plan between companies? We are going to be the last mover of all the APEC countries on sharing information to cut down on corporate tax deduction.

What about profit shifting and parallel pricing? These things are actually legal. They are loopholes that allow corporations to dodge tax while the man and woman on the street have to pay their fair share. These laws are unfair and they are unjust, and the Greens—hopefully, along with other people in this chamber—will stand up and make sure we get effective action on tax avoidance, because it ruins the morale of small businesses and workers in this country who work hard and pay their fair share of tax when they see big businesses getting away with tax evasion. So we need to do something about that, and if that is not a lack of confidence in this government's business abilities then I do not know what is.

Senator DASTYARI (New South Wales) (18:20): What a performance we had in this chamber from Senator Canavan just moments ago. Before touching on some of the points and the incorrect and false information that was presented to this chamber, I want to acknowledge the contribution of Senator Whish-Wilson, who actually outlined and detailed a series of policy failures from this government and the impact of those failures. Earlier we had Senator Canavan getting up here, giving a speech begging why the Australian people are not thanking this wonderful, fantastic government for the brilliant work it is doing in business confidence!

Let's be clear, when we are talking about confidence, there is one group that has no confidence in this government and that is the government itself. In the same week that 60 per cent of their own backbench tried to neck the Prime Minister, you have got senators getting up in this chamber talking about what a wonderful job this government is doing, how fantastic business confidence is and simply wondering why they are not being thanked for what has been failure after failure, lie after lie.

Business confidence in this country is down. Consumer confidence has consistently been taking a hit. Why? Because you have got a government that has not been honest with its own people. A government that has not been clear on who is responsible and what can and should be done. Of course there are economic challenges facing this country. Of course there are spending, fiscal and other challenges facing this country. But rather than have an honest debate, you have fearmongering. You have this whole fear of debt and deficit that does not match the reality of what has actually gone on in this country and of what has actually taken place. The result of all of this has been a complete hit to Australian consumers. What we should be doing in this country is talking about, firstly, what the opportunities are for growth, not turning around and playing this complete blame game of saying, 'This group is responsible for debt and deficit, and this is what is going on'—none of this whole kind of fearmongering by the government. What this government should be doing is sitting down and saying: 'Here are the opportunities; here's what we can do; here's how we can work together and here's how we can face the challenges.'

The Westpac - Melbourne Institute Consumer Sentiment Index shows that confidence remains 10 per cent lower than it was at the election. As my colleagues have noted in this chamber, notably Senator Canavan amongst others, there is a blip in today's release—an uptick of eight per cent in January. But it is hardly reason for a celebration. According to Senator Canavan, who came and started calling it a surge, Westpac's chief economist himself, Bill Evans, commented that this is a stronger result than we had expected. And that is right. The experts are genuinely surprised by what was a blip in today's results.

The Saudis have flooded the market with fuel, lowering petrol prices—a 21 per cent drop in the past few months. We all know that, thankfully, there has been a recent interest rate cut which actually allows some people a little bit of relief from what is increasing desperation to be able to meet their repayments. And the share markets have been buoyant, among other things. But what you have here is a government in disarray. What you have here is a lack of faith in the Australian public. What you have here is a constant fearmongering—a constant scare campaign. Rather than having a government that is prepared to sit down and say, 'Here are the strengths; here is what is working in this country; here is how we improve; here is how we grow,' what you have is a government that is simply limping from crisis to crisis of its own. And, to do so, it is trying to create another crisis and pretend there is a greater crisis out there. Confidence—business confidence, consumer confidence—requires strong and stable government, and that is not what we are receiving from this government at the moment.

Senator BACK (Western Australia) (18:25): Once again I thank Senator Moore and the Labor Party for the opportunity to expose the absolute failure and the incompetence of their six years in government. I will come to Senator Dastyari in a moment; I will just let him stew for a few moments, though I will allow him just this one snippet for a minute. The last time the Labor Party in government actually brought down a surplus, you, Senator Dastyari—through you, Acting Deputy President Williams—were a kid in short pants. You were six years of age. The member for Longman, Wyatt Roy, the Prime Minister of Australia in 2050, was not even born; the man was not even alive.

Senator Dastyari: When's your next surplus?

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Williams ): Order!

Senator BACK: Isn't it incredible how they cannot ever listen in silence because they cannot hear the truth. We are talking about a crowd over there—and I will get to surpluses and I will get to confidence in a moment—that inherited a surplus in 2007 and turned it into billions of dollars of deficits. They were an outfit that had $30 billion in the bank to spend and managed to turn it into a nearly $500 billion debt.

Senator Dastyari: Did you hear of the GFC?

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Dastyari, I made sure no-one interjected when you were presenting your speech. I ask you to show the same respect for others speaking in this chamber.

Senator BACK: I will come to the fact that then in government they had the best terms of trade in Australia's history. But what did they do with it? The first thing they did, of course, was to bring in a carbon tax and to send profitable businesses offshore. They had them compete unfairly with importing businesses which, of course, did not pay the carbon tax. The other industry going so well at that time was the resources sector, because we happened to have a product that the Asian neighbours all wanted. It was nothing to do with the Labor government—nothing to do with Mr Swan, the then Treasurer.

Senator Lines: Nothing to do with you, that's for sure!

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Order!

Senator BACK: It was the fact that we had commodities that were in demand and, of course, we had excellence—

Senator Lines: Nothing to do with you!

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Order on my left!

Senator BACK: in terms of iron ore and coal, and, more latterly, gas.

I turn now to Senator Whish-Wilson. Absolutely laudable, Senator Whish-Wilson—through you, Acting Deputy President Williams. Like you, small business—fantastic! A one-and-a-half per cent tax cut; I am glad you are going to support it. What else have we done? Red tape has been reduced. I hope that you—from your background, Senator Whish-Wilson—will be very, very keen to support us when we have a reasonable discussion about what the impediments are to small business in the hospitality and tourism sectors, particularly on weekends, because, again, those are going to be the areas. We have a look at interest rates and we see the benefits. You speak of the Greens policy associated with the mining tax. I know Senator Whish-Wilson well enough to know that he himself would never, in his small business, and nor would his wife in hers, go out and spend profits or income that they thought they were going to earn. We all said the mining tax would make no money. It made no money! But what did they do? They turned around and spent it, that grossly incompetent government. Do not link yourselves to them, whatever you do.

But when it comes to small business, you and I both know well about agribusiness and the farming sectors. I am very pleased to see the crossbench senators also devoting much time and attention. I am not going to go in any detail through the figures that Senator Canavan mentioned because they are there in Hansard for everybody to read, except to say—through you, Acting Deputy President Williams—to Senator Dastyari that these are not coalition statements; they are statements by the ANZ Bank. They are statements by the Dun and Bradstreet Business Expectations Survey. They are statements, again, by Ernst & Young—independent, Senator Dastyari—and they talking about the parameters that we know to be so important.

Let's now turn to what this government is achieving. One of the great faults of the last government was the raising of sovereign risk. It was not just the loss of revenue, income and investment coming into this country; it was Australians going offshore. In my own state, 65 per cent of mining exploration went to Canada. Why? It was because of the imposition of the carbon tax and mining tax. Sovereign risk was causing money to go from this country to other countries. When we should have been investing in mining exploration here, investments were going offshore. Nothing was coming in.

Let me tell you one of the greatest benefits of the work done by Mr Andrew Robb and those fine officials in the department of trade—the three free trade agreements. Nothing was achieved in the six years of the Labor government, but here we had free trade agreements with Japan, Korea and China—

Senator Lines interjecting—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Williams ): Order! Senator Back, resume your seat. Senator Lines, when I am in this chair I continually have to bring you to attention. Stop interjecting; it is disorderly. I will not say it again. I say the same to you as I did to Senator Dastyari. When you are speaking, I will expect the other side to show the exact same respect. I will not ask you again to cease interjecting. Are you listening to me, Senator Lines?

Senator Lines: Yes.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Okay. Continue, Senator Back.

Senator BACK: Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. I do appreciate that. This is a very important point because most people talk about resources and commodities with these free trade agreements. This is a stat that I would invite everyone to take on board. As Senator Whish-Wilson would know, 70 per cent of the Australian economy is made up by the service sector. It is not the resources sector—

Senator Lines interjecting—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Resume your seat, Senator Back. Senator Lines, I am very familiar with the standing orders. If you want me to read the part about naming a senator, I will gladly read out section 203. Enough is enough.

Senator BACK: The point I am making is that the services sector makes up 70 per cent of the Australian economy but it only contributes to 17 per cent of exports. With the Chinese-Australian free trade agreement being signed, we find ourselves in a situation where the Chinese, in addition to wanting our commodities and our resources, want our services. That is what they want most. They want our legal services, education services, prudential regulatory services and insurance services. In response to Senator Dastyari's allegations of no action, imagine if we could move from 17 per cent of exports from services in this country up to 35 per cent or 40 per cent, replacing what we are losing now in the resources sector. The same will happen with Korea. There is an enormous opportunity for this to happen.

The number of tourists coming into Australia now is huge. They tell me that 100 million Chinese travelled last year. That figure will increase to 200 million. We have opportunities in our tourism and hospitality sectors. I gave a speech last year on long-term unemployment on the Gold Coast. There was an interesting stat that Senator Muir might be interested in. There are about 85,000 jobs urgently needing filling in the hospitality and tourism sectors in this country at this moment. I am not suggesting that every long-term unemployed person might be interested in those positions, but the number of people in long-term unemployment in this country is 85,000. Imagine the increase we are going to have and are seeing already now with the increase in tourism and hospitality.

I had the opportunity, at my own expense, to spend a week in Mexico in January. There are opportunities there for our country in higher education. Fifty thousand students leave Mexico each year in the energy sector and they need to the skills we have in their skills development. PEMEX, the Mexican owned oil company, is setting up its own university and asking Australia for our assistance in mining exploration in the oil and gas sector. There are enormous opportunities for us.

I am an absolute optimist. When I have a look at what we have in this country, such as the fact that we are at the forefront of 3D printing, and the thousands of jobs that are going to be needed, I am an optimist. We do not need to be held back by a regressive opposition.

Senator MUIR ( Victoria ) ( 18:34 ): Please note that this is not my first speech; however, I am delighted to inform the Senate and those watching at home that I have booked that in for 5 March this year. I would also like to make a short contribution to today's matter of public importance. Some commentators may say that the fact I am speaking in the chamber two days in a row is a matter of public importance in itself! But I would like to speak on an issue that I believe is important and deserves attention. That issue is the renewable energy target.

On Monday, I attended a high-level industry and stakeholder roundtable on renewable energy hosted by the Australia Institute and chaired by Professor John Hewson. The roundtable created a renewed push to stop the attacks on the renewable energy target and make Prime Minister Abbott commit to the current target. The industry also turned its focus towards the longer term opportunities—in particular, how to secure stronger support for renewable energy.

Australia is at a crossroads in relation to the RET, and we have been here for far too long. The longer this discussion goes on, the harder it will get to meet the target. There are currently enough projects with planning approval that mean that Australia can meet the target of 41,000 gigawatt hours. Finding equity and investment to fund these projects is the problem, and this problem has been caused by the uncertainty created by the government.

The government's refusal to keep its commitment to the RET is creating investment uncertainty for the renewable energy sector, which must be allowed to continue to produce jobs and economic growth opportunities for all Australians. The renewable energy sector currently employs 21,000 people directly and tens of thousands more indirectly. A prolonged freeze on investment would put many of these jobs at risk. Renewable energy offers billions of dollars of investment in the future. Politicians who stand in the way of renewable energy are standing in the way of these future business opportunities and all the benefits that go with them.

I will stand firm to protect the current legislated RET. I do support minor amendments, such as extending the exemption to energy intensive industries to 100 per cent and recognising wood waste sourced from sustainably managed forests as an eligible source of renewable energy within the RET.

I also want to take this opportunity to remind the government of the importance of maintaining the Automotive Transformation Scheme at such a crucial time for the automotive industry. The loss of vehicle manufacturing in this country is tragic, and the flow-on effect through the supply chain will be huge. We need to focus on transitioning these workers and businesses, not place further pressure on the industry by cutting short the Automotive Transformation Scheme.

But one of the most important messages that I want send to the government, and indeed the opposition, today is that the RET needs bipartisan support. The renewable energy industry needs bipartisan support. I urge the government and opposition to negotiate productively and, for the sake of the sector, the environment, consumers and Australian jobs, reach an agreement.

Senator LINES (Western Australia) (18:37): Before I begin, I want to put some more truth around the statements that Senator Canavan came into this place to make today, when he skited about the consumer confidence index. It was up 0.7. If we take 100 per cent as the break-even point, it was 0.7 above that, so it is hardly something to brag about. Actually, if Senator Canavan had bothered to read beyond the glossy headlines, he would have found that it is a most peculiar increase in consumer confidence and is wholly reflected by Labor supporters. The reason for that is that the survey was undertaken during the leadership debate but before the spill motion. The confidence amongst coalition voters is at all-time low, and that is well and truly reflected in the polls that we have had this week. So I suggest that, if government senators want to come in here to brag and say that consumer confidence is up, it was up slightly and it was up due to Labor voters, who at last thought, 'Perhaps we are going to be rid of a harsh, cruel Prime Minister and his budget.'

This week, we have seen the Prime Minister admit that his government has been bad, and I agree with that. He is certainly a Prime Minister who, along with his Treasurer, is now on probation. Sixty per cent of the Abbott government members, including, if we believe the media, some of his ministers, told him on Monday they would rather have anyone other than him as the Prime Minister—anybody. Joe Hockey has apparently vowed to avoid major changes that would damage business, rejecting calls to lift tax rates or scale back tax concessions for the rich, ruling that this would hurt business confidence. But this morning the media described our Treasurer as 'a dead man walking'. So how long will it be before we have a new Treasurer, parroting yet another phrase? Really, how much credit can we give a Treasurer described as 'embattled'. The dysfunction, the chaos and the division within the Liberal Party have been well and truly on display this week; they are out in the open and there is no going back.

Still, I guess what we can be certain of is that, no matter who the leader is, or who the Treasurer is, or whatever role the foreign minister might bid for, or how many votes are bought in return for loose, open-ended promises on submarine tenders, or any other leadership secret contender or pretender, the message from the Abbott government is the same and the policies of the Abbott government will not change—and they are harming business and consumer confidence in our country.

The first Abbott government budget was full of damaging changes. Since the election, business confidence is down along with consumer confidence, despite Labor supporters being somewhat gleeful that there might be a change in leader this week. Consumer confidence is down 16 per cent, all as a result of the Abbott government's chaos, backflips and broken promises, and now a warning from the RBA that lower growth is looming—the real and harmful consequences being higher unemployment and more difficulties for young people trying to find their first job. It is the dysfunction and chaos of the Abbott government which is worsening unemployment in this country. It seems we have to call Mr Abbott our current Prime Minister, but the best that even Senator Canavan could do to shore up the Prime Minister was hope. He said he 'hoped' that there would not be a change. That is not a great, ringing endorsement that the current Prime Minister is going to be there for very much longer. Again, this dysfunction and chaos will harm the Australian community. It will harm business and it will harm consumer confidence.

Our current Treasurer believes that avoiding cutting taxes for the rich is the way to look after the average Australian, rather than actually supporting economic growth and jobs. The real truth behind their reluctance to pursue negative gearing or loopholes is that they do not want to upset their mates at the big end of town—that is the truth of it, but even the business community, particularly the big business community, is well and truly sick and tired of the dysfunction and chaos of the Abbott government. The chamber of commerce, usually good friends of the Liberal Party, agree with Labor on this. Kate Carnell said earlier in the week: 'This sort of leadership instability is actually poison for business confidence and for consumer confidence. It is essential the government focus on running the country.' This is from their mates. This is from business. So they cannot come in here and pretend that everything is hunky-dory in their parallel universe, because, in the real world of business, it is not.

The budget actually reduced economic growth by its impact on consumer confidence. The Liberals think that, if they say 'confidence is up', enough Australians will believe it. I am glad I have this opportunity to get this on the record: confidence is way down since the last federal election. We had Senator Back in here this afternoon trying to pull down penalty rates. If the government think that reducing penalty rates on the weekend is somehow going to lift business confidence, they do not have a clue—clearly, they have not got a clue. You do not attack penalty rates on business. There is a cost to running businesses on the weekend: it is a penalty rate for workers who are forced to work unsociable hours. That should be a given. If the government think that reducing the minimum wage or reducing penalty rates is somehow going to instil business confidence or consumer confidence, they know nothing. How do you increase consumer confidence when you shrink take-home pay?

I would have thought it was fairly obvious. If you reduce take-home pay people have less money to spend in the economy. It is not rocket science, but apparently it is something the Abbott government does not believe or does not understand, as their attack on penalty rates, saying it will be good for business, continues absolutely unfettered despite our being told that good government started last Monday, although we are still waiting on that.

We know that when people are optimistic, when they have money in their pocket and when their penalty rates or the minimum wage is not being attacked they are more likely to spend, and that leads to economic growth. We also know that when people are pessimistic they are more likely to save. I do not know why the Abbott government does not understand that. This is not a government that feeds optimism. The Prime Minister has the lowest poll rating of all time. It is time to listen, Abbott Government, time to act, time to stop pretending. If you are going to put in a new leader, get on and do it, but this chaos and dysfunction is now hurting our country.

Chaos and dysfunction has been a consistent trend since this government came into power. The latest chaos over leadership and the competence of the Treasurer will plunge any last scrap of confidence consumers had in this government even further. The Abbott government's budget strategy—if you can call it that, it seemed just to attack working Australians—did not pay any attention to the economy. Again, if you make people poorer they will not spend money. When you hit everyday Australians in the way the Abbott government did in its unfair, harsh budget it does impact on confidence. Confidence will continue to go down until the Abbott government, or whoever is the Prime Minister, comes to its senses. In the meantime, the damage to business and consumer confidence will continue.

Mr Abbott has given Australians a government that cannot settle on one economic message, on one economic policy, and now they cannot settle on one Prime Minister. This is a government that tells us one thing while in fact doing another. It is a government of smoke and mirrors, a government of no substance. The RBA, the chamber of commerce and consumers all tell us that confidence is down, as are the polls, which have no confidence in this government.

Senator FAWCETT (South Australia—Deputy Government Whip in the Senate) (18:47): I rise to address this matter of public importance on the Abbott government. Labor has talked about a chaotic government, but leaders of both sides of politics in the past have said that one of the most fundamental tasks of government's national security. I would like to step through three areas of national security where the Abbott government has proved why the coalition consistently is the side of politics people trust with national security.

When this government came into office we were facing the lowest level of defence expenditure since the 1930s. Some $16 billion had been cut from the budget, 119 projects had been delayed, 48 had been cut and eight cancelled altogether, and industry had shed some 10 per cent of its workforce in the defence industry space. It took some months after coming to government before we finally quantified just what the backlog was, even in areas such as maintenance and remedial work on base infrastructure. There was some $1 billion that Defence had had to pull out of essential maintenance just to cover the cuts that Labor had made elsewhere. This government, by contrast, has made a significant increase—some $29.3 billion in the 2014-15 budget, which is an 8.1 per cent rise—and is well on its way to achieving the two per cent of GDP for defence expenditure.

Intelligence and security is another area. The government has engaged with both the House and the Senate to move through various hearings with the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security as well as stakeholders in the community, our security agencies, key pieces of national security legislation such as the counter-terrorism amendment bill (No. 1) and the foreign fighters bill, and we are currently working on the metadata retention bill. We have outlaid an additional $630 million to disrupt terrorist activities in Australia. We have seen just in the last 24 hours announcements by the Federal Police and the New South Wales police about the arrest of people in Sydney who were in the final stages of plotting to carry out a terrorist act in Sydney. The law enforcement authorities made a very clear point that it was these new laws, which have been steadily implemented by this government, that provided the environment whereby they were able to take the necessary steps to apprehend these two individuals and save lives.

The third area I will talk about is border protection. A key election commitment of the government was that we would restore integrity to Australia's borders. It is something that the opposition, minor parties and many commentators said could not happen. They said that if we tried—if we did it—we would destroy our regional relationships. Let us compare and contrast the successive governments. When Labor came to government there were no children in detention under PM Howard and the whole detention system cost less than $100 million per year. Under the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd government and all the chaos that represented there were some 12 policy changes and initiatives all attempting not only to undo the Howard government policies but to put in place others when the problem started to get out of hand. The result was that the system ended up costing more than $12 billion—that is, it went from under $100 million to over $12 billion. Most significantly, and this is the thing that exercises a lot of people in the community—they are concerned about the welfare of children—under the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd policies the number of children in detention peaked in July 2013, just over 18 months ago, at 1,992. It went from zero under the coalition to 1,992 children in detention.

Under this government, the boats have stopped arriving, the costs of detention are decreasing and, importantly, not only are we clearing the backlog of some 30,000 asylum seekers who were refused the right to work—with all the attendant issues of mental health and purpose in life that go along with that—we now have TPVs and they have the right to work. Importantly, there are no children in detention on Christmas Island. We have managed in 18 short months to bring the number down from that peak of 1,992 to a total of 193 children, who are in detention because they wish to stay with their parents—193 versus 1,992 because of this government's policies.

It is important to remember that we are talking about the same departments, we are talking about the same equipment available and yet we are talking about an incredibly different outcome. And what is the difference? The difference is this government which has provided leadership and consistency. It has had the courage to take the hard decisions and it has had a steadfast commitment to protecting Australia's national interest, which is the most fundamental task of any government. This government has performed well in the most fundamental task that a government can.

Senator LAMBIE (Tasmania) (18:53): If Australia is to undo the damage, chaos, division and dysfunction that this government—and let's be honest the one before it—has caused to our economy and society, everyone knows that, while we need to readjust our spending priorities, we also need to reform our tax system. The disagreement between senators in this chamber is not about whether we legislate for tax reform, but how we legislate for tax reform. During my appearance on ABC TV's Q&A, I asked why Australia's major political parties were not considering a financial transactions tax. Both coalition and Labor politicians refused to debate the merits or otherwise of a financial transactions tax, and this only makes me fight harder and confirms that I am on the right path.

According to Parliamentary Library research:

In the aftermath of the global financial crisis the idea of applying a general FTT has been the subject of considerable debate.

In August 2009, Lord Turner, chair of the UK Financial Services Authority, canvassed the possibility of imposing a FTT on all financial transactions to promote an efficient financial sector, particularly more stable financial markets!

A general financial transactions tax has come to be seen as a way of reducing financial market volatility and excessive speculation in these markets as a safeguard against future financial crises.

The report continues:

Financial markets have massively expanded over the last few decades and it is argued a general FTT, even when applied at a relatively low rate, would raise substantial amounts of revenue.

It has been suggested that if a general FTT was applied globally the revenue raised could be used to fund a range of global public goods such as reducing poverty and combatting climate change.

If the rest of the world is debating an FTT, then why isn't Australia? (Time expired)

The PRESIDENT (18:55): Before we move onto the next item of business, with the concurrence of the Senate I would like to recommit a vote that was taken earlier in the day. It was in relation to general business notice of motion No. 588. The result was called on the voices and it was resolved in the negative.

Senator Siewert, who was the mover of that motion, has ascertained that that may not have been the correct reflection of the vote. There was a lot of noise in the chamber at the time, and I called it on the voices I heard. Senator Siewert in goodwill did not interrupt the proceedings then, because we moved into the debate on Closing the Gap. I thank Senator Siewert for her patience and, with the concurrence of the Senate, I will now recommit that vote.

The question is that general business notice of motion No. 588 be agreed to.

Question agreed to.

Senator GALLACHER (South Australia) (19:02): At the request of Senator Collins, I move:

That the Senate:

(a) adopt the recommendation in the 160th report of the Committee of Privileges, on the use of CCTV material in Parliament House, that no contempt be found in relation to the matter referred; and

(b) adopt the following further recommendations made by the committee:

• That the Presiding Officers instigate the development of a new Code of Practice which restores the focus on matters of security and safety, and emphasises accountability to the Presiding Officers and the Parliament, with appropriate regard for the primacy of the powers, and immunities of the Houses and their members.

• That the review process involve consultations with members and senators and other building occupants, and give consideration to the matters dealt with in this report.

• That senior officers in the Department of Parliamentary Services involved in the administration of the CCTV system and other systems managed on behalf of the Parliament undertake some structured training to acquaint themselves with the principles of privilege.

• That the attention of the Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee be drawn to the matters set out from paragraph 2.2, under the heading Contradictory evidence, relating to the misleading evidence given at its estimates hearing on 26 May 2014.

When Senator Collins tabled this report at the close of sittings last year, there was no opportunity to move its adoption. The Senate did however give Senator Collins leave to incorporate her tabling statement. The effect of the motion I move today is for the Senate to adopt the recommendations of the committee. If no other senator wishes to speak at this time, I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted.

Ordered that the report be adopted.