BILLS

2020-09-01 46 1 4 House of Reps 0 1

Tuesday, 1 September 2020

The SPEAKER ( Hon. Tony Smith ) took the chair at 12:00, made an acknowledgement of country and read prayers.

BILLS 1 BILLS Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 1

Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020

Second Reading 1 12:02 Ms PLIBERSEK 83M Sydney I move: That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: "The House declines to give the bill a second reading as it is of the opinion that: (1)the Government is making it harder and more expensive to go to university; and (2)the bill will: (a)cause students to pay more to attend university; (b)ensure thousands of students will have their fees doubled; (c)result in billions of dollars being cut from universities; and (d)do nothing to get young people into high priority courses or jobs". This bill, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020, comes at a time when young people are hurting and universities are hurting. It's no exaggeration to say that higher education is in the middle of its most severe crisis in living memory. In the past few months, thousands of university staff across the country have lost their jobs—thousands have lost their jobs already. These losses are being felt everywhere—in Tasmania, in Rockhampton, in Geelong, in Sydney, in Darwin, in Warrnambool, in Bendigo, in Wollongong and in Melbourne. Students have seen lecturers leave and subjects cancelled. They've seen some regional campuses close entirely. And they've seen a government with shockingly little interest in acknowledging this crisis, let alone solving it. At the same time Australia is experiencing a recession that is hitting our young people hardest. Young people were last onto the working ladder and now they're being pushed off first. Like in previous recessions it is youth unemployment that has skyrocketed, and so too has youth underemployment. For many young people their imagined future has changed overnight. Apprenticeships are banishing, travel is impossible and work feels out of reach for so many. Think about those poor year 12 kids this year, those young people who are in their final year of high school who had so much to look forward to—finishing their exams, finishing school, schoolies, formals. All of that has been taken from them. On top of that, on top of the confusion and the stress that they've experienced this year, their government is now telling them that it's going to be harder and more expensive to get into university. So we have two problems here: a financial crisis in our universities; and a surge in youth unemployment. And what's the government's answer to these two problems? What is the proposal to protect our universities and help our young people? Would it be the extension of JobKeeper wage subsidies to public universities? Is it a new investment in TAFE to make our vocational education system world-class again? Is it the expansion of places to make sure that if young people cannot be working in the next few years they'll have at least have an opportunity to study and learn? Sadly, no. We see none of these things from the government. What we have here is a bill that will make it harder and more expensive to go to university—a bill that gives universities fewer resources and then asks them to do more with less; a bill that does not begin to expand places nearly enough to meet the huge growth in demand we've already seen from students who want to go to university or TAFE because, let's face it, they're not having a gap year next year; and a bill that says that it's promoting science and engineering when in fact it actually does the exact opposite of what it says on the packet. Frankly, this bill shows a basic ignorance of how university funding works and how the changes proposed will work in practice. The legislation is a mess. It is not legislation that can be salvaged with a few tweaks here and there. We can't amend it and adjust it to improve it to make it acceptable. It is irredeemable, and the government really ought to go back to the drawing board. If the coalition really wants to legislate to help university students, or potential students, it has to go back to the drawing board. As I said, this bill makes it harder and more expensive for Australians to go to university. The government can't get around this with amendments because the central purpose of this legislation is to push the cost of education more onto students. Actually what's at the heart of this legislation is the continuation of the effort of those opposite, since Christopher Pyne was education minister, to make students bear a larger share of the cost of their education and government bear a smaller share of the cost of university education. That is the aim of this legislation. That is the purpose of this legislation. There's no getting around that from those opposite. They've been trying to do it for years. They tried to do it in the 2014 budget. They tried it again in 2017, and sadly they are trying it again now just as unemployment in this country hits a million. On average, Australian students will pay seven per cent more for their studies under this legislation. Around 40 per cent of students will have their fees increased, some of them to $14,500 a year. For thousands of students, this means that the cost of their degree will more than double. It will increase by 113 per cent. So if you're studying commerce, you will pay more than a dentist or a doctor for the cost of your degree every year. If you're studying humanities, you will pay more than a dentist or a doctor for the cost of your degree every year. If you're studying communications and law, you'll pay more than a dentist or doctor for the cost of your degree every year. What's more, the government have tried to claim that they are doing this in the best interests of students. It's supposed to be directing students to areas where they'll have greater opportunity of employment. In fact, that's not the case, and just this weekend the minister was actually caught out using dodgy figures to mislead students and their parents about the employability of graduates. In fact, the prospects for humanities graduates, when it comes to employment, are quite healthy. When you actually read the report, you see that the figures that the government drew attention to on the weekend show that, after three years, the employability of humanities graduates and science and maths graduates—that the government claims it's trying to support or promote—are about the same, at around 87 per cent. I expect the minister knows this, because he has three humanities degrees himself and it hasn't stopped him getting a job. The business world gets it. Many businesspeople you talk to started out with arts degrees or generalist degrees. That's why they have spoken out so strongly against these proposed changes. To quote Megan Lilly, a director at the Australian Industry Group: The one thing we know about the jobs market is that all the balls are in the air and they could land in a very different place … we have to be as open as possible to lots of different growth areas. We're not of the view that the humanities is unnecessary. Graduates get very good generalist skills, and it can lead to very good career opportunities. Even the CEO of Engineering Australia acknowledges that this bill would produce 'a harmful reduction in the diversity of skills necessary for a modern workforce'. So the government say they want more people studying engineering, and the engineers say that this bill would be harmful. These are people who are out there right now looking for graduates to hire in this tough labour market. Are they saying that what the government is proposing is a good idea? They are not. We need humanities graduates and engineering graduates. This government is forever trying to divide Australians. Now they're trying to divide one group of students against another group of students. We need Australians to have access to a first quality TAFE system and a first quality university system. The government's forever pretending that there is a choice to be made in Australia. We either fund TAFE or we fund universities. We get people studying humanities, or we get people studying engineering. It's just not the case that we should be dragged into these hostile binary positions when the truth is that we need an education system that meets the broadest possible needs of our economy and the broadest possible interests of our students. This bill doesn't make economic sense, particularly at a time when we will need a trained workforce to help us recover from the recession that we're in right now. It doesn't make sense for the economy, and it doesn't make sense for students. Honestly, you would think that those opposite could put themselves in the shoes of students who have been making these hard decisions this year. They've just completed their HSC, or equivalent in other states, under the most uncertain conditions you could possibly imagine. They've watched as all of the fun stuff that was supposed to come after their years of study has all been taken from them. Think about how they feel as they watch the labour market collapse around them, just as they're preparing to graduate into it. They've been trapped at home. They've had all of the energy of youth pent up within them. Many of them have been focused for years on what they want to study. They've been working hard to get the marks to get into the course they decided they wanted to do last year or the year before or when they were eight years old—who knows? They've had the rug ripped out from underneath them by this government, which has just told thousands of them that they'll have to pay more than double the cost for the degree of their choice. This bill changes the rules on people who have been struggling to get marks to get into those degrees. It's unfair and it's heartless. It ignores the reality of those young people's lives, and it ignores the massive contribution that their parents, their teachers and their communities have put into getting those year 12s through their final year of school this year, trying to make it possible for them to graduate with some sense of security and certainty and predictability around them in a world that has turned so chaotic. Australia is about to experience an unprecedented increase in demand for university places and TAFE places. Since this recession began, an extra 90,000 young people are now unemployed, and another 90,000 have stopped looking for work altogether. We know that in the last few years a lot of people have been taking a year off after their final year of high school. They've been working and they've been travelling; they've been taking a gap year. There are not going to be any gap years next year. There aren't those entry-level positions for high school graduates to go into and, let's face it, none of us are travelling very much at the moment. As well as that, we are actually facing a demographic bubble. Many of you will remember when then Treasurer Peter Costello said he wanted Australians to have 'one for Mum, one for Dad and one for the nation'. Well, Australians followed his advice and they received that $5,000 baby bonus, as it was at the time. They went out and had one for Mum, one for Dad and one for the nation. Those kids are ready to go to university or TAFE this year. So, on top of the massive hit to young people's employment prospects, on top of the fact that we're not going to have young people going off on a gap year, on top of the increased challenge and insecurity of their final exams this year, we have Peter Costello's baby boom just hitting the system now. What that means is that there has already been a huge increase in the number of young Australians who are applying to go to university. In New South Wales, just as an example, applications to go to university next year have more than doubled compared with applications for this year. This legislation does not come close to addressing that massive increase in demand for university. The government is making much of the fact that there are an extra few thousand places at university as a result of this legislation—well, potentially as a result of this legislation; it's not legislated that these extra places will appear. But who pays for those extra places? Other students pay for those extra places because of the increase in student contribution as a direct result of this legislation. Extra places are paid for by other students paying more for the cost of their education. There's a lot of smoke and mirrors in this bill. There's a lot of moving money around. What there isn't—what you cannot hide—is the fact that students will pay more and the government will contribute less to the cost of university in this country. In fact, the government will provide about a billion dollars a year less for universities—on average, six per cent less to teach every student, and, as I've said, students will pay more. We're not going to manage to create the sorts of places we need at TAFE and university now simply by charging more to students who want to get an education. That is not the way this country should meet the increased demand for education that is created by the recession that we're in right now. I cannot, for the life of me, understand why any government presiding over the first recession in three decades would want to make it harder for people to get an education. If young people or anyone, like a middle-aged worker who's lost their job, want to train, retrain, get an education or develop their skills so they are more employable in this hostile labour market that they're entering into, with a million unemployed, doesn't it make sense for their government to support them in that effort? No. Instead, this government wants to make it harder and more expensive for people to upgrade their skills or get a new qualification. I can't understand why something that is so obvious to me is not obvious to our Prime Minister. As it stands, this legislation will lock out thousands of students just when they need an education the most. What's sad about this is that all of the Liberal cabinet ministers have had the opportunity to get a great education—they've all been to university; it's good enough for them—but they're saying to thousands of young Australians that it's not good enough for them. They're saying, 'You don't deserve an affordable university education.' Even if we were to take this bill on its stated aims, even if we were to have a look at what the government says it's trying to do and say, 'Well, let's measure this bill against what the government claims it wants for students,' the bizarre truth of the legislation is that in many respects this bill will do pretty much the opposite of what the government is claiming. When the Prime Minister announced the changes, he said that they would promote the study of engineering and science and that that is in fact the entire purpose of this bill. That's why he has given it another marketing slogan name: the Job Ready Graduates Package. But, as you often have to do with this Prime Minister, you look at the headline and at the slogan on one day and then over the subsequent days you look at the detail and you find that the detail doesn't always match up to the first day's slogan. When you look at the detail here, you will find that, in academic areas that the government apparently wants us to encourage study in, universities will actually receive overall less funding for each place. The government says, 'We're going to encourage students to study in these areas by dropping student fees.' But most people say that that is not going to work. In fact, the former education minister, Julie Bishop, who is now the Chancellor of ANU, is the first to point out the fact that she tried this and it didn't work. When you look at the detail here, they're not just dropping what students will contribute to the cost of their education but they're also dropping what the government will pay for those places. For every extra student that universities take in these areas, they'll be losing more funding. In fact, under this legislation, universities will receive 32 per cent less to teach medical scientists. They'll receive 17 per cent less to teach maths students. They'll receive 16 per cent less to teach engineers. They'll receive 15 per cent less to teach clinical psychology. They'll receive 10 per cent less to teach agricultural students. They'll receive eight per cent less to teach nurses. You don't need a doctorate in aeronautics from one of these engineering schools to guess what the impact of that will be as universities are deciding where they're going to allocate places. When you cut money that supports the teaching of engineering and science courses, either you're going to get worse outcomes in those courses or you're going to get fewer scientists and engineers. The Chancellor of the Australian National University, Julie Bishop, pointed out: My concern is that under these new arrangements, there is a greater incentive for universities to take in a higher number of law, commerce and humanities than there is to take in students in engineering and maths … that appears to be contrary to the government's policy intentions. That is the sort of diplomatic understatement that the former foreign minister learnt in the job as foreign minister. The Australian Council of Deans of Science says the same thing: 'It will not serve to generate more STEM-capable graduates if the funding changes undermine the capacity of universities to produce them. The funds that will come to university science to produce graduates will shrink by 16 per cent under the Job-ready Graduates proposal.' That's the deans of science. They might know a thing or two about teaching science graduates at university. The Prime Minister has either been dishonest about the intention of this legislation or, potentially worse, doesn't have a clue about how this funding arrangement will work in practice. You cannot promote the study of science and engineering by starving science and engineering departments in universities. We've heard a lot from the government this year about their attitude to universities. The Liberal Party have made it very clear that they think universities are hotbeds of Marxism, feminism and cultural studies nonsense. They have almost been suspicious of universities, and they been proud of their suspicion. It didn't stop them from attending university themselves, and it probably won't stop them from sending their kids there. But this year we've seen this suspicion about the role that universities play in our society jump the shark to outright hostility. We've gone from suspicion to outright hostility this year. No other major industry has been treated the way universities have been treated at this time. There are thousands of university workers have already lost their jobs. That is professors and tutors, but it's also librarians, cafeteria workers, ground keepers and admin staff; it is people across the board. The Prime Minister has sat with his arms folded and his lip curled watching those jobs go. There are thousands more jobs set to be lost. One estimate is that 30,000 jobs will go. The government has changed the JobKeeper rules three times to lock universities out of receiving JobKeeper. And now the Prime Minister wants to make it harder and more expensive for students to go to university. This government wants people to feel that universities are a bit dodgy, a bit strange, a bit weird—'You don't really want to send your kids there'! They want people to think universities are an indulgence, something to resent, a luxury for the elite. This is really the fundamental difference. I don't share that view and I don't think Australians in general share that view. I think it's worth saying that 41 per cent of Australians aged between 25 and 40 now hold a bachelor's degree because of the changes Labor made in government of uncapping places at university. All of those people we are looking to to help us during this pandemic—doctors, nurses, teachers, epidemiologists, scientists, researchers—have all been to university. Why is there this terrible suspicion about universities from the government? I know that people don't agree with them. I have 15½ thousand people who have signed this petition today, and another 11,000 people who don't agree with them have signed a petition that is being tabled in the Senate. But it's more than that. I said earlier that this is a government that has spent its time in office trying to pit Australian against Australian. I think of my own family here. My parents both left school much earlier than they would have liked to. They were little children in a war zone in Europe during the Second World War. One day they woke up and all their teachers were gone, and basically there were teachers speaking German in their classrooms. They were two super-smart people who, like a lot of people of their generation, never had the chance to finish high school let alone go to university. Those opposites say we shouldn't look down on people who choose a TAFE qualification, people who want to choose a trade. We never have. My dad was a plumber and gasfitter. I never looked down on him for the work that he did, which fed our family and put a roof over our heads. He worked six days a week. But I'll tell you what: when he had a minute to himself, he'd pick up New Scientist or a newspaper and he would read and he would educate himself. When my brothers and I expressed an interest in going to university, he didn't say it was better than going to TAFE; he didn't say it was worse. He said: 'You should do what will satisfy you, what will make you happy, so long as you make a contribution to the economy that you're part of.' That's how Australians feel about education—not that there is a gap or a difference between TAFE and university, not that one is better or worse than the other, but that every Australian citizen should have the opportunity to do what makes them satisfied, contributes to our economy and means that they are employable, can support themselves and can make a contribution to our economy as a whole. That's what we want to do on this side. We want to expand those opportunities so that there is no kid anywhere in Australia who is prepared to work hard and study hard and put the hours in when they're in high school who is denied a university education because those opposite have doubled the cost of the degree that they want to study. There should be no child anywhere who is saying: 'I can't afford to go to university. I can't afford $58,000 to do a university degree.' That is so fundamentally wrong. Those opposite are saying I'm misrepresenting this. If you think that, you haven't read this legislation, because that's exactly what this does—it more than doubles the cost of a university education. And if you don't get that, you should be embarrassed that your minister and your Prime Minister haven't told you the truth about what this legislation does. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 72184 Is the amendment seconded? Mr Clare HWL The amendment is seconded and I reserve my right to speak. 12:32 Dr ALLEN 282986 Higgins This year will be like no other. The changes and pivoting required to deal with and navigate the COVID crisis have seeped into every part of our lives, not just here in Australia but overseas as well. The nature of our universities, with large-scale lectures and small, intimate tutorials, meant that, when social distancing restrictions came in, universities were one of the first sectors to close and were forced to move to online platforms. I think it is worth noting that they've done remarkably well and should be commended on their quick transition to online learning. But the COVID-19 pandemic has also exposed our dependence on international students enrolling in higher education, which is our fourth-biggest export. Universities are working hard to ensure that the strength of this sector continues, and I know that they've had productive discussions with the Minister for Education in order to ensure the dynamism of our international student programs remains. But, at least in the short term, our universities will need to strengthen their focus on domestic students. That is because we know higher education is countercyclical. When the economy suffers, as it indeed is doing with the COVID pandemic, more people turn to higher education to improve their skills and training. The public understand that higher education helps them with the skills to succeed in areas of future job growth. That is why they turn to the sector, because they know it will help them to get a job. The Morrison government understands that, in this COVID crisis, we now need to pivot to a job-ready workforce with job-ready skills. The job-ready graduates reforms in this legislation will support increased demand from school leavers and provide more options for upskilling and reskilling workers who have lost jobs due to COVID-19. The job-ready package will create 39,000 new university places by 2023 and 100,000 by 2030 and provide additional support for students in regional and remote Australia. Despite Australia's strong health and economic response to COVID-19, there will still be more to come globally and we need to know how we're going to deal with this going forward. We know international travel is not going to come back very quickly. As the rest of the world continues to battle the virus, now is the time for Australia to look to our future and to prepare for the post-COVID world. The Morrison government is ready to support universities to educate the next generation for the opportunities that a new post-COVID economic order will indeed present. The future might be uncertain, but what we do know is that Australia must create a workforce that is prepared for the future. We know that will be dependent on our ability to innovate, to be ready for technology and to be ready for the 21st century, and the best way to do that is through our university sector and to encourage students to enrol in subjects with specific vocations in mind. Ensuring every student has the opportunity to access education, to learn, to upskill or to reskill will form a good base for Australia building its way out of the economic pressures that COVID presents. To do this we need to better educate and train the next generation in subjects such as science and technology so that we can grasp the opportunities with both hands as they present themselves. We know that when unemployment rises the biggest impact is on the young. I know this because my four children are in this age group of 16 to 23. I know they and their friends are looking to the future, and they know that they need to be focused on how to be ready for the jobs of the future. Projections show that the overwhelming majority of new jobs will require tertiary qualifications. With health care, science and technology, education and construction projected to provide 62 per cent of total employment growth over the next five years, these are the opportunities we need our children to hear about. These are the focuses that our children need to grasp with both hands. Recently, the parliamentary Joint Standing Committee on Trade and Investment Growth, of which I'm a member, handed down the inquiry report Trade transformation: supporting Australia's export and investment opportunities. The report reiterated what we all know: Australia is an export nation and we have a growing opportunity to build on our service exports, particularly in health, professional services and financial services, as well as travel when the restrictions are lifted. Amongst other growth areas, the future of energy in this country will be dependent on a trained and educated workforce, and this particularly includes the renewable sector and other novel technologies, which have been outlined by the Morrison government's Technology Investment Roadmap, the draft of which was released last month. If we are to carve our own future, we will need to pivot to new market opportunities as the resilience on our resources shifts in the new energy order. For the last decade, our pretertiary education system has focused on students' participation in the STEM disciplines—the disciplines of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. That has been supported by both sides of the House and indeed by the crossbenches, because we do understand the importance of STEM in primary schools and secondary schools. I am sure every local member in this House has been down to their local school to celebrate the wonderful science and technology innovation happening in our primary and secondary schools, from prep students right through to students at the highest levels of secondary school. I want to alert you to something that's happening in my electorate of Higgins. I was approached by a young girl, Grace Halifax, who is eight years old. Grace understands that coding is the ABC of mathematics. She had a meeting with me and her mother, and she said, 'I would like to teach other children about coding.' This is an eight-year-old girl in my electorate, Grace Halifax. She had a great plan, which was to have a community hall with laptops and volunteers. I thought, 'What a great idea, but how can we do it when we're in stage 4 lockdown in Melbourne?' So I said to Grace, 'Why don't we host a Zoom?' We advertised it to the local primary schools, for children from grade 2 to grade 5, in the electorate of Higgins. Lo and behold, 250 students signed up for Grace Halifax's 'ABC for Coding' via Zoom! Every Thursday, from four o'clock—please sign up, if you want to; it's still open and it's free—for six weeks, she's teaching the children of Higgins, peer to peer, how to code, the ABC of coding. It's a fantastic initiative. She's using Scratch, micro.bit and machine learning. She is a digital native. More importantly, she's a coding native. That is because she understands that the world that is opening up opportunities for her and her peers, her cohort, is full of maths, and she really understands that coding is a very important part of that. It was an amazing experience, to see these kids enthusiastically participating in coding. I wish I had learned coding. That is why we as a government understand that nurturing the lifelong love of science makes sense not just for our employment and jobs of the future but for our understanding and place in the world. That is why the government will increase the number of graduates in areas of expected employment growth and demand. These include STEM and IT but also teaching, nursing and agriculture. This growth will seek to complement the Job-ready Graduates Package. We will incentivise students to make more job-relevant choices, which lead to job-ready graduates, by reducing the student contribution in areas of expected employment growth and demand. Our reforms will create an extra 100,000 places at university by 2030. Importantly, the proposed changes are focused on a unit, not a degree level. This means students studying for a Bachelor of Arts can reduce their total student contribution by choosing electives in subjects like maths, English, science and IT within their degree, because we know these are the skills that employers want and seek in their prospective employees. This, in turn, will encourage students to embrace diversity and not think about their education as a silo degree that remains in one area. Most importantly, the students of today will not be penalised. This scheme is grandfathered. No current student faces increases for the duration of their course. It's also worth noting that continuing students that are set to gain from the policy will do so from next year. Our government is committed to supporting students in paying back their loans. Our higher education loan program remains the world's most generous income-contingent loan scheme, and these new measures will continue to maintain the arrangements that are currently in place. Overall, more than half of the cost of Commonwealth supported places will continue to be subsidised for students. This funding will be prioritised to the areas of high public benefit and those most needed by the labour market. This means that the Commonwealth supported students studying in key growth areas, including science, nursing, teaching, engineering and IT, will see significant reductions in their student contribution to those units. Students enrolling in teaching, nursing, clinical psychology, English and languages will pay 42 per cent less for their degree. Students who study agriculture and maths will pay 59 per cent less for their degree. And students who study science, health, architecture, environmental science, IT and engineering will pay 18 per cent less for their degree. We also recognise the importance of a growing burden on mental health, and we know that mental health will be an enduring challenge of our time. The Prime Minister, along with the Minister for Health, is particularly committed to investment in mental health services, so we know we will need more people in these areas. As such, the government will also recognise two more disciplines, psychology and social work, as part of this legislative package. Students completing units in those areas will also see a reduction in the student contribution for those subjects. This will form an incredibly important pathway to employment in these areas—the employment of psychology and social work. These payments are incredibly important because we know this is a particular growth area. Overall, government policy is to lower the cost for students through fee structures, and our continued record $18 billion investment into the sector will grow to $20 billion by 2024. The 2017 higher education report from Deloitte argues it is: … crucial that funding appropriately relates to the cost of higher education provision such that the signals that funding sends—to both students and providers—positively influence decision making. In summary, subsidies offered by the government to students need to reflect the national interest and align with the whole-of-government approach of ensuring Australia's future prosperity, which means an employed workforce with job-ready degrees. Unsurprisingly, those opposite are whipping up unnecessary anxiety amongst current students through misinformation about the cost of university courses for students already enrolled. This is in the context of Labor's own previous support for this form of incentivisation. A 2008 Rudd government decision saw a reduction in student contribution for mathematics, statistics and science that was aimed at addressing falling enrolments in these disciplines. Importantly, the Rudd government student contribution reduction saw an almost doubling in STEM course participation, from 13,795 in 2009 to 26,272 in 2012—that is just three years later. Now is the time to prepare the next generation for the jobs in the century ahead. These reforms will deliver more job-ready graduates in the disciplines and regions where they are needed most and help drive the nation's economic recovery post-COVID. I'm proud to support this legislation. 12:47 Mr GORMAN 74519 Perth I could not feel more strongly that this legislation, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020, is the wrong direction for our country. It's a tax on students. It's a knowledge tax on Australia, and it says a lot about this government that this is its priority in the middle of a pandemic. First they denied JobKeeper to universities, sending people to the unemployment queues because universities could not afford to keep their staff on the books. That was a decision of this government. Now they are proposing to increase fees for education and give less money to our higher education institutions—all in one piece of legislation. Fairness and opportunity should be the values that drive our work in this place—no-one held back, no-one left behind. This legislation does hold Australians back. It holds them back in the middle of the first recession in 30 years. It leaves behind people who find that university is too expensive. It is a war on our universities—a war that, in my view, the Liberal Party have been raging every time they are on the government benches. I noticed the contribution from the member for Higgins—'no current students'. She was at pains to stress that no current student would pay these fees, because the government know that students are worried about the fee increases that will come as a result of this legislation. The reality is that, while they say 'no current students', from next year we'll have students sitting side by side in humanities classes who'll be paying different rates of fees. Some will be paying more than 100 per cent more than the student that they are sitting right next to. As the member for Sydney really appropriately pointed out, this legislation is being debated in this place at the worst possible time for year 12 students across Australia. Year 12 students in my electorate, and indeed in every one of the 151 electorates in Australia, have had an incredibly stressful year. Already, they feel like they don't know what the opportunities are going to look like next year. They don't know what their world looks like next year. The government's solution to that is to say: 'Well, let's just pile uncertainty on top of uncertainty.' I also noticed the member for Higgins paid tribute to Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard for reducing university fees. If you want to copy the Rudd and Gillard governments for making it more affordable for people to go to university, be me guest; however, we will not let you get away with increasing fees for students at the worst possible time. I'm pleased the Labor Party is opposing this bill. The University of Western Australia have publicly stated that this legislation will cut their revenue by three to four per cent—a three to four per cent reduction in their gross revenue. It does make it more difficult for students to go to university. It makes it more expensive for students to go to university. On average, students will pay seven per cent more for their degree. That's a pretty hefty tax to whack on higher education. Some 40 per cent of students, however, will see their fees increase to $14,500 a year. That's doubling the cost for thousands of students. A law and a commerce degree will increase by 28 per cent, and the cost of a humanities course will go up 113 per cent. I studied humanities at Curtin University and business at the University of Western Australia. I am very happy to be standing up for students who are studying the courses that I studied a decade or more ago. We know universities are already taking huge whacks to their operating revenue. Former UWA Vice-Chancellor Jane den Hollander—someone who I got to know when she was a deputy vice-chancellor at Curtin University, a great Australian—says they will face a funding shortfall this year of some $64 million. Curtin University Vice-Chancellor Deborah Terry says that their revenue will be down $60 million on what it's budgeted, and this legislation makes the challenge for them all the more hard. Today we saw the ABC, a great broadcasting institution, get information leaked out of Curtin University that they are going to cut $41 million worth of staff wages next year. They are looking at potential forced redundancies. These things are all happening while the government continues to press along with this legislation. I was out at Curtin University a few weeks ago talking to Hana Arai, the Curtin Student Guild president. They were in the middle of their virtual O-Week. Most of us in this place probably got a pretty good in-person university experience. New students are having to start their courses and their education entirely online—and that's a legitimate choice for many people to make—so if they wanted a real university experience they're having a really tough time. They were saying one of the most stressful things for new students is the uncertainty around fees going forward. Indeed some students had brought forward their studies to get ahead of any changes that the government might make. If you think about young people in Australia right now, they are having an absolutely terrible time. We criticise Senator Colbeck a lot in this place at the moment for his failures on aged care. The reality is: he is also the minister for youth. We have no youth strategy—we've had no youth strategy for seven years under this government. The things they've done for our young people are pretty rotten. We've got 140,000 fewer trainees and apprentices than when this government came into office. In July the ABS labour force figures show that we now have a million Australians unemployed and 345,000 of them are young Australians. We have the highest youth unemployment in decades because of this recession. We have young people starting out with the least secure financial footing in generations. They've been forced to raid their superannuation, what little superannuation they've been able to accumulate, and now the government's going to cut down the superannuation guarantee, giving them even less in their future. We know we've got record youth unemployment. We know they've put a huge dent in their superannuation. We know that young people are going to be saddled with paying back government debt for decades. Again, I come back to this knowledge tax that the government has proposed. Most people in this place believe in an equitable education system. In the past I've been one of those people who've said I'd love education to be free. I recognise that that's probably out of reach, but to go in the direction we are now going at this time in Australia's economic situation is wrong. My parents went to university for free. In fact, if they hadn't gone to university for free, I don't know if they'd ever have met, so I'm very grateful to the Whitlam government and Kim Beazley Sr, who made that possible. They studied education. They spent their lives as primary schoolteachers; they spent their lives educating others. And I take this opportunity to give a shout out to Ron and Wendy, aka Mum and Dad, and to all teachers in Australia who do a great job and, in particular, have done an immensely difficult job this year in dealing with the challenges of delivering learning via remote and other mechanisms. So you don't need to tell me that education is an investment—an investment in the next generation. The first time I ever walked into this building, in fact, was to campaign against the Howard government's 25 per cent fee increase. That was a long, long time ago, back when an arts degree cost only $12,000. Under this legislation, that same arts degree could cost $45,000. When I spoke to a bunch of university students in Western Australia about this tax and this legislation, I talked to them about the history of education in Australia. I said, 'There's a great, proud Western Australian story about making higher education more accessible to Australians.' Kim Beazley Sr was 27 years old when he entered the federal parliament. As we in this place know, he was able to enter the federal parliament because of the tragic death of John Curtin, a great Western Australian and a great Australian. Kim Beazley Sr entered the parliament at 27 years old. It was another 27 years until he became Minister for Education in the Whitlam government. It was Kim Beazley Sr who delivered the education package. I will never forget that it was a Western Australian who made that possible, and I credit the Beazley family in no small part with my parents meeting at university in Western Australia. This government has missed the opportunity, time and time again, to step in and help universities save jobs. The university sector itself estimates that some 21,000 staff will lose their jobs because of falling international student revenue and the lack of support through JobKeeper—21,000 staff ripped out of our higher education institutions. The knowledge that leaves those institutions when those staff walk out the door—we will probably only recognise the full impact of that in the years and decades to come. We know that the Group of Eight universities have actually stood up to this government and criticised this government's 'knowledge tax', saying: … the legislation will force universities to teach more students with less funding. The legislation will force universities to teach more students with less funding. Modelling by the group shows that, in 2024, universities will be expected to teach an additional 5,000 full-time students, with a decrease in base funding of $92 million—that is, ripping out $92 million and pumping 5,000 more students into the system. Even the chancellor of the Australian National University, someone whom we used to know in this place as the Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party, Julie Bishop, has raised concerns about the legislation. I would be interested to know if the current member for Curtin will be speaking on the legislation, given her well-regarded work as a former vice chancellor at the University of Notre Dame. But I wish it were just universities this government cut when it came to education—child care, TAFE, apprenticeships. It's all part of a pattern, a 20-year long agenda of trying to privatise universities. And, if this legislation goes through, who knows what this government will then do to our TAFEs and our vocational sector over time. My community is very worried about this legislation. More than 800 people in Perth have signed my petition against the knowledge tax. It says: We call on the Morrison Government to Stop the Knowledge Tax, cancel its increase fees for humanities, law and commerce degrees, and properly fund our universities. In the Perth electorate, there is strong support for our universities. We've received messages in response to that petition, and I'm just going to share a few pieces of commentary that have come through to my office. Maia says: Australia will benefit from building a country that understands diversity; is able to think critically; and has skilled, knowledgeable and diverse communication skills. The Humanities contribute to a better future. Sky wrote: These changes will not only discourage low-income students from studying important areas, they will undermine the quality of education across the tertiary sector. Helen wrote to me: We should be keeping educational horizons open and free from political interference. We need creative, critical thinkers at this time more than ever. Give youth choice so they can be contributors to the future. Liz said: The message these fees send is not the one we want our young people to receive. Valuing one area of education should not lead to devaluing of another. All strengths with individuals should be valued. Every individual should be valued. I thought: '"Every individual should be valued"—where have I heard that before? Isn't it the foundational principle of the Liberal Party of Australia that every individual should be valued?' Yet they are now saying that some individuals and the things that they choose to study and apply their life to are not as important as others, and that is wrong. I have had a total so far of 800 signatures, and the number keeps climbing. I was going to read in the names of all the people that signed the petition, because I published them in the Perth Voice, a great local independent newspaper in my electorate, but I will spare people on both sides of the chamber from that 800-person list of names. I'll finish by just reminding people that Labor has a proud history of investing in university education. We invested so that an additional 190,000 Australians could get a place at university when we changed to demand-driven funding. We boosted investment in universities from $8 billion when Labor last came to office, in 2007, to $14 billion when Labor left office in 2013. As a result of those changes, financially disadvantaged student enrolments increased by 66 per cent. Those opposite can never claim that they did some sort of transformation like this. Indeed, we will see those sorts of numbers go backwards under the Liberal Party's knowledge tax. This is bad legislation, and this House should not pass it. 13:02 Dr HAINES 282335 Indi I see the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 in two parts. On the one hand, it implements several of the recommendations of the Napthine review into rural, regional and remote tertiary education. These reforms are important and overdue. They're evidence based and they're supported by the regional university sector. In fact, since the Napthine review was released in October of last year, I've been advocating for the full implementation of its 33 recommended actions. On the other hand, this bill involves what can only be described as a radical overhaul of the way we charge students for higher education. These second reforms are unexpected, were not prompted by a wholesale and detailed review of the sector, have caused significant angst amongst universities and university students, and appear not to be based on clear evidence at all. Since the minister announced these changes in June, I have analysed them with deep concern and trepidation. Unfortunately the bill before us does both of these things at once. The government has combined a good bill with a very problematic bill and asked us to vote on them as one. It feels like it's rushed this. I've consulted widely and listened carefully to the regional universities in my electorate, and they've told me of their very real concerns. They've also told me, though, that they need some certainty. And I've met with students from Indi who are worried by the increase to student contributions in the humanities subject categories but ultimately welcome the measures that address some of the issues that have historically held regional students back from participation in higher education. As such, I have honestly anguished over my position on this bill, but I've determined that I cannot in good conscience vote against a bill that involves significant new measures to support regional universities and regional students. Full of imperfections as this bill is, I cannot vote against the implementation of the Napthine review recommendations that I have so strongly advocated. Today I'd like to explain my position and call on all members of the upper house to refer this bill to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee before considering its passage. There are five measures in the job-ready package that together represent a significant investment in improving access to higher education for regional Australians. First, the tertiary access payment. This has been rebadged by the government, but while the name is different the point is the same: over four years $160 million will be invested into scholarships to help kids who move out of home for uni. This is important, because we know that, compared to their city cousins, students in rural and regional areas are less likely to apply for uni, less likely to accept a place if offered and less likely to complete a degree. Cost is a huge part of the reason. It costs money to move from a place like Corryong, Myrtleford, Wodonga or Ballarat to Melbourne for uni. The Napthine review found that moving can as much as double the cost of a degree, adding $25,000 to $30,000 to support a student out of home, and found that cost is the most common reason for regional students deferring university. Second, as a result of this bill, any Indigenous student from regional Australia will be guaranteed a Commonwealth supported place when they enrol in university. Importantly, this is nowhere near the Napthine recommendation, which called for places for all people in regional Australia to be uncapped. But this is obviously a significant step forward for Indigenous Australians and a measure I fully support. Third, the bill increases access to the fares allowance which would help students return home in the uni break. Right now the waiting period is six months but this bill will take it down to three months, allowing students to return home in their midyear break in their first year of study. This is important, because 70 per cent of students from regional Australia who undertake tertiary study relocate to do so, and stress and loneliness is the most common reason for the higher drop-out rate that regional students face when they get there. Giving those students a little bit of extra support to come home in their first year might make the difference between being able to complete a degree and feeling despair and dropping out. Fourth, the package involves a dedicated focus on regional and rural students as a specific equity group under the Higher Education Participation and Partnerships Program. This is the first time that HEPPP will look specifically at support for regional students. Moreover, it sets aside $7.1 million over four years to support outreach to regional schoolkids to consider, and to encourage them to look at, tertiary study. This is important, because we know the evidence tells us that schoolkids in regional areas don't have access to the same career advice or mentoring as their city peers. The Napthine review found that the career and educational aspirations of regional kids are hampered by a lack of resources to help them understand what a university education could bring, and how to prepare for it. Finally, this package involves accelerated funding increases for regional universities. Funding under the Commonwealth Grant Scheme will increase 3.5 per cent a year for regional campuses, compared to 1.5 and 2.5 per cent in high- and low-growth metropolitan areas. This boost means there will be a faster increase to Commonwealth supported places at regional universities, which is good news for students and for cities like Albury-Wodonga, which will benefit from a larger student population. Importantly, though, this was not recommended by the Napthine review. The Napthine review went much further, calling for uncapping of places at regional universities. That would mean that every student granted entry to a regional university would be guaranteed a government supported place. Instead, the government is maintaining its handbrake on the growth of regional universities. This leads me to the many deficiencies I see in this legislation. To state the obvious, Australia is in a deep recession. When people lose their jobs, demand for higher education goes up. At the same time, the baby boom of the early 2000s is reaching university age. Together these factors mean that over the coming years we will see a boom in demand for university places, and this package goes nowhere near far enough to cater for that. Yesterday the Innovative Research Universities group stated that the package ignores increased demand as a result of COVID-19, ignores increased demand from older students and ignores the general rising need for tertiary qualifications, and they called for an additional 10,000 places on top of what the government is proposing. Just imagine for one moment if we put those places into regional cities—another 500 students in Albury-Wodonga and another 1,000 at the University of New England in Armidale or CSU in Wagga. That would be transformational not just for those cities but for those students too. But my greater concern is the truly drastic changes to course fees that the government is trying to rush through. Under the bill before us, some degrees will double in cost; others will halve. But regional students will be disproportionately impacted by higher course costs, because the courses that regional universities tend to offer are the ones facing increases under the subjects of this bill. Consider also the email I was sent by the vice-chancellor of the University of Sydney—an email that was sent to all MPs yesterday. Vice-Chancellor Spence said: 'The funding changes proposed in the bill are too significant and radical to rush. The proposed changes to university education and research funding have not been developed in accordance with the government's own guidance on best practice consultation.' He went on to say, 'Parliament and all higher education stakeholders must have full details of the proposed new funding arrangements before judgements can be made on the package of changes the bill seeks to implement.' The Innovative Research Universities group has contributed some considered good faith alternative subject funding tables that still achieve the government's budget and policy imperatives but spread the contribution across subject categories in a fairer way, and these should be considered. This minister rushed through changes to the childcare funding arrangements during COVID-19 with not enough consultation and not enough consideration for how the changes would affect smaller and regional childcare providers. The result of that rushed policy was substantial pain for many of us in regional Australia. I'm extremely worried that with this rushed bill there will be problems experienced by us again. I'm worried that this legislation that we had just a week to review, which was substantially amended on the fly after the government publicly split in two over it and which key stakeholders have deep reservations over, is not how we should begin our task of rebuilding Australia. I was alarmed to see that on Sunday the minister himself was forced to clarify incorrect statistics he'd released on employment outcomes for humanities graduates that falsely implied their employment rates are far below science graduates. The statistics were from the 2020 graduate outcome survey, which came out on Sunday. The survey showed that, after one year, the employment rates of students in humanities, cultural and social sciences and communications are higher than the employment rates of students who studied science and maths. After three years, the employment rates are about the same. The minister's press release contained exactly the opposite message, with statistics that were patently wrong. He said that students in the humanities and social science have the lowest employment outcomes and gave incorrect statistics to back up this claim. I'm not trying to make a pedantic point here. What I'm trying to say in pointing this out is that the entire justification for the minister's radical upheaval in the cost of subjects in these university degrees is that humanities and social science degrees don't lead to jobs, but maths and science degrees do. If that's not supported by the definitive empirical survey on the topic, what is the point then of this radical change? Where is the policy rationale? I am supporting this legislation because it has the qualified support of the regional universities in Indi that I represent and because it contains many measures that I have long advocated. But the clear and glaring deficiencies in the bill cannot be ignored. When regional MPs raised concerns that the original bill would exacerbate regional workforce shortages in mental health, psychology and social work, the government listened and changed the bill. That was sensible, and I applaud it. I have spent years pushing for better policy on rural health workforce in those areas in particular. So I was very pleased about that. But I call on the minister to listen again: the Senate must refer this legislation to the education and employment committee for review. The future of our nation depends on decisions such as these, and they must be carefully scrutinised. 13:14 Mr THISTLETHWAITE 182468 Kingsford Smith I am the son of working-class parents, parents who worked hard so that their kids had the opportunity that they never got, and that was the opportunity to get a university education. It was an opportunity that they could never afford, but I, like many of my generation, was the first person in my family who got the opportunity to go to university. In my later years of high school, I was the beneficiary of a great economics teacher, Peter Singer, who inspired in me a wonderful love and passion for economics and how governments make decisions about allocation of resources. He encouraged me to pursue and follow my passion to study economics at university, and, thankfully, I did. I got the wonderful opportunity to study at the University of New South Wales, a university in my home town, and develop that passion for economics. It was following that passion, I firmly believe, that led me to an interest in politics and how political decisions are made and, of course, to this place here. I would not have had the great privilege of representing the people of Kingsford Smith without the opportunity to pursue my passion for economics at university. The crux of this bill, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020, is that the cost of university fees in humanities will increase and in some other degrees, particularly maths, science and other STEM based subjects, the costs will fall. I'm opposing this bill because it's unfair. It's unfair because many young people who are interested in studying humanities will have the cost of going to university increased dramatically for them, making university, in some cases, beyond their reach. So many of those young Australians who now are developing their passion for humanities subjects in their later years of high school may lose the opportunity to pursue that dream at university because of this legal reform, and that is wrong. Anyone who's looking at the prospect of pursuing law, accounting, economics, commerce, journalism and communication, or humanities will pay more under this legislation than someone looking to do a medicine or dentistry degree. About 40 per cent of students will have their fees increased under this Morrison government's plan for this bill. Some of those courses will have cost increases of 113 per cent, and that will mean, for many low- and middle-income families, that they will lose the opportunity that I have had to get a university education. Young Australians will lose the opportunity to pursue their dreams and passions and to study their subject of choice if this law is passed. That is a great shame, and that is why this bill must be opposed. The greater effect of this legislation, unfortunately, will be on women. All of the studies and statistics that have been produced by some of the unions and others that are opposing this indicate that women tend to enrol in humanities subjects more than STEM based subjects, so the effect of this bill may be to make it harder for women to go to university. Similarly, I can't see how this bill is going to encourage and help Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians to get a university education. In fact, I think it's going to do the opposite: it's going to make it harder for many to pursue that dream of a university education. So the crux of this bill is that it makes it harder for low- and middle-income families and their kids to pursue their dream of a humanities education at university. That is wrong, that is unfair and that is why this bill should be defeated. The second point I'd like to make is that this bill and this change to our university funding structure represent government and politicians interfering in the decisions of young Australians and families about which subjects they can pursue at university and, ultimately, which career path they should go down in their working lives. It's effectively trying to force students into certain subjects and force some young Australians to abandon their dreams and their passion for other subjects. Most Australians believe that there's enough government in their lives without government telling parents what they want their kids to study, let alone government telling young Australians what career the government thinks they should pursue over the career they have a passion for and want to pursue. Decisions about which subjects young Australians study at university should be made by those young Australians, not by the Morrison government. The government says that the philosophy and purpose of this bill are to encourage more Australians to study STEM subjects. It says that we have skills shortages in some of these areas and it wants more Australians to move into studying those subjects. That's fine. That objective is a reasonable one. It's the means that the government is using to achieve that objective that is wrong and represents an interference in the decisions that young Australians have the right to make. We should be encouraging people into STEM and other areas of study with incentives and encouragement, not with a big stick approach such as this bill. We should be offering scholarships to young Australians to move into the STEM subjects. We should be ensuring that there are bridging courses available to ensure that people can get their skills up to a satisfactory level to move into some of those subjects. Importantly, we should be doing more to promote science based and mathematics based subjects at high school. We can achieve these outcomes with incentives, not by the government telling students which subjects they should be pursuing and so, effectively, forcing a whole generation of young Australians onto a path that they don't want to follow and that might not be their passion and their dream. The third point I'd like to make is that this bill is inequitable. It won't produce the outcomes that the government believe and say it will. In fact, the legislation in many respects works against its stated aim. In areas where the government want a greater enrolment, they're paying universities less per student, which doesn't make any sense, and, in course areas where they want to discourage enrolment and push people into other subjects, they're paying universities more. It simply doesn't make sense. The overall effect of this legislation, once again, is to reduce the amount of funding that's going to Australian students and to universities to subsidise places for Australian students and encourage them to pursue a university education. It's part of the Morrison government's trend of undermining university education and removing the opportunity of a university education from a generation of Australians. That will have consequences for our nation down the track. It will have consequences for the individuals because they will lose access to the opportunity of a university education if they are passionate about a particular subject. We know that the more people stay in study—the more highly educated a population is—the greater the productivity of that workforce, particularly in future years. There is no truer statement than 'if we invest in education now, we reap the benefits for our economy down the track'. This bill undermines that objective and the statement of ensuring that we as a nation are encouraging more Australians into a pathway of university education and pursuing their dreams and wishes about where they wish to go with their education. It's all part of this government's plan for making it harder for young Australians to get a good education in this day and age, particularly if you come from a low- to middle-income family or socioeconomic background, because the effect of this legislation will be to ensure that the chance to study at university is beyond the reach of many families to afford. It will be beyond the reach of many individual Australians to afford to pursue a passion in the humanities subjects at university and in a career, and that is wrong. Decisions about what you study at university and what career you pursue should be based on your dreams, on your passions and on what you think you're going to be good at, not on what the government tells you you should have to pursue into the future. So the effect of this bill, once again, is to make it harder for many of this generation's young Australians to get a decent education, and that is wrong. For those reasons, I will be opposing this bill, like my Labor colleagues. We're calling on the bill to go to a Senate inquiry so that these issues and many more can be thrashed out and so that Australians, particularly young Australians, have the opportunity to put their point of view to this government about what is wrong with this proposed change to universities. The effect of this bill is that it will be harder for many Australians to pursue their passion in education and it will be harder in what is a particularly difficult year for many people who are finishing their final year of schooling. We all know the challenges that young Australians finishing year 12 this year are facing with COVID and the disruptions that they've had to their education this year. They don't need government making it even harder for them to pursue their dreams and study the humanities because of this legislation. It's unfair to that generation of young Australians and it represents government forcing students into areas where the government wants them to study, not where the individual student wants to study, and that is wrong. Finally, the bill is unfair and inequitable. It will result, once again, in a reduction of subsidised university places in Australia and a reduction in funding for universities so that they can educate more young Australians, and that is wrong. On that basis, I will be voting against this bill. 13:27 Ms COKER 263547 Corangamite [by video link] Labor will be opposing the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 because it will make it harder and more expensive for young Australians to go to university. As one year 12 student said to me earlier this week, 'Why does Scott Morrison want to punish us for choosing to study humanities? It's so unfair.' This is the voice of so many people across my region. Their concern is real, because this bill would increase the student fee load, meaning that students will pay more, a lot more. It would also cut Commonwealth university funding, meaning the government will pay a lot less. They will instead shift the debt burden to young students. It will leave universities with fewer resources to teach students, meaning students may miss out on the best education possible. This is a radical, retrograde step regarding university funding. It is a dangerous threat to our system of higher education in Australia, and it would have a devastating impact on young people in my communities across Corangamite. As we know, 2020 has been a nightmare year for young Australians. COVID-19 has resulted in students having to study remotely. They've missed out on key milestones, from formals to schoolies to gap years to the pursuit of dreams. For young Victorians, in particular, this has been a year where they have been unable to see their friends and classmates. So the last thing they need now is to be saddled with a lifetime of debt if they continue their studies. Yet this government is trying to ram through this legislation— The DEPUTY SPEAKER 72184 Order, Member for Corangamite. The debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may be resumed at a later hour. The member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed. STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS 13 STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS JobKeeper: Small Business 13 13:30 Ms THWAITES 282212 Jagajaga [by video link] I'm highlighting the position of small businesses in my electorate shut out of JobKeeper because of unfair anomalies put in place by this government. I've been contacted by a number of people with small businesses who are being excluded from JobKeeper because of technicalities. Erin and Caitlin run a local hairdressing business in Greensborough. They opened their business at the beginning of the year and lodged their Business Activity Statement at the end of the first quarter. They discovered they're ineligible for JobKeeper because their BAS wasn't lodged prior to 12 March, but if they'd lodged monthly, instead of quarterly, they would've been eligible. Maddie and her family, also in Greensborough, had poured all their savings into launching their new cafe in September last year. Prior to the pandemic, they were trading really well, but of course they've been struggling more during the restrictions. Yet, because their BAS was not lodged before 12 March, they're not eligible for JobKeeper. These businesses have rents to pay and overheads they still need to meet. It seems cruel and unfair that the Treasurer is leaving them out of support due to technicalities. Of course, we know the Treasurer could fix this, and in fact I've written to him about these cases. Unfortunately, I haven't had a response. He couldn't take the time to support these small businesses through this crisis but he's showing this week what he can take the time for: blame-shifting to the Victorian government. Well, it's not good enough. Step up. Do your job. Fisher Electorate: Legacy Week 14 13:31 Mr WALLACE 265967 Fisher This week is Legacy Week, and, with around 15,000 veterans on the Sunshine Coast, it's a particularly significant time for my community. By buying badges and making donations before 5 September, Australians can support Legacy's work in caring for 52,000 partners and children of ADF veterans who are experiencing grief, loss or hardship as a result of their loved one's service. Legacy supports 960 families on the Sunshine Coast, including local widow and president of Maroochy Legacy, Nita Tupper from Sippy Downs in my electorate. Nita's late husband, Noel, served in the Navy in Korea. Like thousands of others, shortly after his death 30 years ago, she received a knock on the door from a local Legatee. To her credit, Nita has been giving back through Legacy ever since. Fundraising this year has been incredibly tough. With Anzac Day commemorative events cancelled and many struggling financially during COVID-19, it has been harder than ever for Legacy to find the funds that they need. This week could not be more important. On the Sunshine Coast the organisation is hoping to raise $20,000 this year during Legacy Week. I urge all locals in Fisher to do their bit by heading out to the Caloundra RSL, Stockland Caloundra, Currimundi marketplace, Chancellor Park, Stockland Birtinya shops, Maleny shops or Montville shops and buy a Legacy badge or bear today. Moore-Gilbert, Dr Kylie 14 13:33 Mr BURNS 278522 Macnamara [by video link] Today marks 719 days since Dr Kylie Moore-Gilbert, an Australian academic who lived in my electorate, was imprisoned in Iran on charges of espionage. Dr Moore-Gilbert and the Australian parliament reject these charges. She was attending a conference in Tehran in September 2018 when she was arrested at the airport as she was about to leave the country. She was charged, convicted in a secret trial and sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. None of the supposed evidence that convicted Dr Moore-Gilbert has been released. Dr Moore-Gilbert was originally held in the Evin prison in solitary confinement and forced to sleep on the floor. However, Dr Moore-Gilbert was recently transferred to the Gharchak prison, a prison known as Iran's most dangerous. Gharchak prison is associated with widespread allegations of human rights abuses, including overcrowding, torture and rape. Dr Moore-Gilbert is gluten intolerant, but it has been reported in the media that she is being denied adequate food and proper consular assistance and that she was beaten and thrown in solitary confinement to prevent her from contacting the outside world and as punishment for assisting other prisoners. Labor supports the government in its efforts to find a diplomatic solution to ensure Dr Moore-Gilbert's release, but those close to Kylie are rightly concerned at the lack of progress over the last two years. Kylie Moore-Gilbert is an Australian citizen and a political prisoner. She must be released, and we must not be silent until she is. COVID-19: State and Territory Border Closures 14 13:34 Dr WEBSTER 281688 Mallee My electorate of Mallee continues to suffer under hard border closures to our north and our west. I have been outspoken about the immeasurable grief and hardship forced on many people in my community, and today I bring another situation. Michelle contacted me yesterday about her husband, David, who 12 months ago was diagnosed with a glioblastoma multiforme grade 4 brain tumour, a malignant brain tumour, for which he had emergency surgery in Melbourne to remove it. A recent MRI, sadly, revealed new growth in the tumour. In desperation, David was booked for another surgery on 26 August with Charlie Teo, a leading neurosurgeon in Sydney. The paperwork for exemptions, permits, tickets, quarantine and hospital admission—the whole process—had to rapidly occur. The surgeon had made it clear to all involved that David had a malignant brain tumour which could double in size in 14 days, making the tumour inoperable. They travelled from COVID-free country Victoria in my electorate to Melbourne and then on to Sydney with their two-year-old daughter and were still required to hotel-quarantine for 14 days. They have been sitting in a hotel for seven days now with David's health deteriorating. I have taken this issue directly to the Prime Minister, and I would like to thank him for his direct intervention and assistance. My hope is that they will be in the Prince of Wales Hospital today. I welcome this intervention. Burt Electorate: Vocational Education and Training 15 13:36 Mr KEOGH 249147 Burt Last year the state member for Armadale, Dr Buti, and I secured federal and state Labor commitments in the federal election campaign to build a new TAFE in Armadale. While we're unfortunate that Labor didn't make it to government in 2019, I'm so excited that the McGowan Labor state government has announced a new $22.6 million state-of-the-art TAFE campus to be built in the heart of Armadale in the electorate of Burt. This federal government has cut $3 billion from TAFE and training over the last seven years. Now more than ever, TAFE is critical to our nation's economic recovery. We need to be investing in skills and training to ensure that jobs are restored and, indeed, created in Australia as a whole and especially in my electorate of Burt. We need to better support apprentices and trainees, displaced workers, women and young people and provide training for emerging skills needed in our community. While the federal government have decimated the TAFE system over the years, the McGowan government in Western Australia not only are working hard to restore it in Armadale as part of their COVID recovery plan but have announced that more than $229 million will be spent on upgrading TAFEs across Western Australia. This is fantastic news for apprentices and trainees across the state, but in our community it's not just the students who will benefit; the entire Armadale town will be rejuvenated. There's no doubt this new TAFE will play a key role in setting up our community for a post-COVID-19 recovery. Robertson Electorate: Surf Life Saving New South Wales Awards of Excellence 15 13:38 Mrs WICKS 241590 Robertson I rise to congratulate our Central Coast athletes who were recognised at the Surf Life Saving New South Wales Awards of Excellence. In the electorate of Robertson, we are privileged to be surrounded by beautiful beaches, and our hardworking lifesavers really do an incredible job keeping our beaches safe. This was recognised at the recent awards of excellence, with Umina Surf Life Saving Club receiving the New South Wales Club of the Year award for the second year in a row. This is really a fantastic achievement, and it's a testament to the passionate and hardworking volunteers of the club. Umina also received the award for New South Wales Patrol of the Year, and club member Kai Darwin was named New South Wales Youth Surf Lifesaver of the Year for the second year in a row. Congratulations, Kai. The president of the club, Stephen Scahill, said that the award was the culmination of many years of effort and the collective contribution of all of the members. He said Umina Surf Life Saving Club prides itself on being inclusive and showing members of our community that there is a role for everyone, be it in lifesaving, first aid, sports, coaching, training and education, or becoming an official. Other athletes recognised on the night included Paul Lemmon from Terrigal, my own club, who received the award for Master Athlete of the Year, and Jimmy Koch from Shelly Beach, who received the award for Open Athlete of the Year. Surf Life Saving Central Coast also received the award for Branch of the Year, a fantastic achievement. I congratulate these worthy recipients. Australian Bushfires 15 13:39 Ms McBAIN 281988 Eden-Monaro Today marks the start of the bushfire season across eastern parts of the mighty Eden-Monaro. The communities I serve are also digesting the interim report from the bushfire royal commission. I am pleased that commissioners have echoed the harsh realities communities from Batlow to Kiah to Rockton to Braidwood all experienced on those days choked by smoke and fear. The interim report highlights more frequent and intense natural disasters due to climate change. I implore the government to not just watch but act. The lack of national coordination that was evident last season was simply cruel. The recommendations from 20 years of natural disaster inquiries have been lost, and Eden-Monaro can't tolerate that again. For starters, the simplifying Australia's confusing bushfire warning system needs to be finished. The confusion and mismatched technology many experienced need to be addressed. Information brings power and comfort. Right now my communities are in the midst of a fragmented recovery effort. We need to make that trauma count and to flip the experience in the future. I thank the commissioners for their work to date and the residents of Eden-Monaro, who have made their voices heard in this process. I stand with you. While recent rain has been welcome, it shouldn't slow the progress of what needs to be done into the future. Men in Bibs 15 13:41 Mr CONAGHAN 279991 Cowper Today I recognise the great work of Men in Bibs. No, Mr Speaker, they're not a group of messy eaters! This is an organisation whose goal is twofold. Firstly, to get more men and boys into the great sport of netball. As someone who has played in a mixed team a long time ago, I can say that netball is one of the fastest and most skilled games you can play. Secondly, as important as the sport is, at the core of Men in Bibs is a sense of self-worth, community and ensuring that men reach their own personal best and become mentors and examples to our youth. Their motto is about positivity, growth, learning and community. One quick glance at their Facebook site of Men in Bibs shows this is much more than a Saturday afternoon of sport. I would like to congratulate all of those involved with Men in Bibs and give a shout-out to one person in particular, Craig Waiwiri, who has led by example as a father, a person and a member of the community. In finishing off, we should always remember their moto: 'The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.' Well done, Men in Bibs. Indi Electorate: COVID-19 16 13:42 Dr HAINES 282335 Indi I rise in the House to speak about my communities of Indi. They have risen to the challenges of isolation thrown at them by this unending pandemic and proven themselves to be resourceful and benevolent. While the demand made on the mental health and wellbeing of many in my electorate this year has been great, I want to take this opportunity to mention a few of the organisations and individuals who have shone through in what often feels like dark times. Mary Pike and the Upper Kiewa Valley Community Association made PPE for the local hospital. Local CWAs and Pangerang Community House are making face masks. RSL volunteers are providing delivery services to vulnerable veterans. Mansfield Primary School students are writing letters to isolated senior citizens. Kinglake Rangers Neighbourhood House are providing counselling and music therapy. Free online initiatives like laughing yoga are being offered. After 50 years of teaching piano to local students, Lorice Vine took her lessons online for the very first time. Finally, the Kangaroo Hoppet, an internationally recognised annual cross-country ski event held at Falls Creek, has also gone online. It has attracted over 18,000 entries and almost 500 international competitors. It closed on 30 August. I wish them all an overwhelming success. We are all in this together. I appreciate your fortitude and resilience. Thank you to the people of Indi. Australian Bushfires 16 13:44 Mrs PHILLIPS 147140 Gilmore Today marks the start of the bushfire danger season on the New South Wales South Coast, in particular in the local council areas of the Shoalhaven and the Eurobodalla. Now, Deputy Speaker, my communities know a thing or two about bushfires. They've been through the raging bushfires, and they want help to prepare for the next bushfire season. What we have is a government and a Prime Minister that have no plan for disaster preparedness—no plan. The Prime Minister could learn from my community if he actually visited. The government had a $200 million emergency response fund to help with disaster preparedness. They let it lapse. They didn't spend a cent. My communities are calling out for help. I have visited community group after community group, right across the South Coast. They want to know how they can get backup generators, backup communications, backup power. They want help with things like an integrated emergency management centre in Moruya. They want help with our telecommunications and our power. We want our Princes Highway fixed. We want our mobile blackspots reduced. There is so much that can be done, and the government hasn't spent a cent of that $200 million. It is not good enough. The government has no plan for disaster preparedness and they need to fix it now. Northbridge Football Club: Sustainable Sports Program 16 13:45 Mr ZIMMERMAN 203092 North Sydney I rise to draw members' attention to a wonderful initiative, which has been sponsored by Northbridge Football Club, in my electorate, to promote the role of community sport in the protection of our environment. The Sustainable Sports Program at Northbridge has been led by two determined and passionate mums at the club, Linda Curtis and Liz Courtney. With a grant from the federal government, Linda and Liz have started piloting the program, which they hope will become a wider effort to promote sustainability, reduce the carbon footprint of sporting clubs and create awareness among young people—and maybe among some of their parents as well! When I attended the launch of the program a few weeks ago I was really thrilled to be able to meet with some of the program's inaugural youth ambassadors, who are an impressive group of young Australians. They are people like Sophia Skaparis, who was also Australian Geographic's 2018 Young Conservationist of the Year. The Sustainable Sports Program is based on activities from a grassroots level, which exemplifies the power of the community coming together to encourage sustainable practices. The program has already implemented an audit system at the Northbridge club's canteen, with a drive to use keep cups, reusable water bottles and a free refill water station as well as have rubbish clean-up days and second-hand soccer gear donation drives. The breadth of their ambition to involve community sport is only matched by their enthusiasm, and I am pleased that my electorate is the starting line for what I am sure will become a national success. Higgins Electorate: COVID-19 17 13:47 Dr ALLEN 282986 Higgins At the beginning of the COVID pandemic, I reached out to my local community leaders to ask how, together, we could make sure our community in Higgins was kept safe and no-one was left behind. Together we decided it was key that they were kept informed of our federal government initiatives and, in turn, that I understood what was happening on the ground and where help was most needed. Hence, the Higgins leadership committee was formed. We've met regularly via Zoom throughout COVID-19. The committee includes leaders from aged care and child care, local traders groups and business groups, local schools, churches and hospitals, and local and state governments. Thank you Sue Williams, CEO of Cabrini Health; Michele Lewis, CEO of mecwacare; Bob Stensholt, chair of the Samarinda Ashburton Aged Care Services and president of the Ashburton Traders Association; Graeme Callen, Carnegie Main Street Traders Association; Sue Foley, Murrumbeena Community Bank; Susan Just and Joshua Sheffield, principals of Lauriston Girls' School and Malvern Valley Primary School respectively; Stuart Cogan, president of Hughesdale Kindergarten; Pia Demsky and Gail Wallman of Rotary Prahran and Rotary Toorak respectively; Father Peter French, St John's Toorak; Jacqui Weatherill, Andi Diamond, Phil Storer and Rebecca McKenzie, CEOs of Stonnington, Monash, Boroondara, Glen Eira, respectively; and last but not least state members of parliament Georgie Crozier MLC and Steve Dimopoulos. Thank you very much for the frank and fearless advice and for taking time to advise me on the issues impacting locals during COVID. Clontarf Foundation 17 13:48 Dr ALY 13050 Cowan ( On Friday 14 August, Clontarf Foundation held the Deadly Attendees Cup at Kingsway sporting complex just down the road from my house in Cowan. It's the fourth year in a row that I've attended the Deadlies to speak to the young men playing and to hand out the cup, and to see the fantastic staff from Clontarf Foundation and the academies present. The players representing their academies in the cup are the 10 with the best attendance records at their school. They come from Geraldton to Mandurah and everywhere in between. In between the matches, the young men take part in sessions talking through issues like mental health and wellbeing as well as learning skills like first aid. In the end, it was the local academy in Cowan that won first prize, so it was an absolute pleasure for me to present the shield to the Girrawheen Academy—good on you, boys! Since it was established in the early 2000s, Clontarf has been an amazing success, with 119 academies around Australia. I want to give a special shout-out to Wayne Young, the Girrawheen Academy director, and all the boys at the academy. When I'm back I'll be popping into the academy for their 100 per cent attendance lunch, which they hold on Fridays for all the students who have attended school that week. I've promised to cook for them—uh-oh! I want to give a special shout-out to Jamison Ugle—'Jamo'—and Edward Booma Lyndon, two local boys and local heroes: good on you, guys! Bass Electorate: Rascal Robot Art Space 17 13:50 Mrs ARCHER 282237 Bass Many children participate in sport in their free time, but the opportunity to pursue art, music or theatre can be out of reach. In February northern Tasmanian artist Sarah Ferrington opened the Rascal Robot Art Space in the rural town of Beaconsfield after spotting the artistic potential of local children through a community arts project. The not-for-profit centre was only just up and running, offering affordable classes for local students when COVID restrictions shut them down. Sarah quickly pivoted to offering curated art packs to send out to families for their children to do at home. Each month offers age-appropriate activities, and my own children can attest to just how fantastic these art packs are. I know from speaking to other parents that these packs proved to be a lifesaver when many were home schooling, offering a great creative outlet for their children. The packs go beyond your standard art supplier's, offering STEM-related activities. When restrictions began to ease, I was committed to finding a way to ensure Sarah had what she needed to get the classes back up and running as soon as possible. I wrote to the Premier and they were able to secure a state grant thanks to the Premier's Discretionary Fund, which provided Sarah with the funds she needed to ensure that her space is COVID safe. Well supported by the community, Rascal Robot is continuing to provide topnotch art classes to those in the community who might otherwise miss out. Well done, Sarah. COVID-19: JobKeeper Payment 17 13:51 Dr LEIGH BU8 Fenner When the coronavirus recession hit, most firms recognised there's a social contract: get a wage subsidy from the taxpayer and do right for workers. But some companies didn't understood that JobKeeper was designed to keep people in work, not pad corporate profits. Half the shares in Australia are owned by the top fifth of the population, so converting JobKeeper into 'DividendKeeper' takes a program designed to reduce inequality and uses it to increase inequality. Crown Casino received $111 million in JobKeeper and paid a dividend of $203 million. One-third will go to a billionaire. ARB received $8 million in JobKeeper and will pay a $16 million dividend. Adairs received $18 million in JobKeeper and its New Zealand equivalent and paid $11 million to shareholders. Harvey Norman and its franchisees received $9 million and will pay $75 million in dividends. Half will go to a billionaire. Accent Group received $14 million in JobKeeper and will pay a total dividend of $50 million this year. In other countries, regulators are asking firms to choose between getting government handouts and paying dividends. In New Zealand, Mainfreight paid back its taxpayer subsidies. They said, 'We didn't deserve it.' But these companies I've named are too stingy to pay it back, and the Treasurer is too gutless to ask them to do it. National Stroke Week 18 13:53 Ms BELL 282981 Moncrieff This is National Stroke Week. It's timely to acknowledge the excellent work of the many health professionals treating stroke victims at the Gold Coast University Hospital in Moncrieff. To highlight an outstanding example we need look no further than Dr Hal Rice and Dr Laetitia de Villiers, who are pioneering robotic neurovascular aneurism and stroke treatment at the Gold Coast University Hospital. Dr Rice and Dr de Villiers have both undertaken specialist fellowships at the world-renowned Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. At the Gold Coast University Hospital, Dr Rice recently performed world-first surgery on a Gold Coast woman, successfully using a robotic arm for the delicate task of removing a brain clot with great precision. Dr de Villiers was also involved in the stroke patient robotic treatment. The hospital is part of the Gold Coast Health and Knowledge Precinct that is rightly described as Asia-Pacific's health and innovation hub. The precinct has supported Dr Rice, Dr de Villiers and their dedicated colleagues to achieve world-class expertise through superb onsite research facilities and partnership opportunities. I extend my support to the Stroke Foundation's campaign to save lives through FAST heroes. F stands for face—check their face to see if their mouth has drooped; A is for arms—can they lift both arms; S is for speech—is their speech slurred, and do they understand you; and T is for time—time is critical. If you see any of these signs, call triple 0 straightaway. Age Pension 18 13:54 Ms TEMPLEMAN 181810 Macquarie For the first time in more than 20 years, age pensioners are not going to receive a regular pension increase this month, but this government just doesn't care. Usually in September and March there's a small rise in the pension, based on a formula around wage increases and inflation. That increase might be small, but it makes a huge difference to pensioners' ability to pay bills. Right now, in the Hawkesbury and Blue Mountains, many are facing rising rates notices. They have their winter power bills to pay, and groceries during COVID are not getting any cheaper. Pensioners who earn a little bit from modest savings are getting next to nothing with low interest rates. This is a hit they don't deserve. The freezing of the pension applies to other benefits too, such as the carer payment and the disability support pension. This is the worst possible time to be squeezing the household budgets of seniors and the most vulnerable, but it fits with what the Liberals do. This government has tried to cut the pension or increase the pension age to 70 in every single budget. It was this Prime Minister who, as social services minister, showed he didn't care about pensioners when he did a deal with the Greens to cut the pension to 370,000 people by changing the assets test. The Prime Minister could fix this. The Prime Minister should fix this. But so far he is not lifting a finger to fix it, because this is a Prime Minister who only pretends to care. Superannuation 18 13:56 Mr TIM WILSON IMW Goldstein Compulsory super should be for Aussie workers, not arrogant union fund managers. Industry Super has been exposed, spending $400 million over the past five years on ads and marketing for a compulsory product. Those hardest hit are young Aussies, who have funded this ad splurge at the expense of them buying their own home. This House's Standing Committee on Economics asked IFM Investors about paying secret $36 million bonuses to union fund managers, and they contemptuously refused to answer the questions. We know unions have no issue taking a slice of workers' wages through sneaky backroom deals, but this is now on a trillion dollar scale. Secret Industry Super Australia research reveals increasing the compulsory super rate will cost wages and jobs, but that doesn't stop the ALP demanding we give their union and fund manager mates a larger share of Aussie workers' wages to fester it for fees and give $40 million back to the Labor Party—coincidentally, that's how much the unions donate to the Labor Party each year. Wash, rinse, repeat—this isn't a retirement savings system. It's money laundering, benefiting shakedown merchants from the wages of Aussies. COVID-19: Hydroxychloroquine 19 13:57 Mr BOWEN DZS McMahon In Australia, the safety of medicines is not determined by politicians or even by individual doctors. It's assessed by the independent experts at the Therapeutic Goods Administration. There's a reason for that, and that reason is thalidomide. Before thalidomide, there was no independent assessment of medicines in Australia. Thalidomide was successful in dealing with morning sickness, but it had tragic side effects. Those in this House who argue that we should return to the days of doctors being able to prescribe whatever they want are arguing for a return to the pre-thalidomide era. In response to thalidomide, the Australian Drug Evaluation Committee was established in 1963, and this evolved into the TGA. The TGA says, 'It strongly discourages the use of hydroxychloroquine to treat or prevent COVID-19.' There are tragic consequences when the independent advice of experts is ignored. The Vice-President of the AMA said today: 'It can cause your heart to stop.' The members for Hughes and Dawson need to reflect on why the TGA exists and why they are continuing on their dangerous crusade. Trumpian rants have no place in our public health response, and the Prime Minister and the Minister for Health need to care more about defending and protecting the TGA than they do about protecting their rogue backbenchers. The SPEAKER 10000 In accordance with standing order 43, the time for members' statements has concluded. QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE 19 QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE Aged Care 19 14:00 Mr ALBANESE R36 Grayndler My question is to the Prime Minister. Yesterday he boasted about his record on aged care, with a list of more than 15 announcements. Does the Prime Minister recognise that his announcements are not matched by delivery? How is it that after seven years of this Liberal government a royal commission chooses the word 'neglect' to describe the sector, a resident has ants crawling from open wounds and over 450 have died from COVID-19? 14:00 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook I thank the member for his question. The royal commission, which I initiated soon after becoming Prime Minister, was designed to ensure that all in this place—and some, like the Leader of the Opposition, have been in this place for a considerable time. The royal commission has observed, as have many outside the royal commission, that the challenges that we have in aged care are not the product of just one or two years; they are the product of 30 years of how policy has impacted on the aged-care sector. It is important that as we seek to address the issues that I'm sure the royal commission will be identifying—as I outlined to the House yesterday, we have, even since the royal commission, announced numerous measures which are being implemented, have been implemented and will continue to be implemented to address the very significant issues and challenges that are in aged care. The government does not walk away from those challenges. We have done everything we can to ensure that a light is shone upon the challenges that are in the aged-care sector. We have backed that up with a commitment—during the COVID period alone, we have contributed an extra $1.5 billion to address the critical needs that exist in that sector. Every single death that has occurred as a result of COVID or has otherwise occurred in the aged-care sector, or where there have been issues of neglect or issues of a failure to come up to standard by operators, be they public, private or not-for-profit—these are the challenges that we are addressing and will continue to address. I would invite the opposition to join us in the measures that we have put forward and will continue to put forward to address these very significant issues. The SPEAKER 10000 Before I call the member for Grey, I would remind the House that photographers will be shooting again from the three ceremonial doors that are open and from the two open doors that are behind me. I call the member for Grey. COVID-19: Economy 19 14:02 Mr RAMSEY HWS Grey My question is to the Prime Minister. Will the Prime Minister outline to the House how the Morrison government is working to give Australians the hope and certainty they need to plan for their futures despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and recession? 14:03 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook I thank the member for Grey for his question. In May, nationally, we agreed to a plan to reopen Australia. That was informed by the work of our own cabinet and, indeed, the cabinets of state and territory governments all around the country. And we had ambition that that plan would be achieved in July. That plan included the movement of Australians between states and territories—interstate travel. The state and territory premiers and I committed ourselves to that plan. Much has been achieved as a result of that plan. Seven out of eight states and territories have been able to gather considerable ground against the virus in opening up their economies all around the country. But it is true that the second wave that has occurred in Victoria has stalled that progress and, in many cases, it has resulted in that progress receding. That has obviously cost lives, and it has cost livelihoods as the second wave that has occurred in Australia has impacted in Australia. But Victoria has turned the corner and we, together with the Victorian government, are planning to reopen Melbourne and reopen Victoria. In discussions last night between me and the Premier of Victoria and the Premier of South Wales, that was our commitment—to see Australia opened up again, to see the New South Wales-Victoria border opened up again as soon as it is safe to do so. And I welcome that cooperation from the New South Wales and Victorian governments. We must, though, return to the ambitions that we set out in May for that plan to open up Australia again. We should aim for Australians to go to work by Christmas, to be with their families at Christmas, to return to visit their friends and to look forward to a positive 2021. We cannot resign Australia to being a dislocated nation under COVID-19. What we must plan to do by Christmas is work together to ensure we have the protections in place to protect the health and safety of Australians, to open up our economies and to ensure the ambitions of our Federation are returned to again and not resigned to being a victim of coronavirus. That is what our plan is: to work together with the states and territories to reactivate the plan that we first set out in May and made great progress towards. There is much to be achieved. There are borders in place now, and that is understandable. But what we have to work to do is let Australians know that they will be able to come together as families by Christmas and look to a 2021 that doesn't look like the difficulties that they have gone through in 2020. That is what our government is seeking to do. That is what we are committed to doing, and we are committed to doing it with everyone in this country, every government in this country, who will come together behind that ambition. Aged Care 20 14:06 Mr ALBANESE R36 Grayndler My question is to the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister has failed to listen to aged-care residents, providers and even the royal commission he established. Isn't counsel assisting the royal commission right to say, in direct response to the Commonwealth's evidence, 'It's difficult to learn a lesson if you don't think there's one to learn'? Why is the Prime Minister focused on a list of announcements instead of taking action to protect aged-care residents? Is it the case that, if actions speak louder than words, the Prime Minister truly is the quietest Australian? 14:06 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook Glib lines from the Leader of the Opposition. Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 Members on my left! Mr MORRISON E3L When we're talking about deaths in aged care— The SPEAKER 10000 The Prime Minister will pause for a second. The Prime Minister will just take his seat. The level of interjections is far too loud, and I will start ejecting as fast as you're interjecting. The Manager of Opposition Business was seeking the call. Mr Burke DYW An unparliamentary term was used, and I ask it to be withdrawn. The SPEAKER 10000 That is fairly general. I am going to repeat the point ad nauseam: it is very hard for me to hear these when there is a wall of interjections coming over the shoulder of the Manager of Opposition Business. All I can say is: if anyone used an unparliamentary term, I would like them to withdraw it. The Prime Minister has the call. Mr MORRISON E3L What the government will do is respond to issues and questions that are raised by the royal commission by simply presenting to the royal commission the information and the facts, as the government has presented here in this place as well. The $1.5 billion that we've already made in response to the COVID crisis that has impacted on this country— Mr Albanese R36 You cut $1.7 billion! Mr MORRISON E3L The Leader of the Opposition interjects again. Aged-care funding in Australia increases by more than $1 billion every year, and on top of that a further $1.5 billion has specifically been provided to aid in support of the response to the COVID pandemic. Now, the Leader of the Opposition can assert many things. He can make many claims but that doesn't make them true—as the Australian people have learnt about the Labor Party, when it comes to financial management and the truth. Mr Conroy interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Shortland is now warned! Mr MORRISON E3L These are two things that seem to elude them on these matters. The issue of responding to the coronavirus challenge with aged care is incredibly significant and incredibly important. We are applying ourselves to those challenges with the resources that are necessary and have been called upon in particular by the aged-care sector, in particular with the extension of measures already put in place by this government and extended again earlier this week in response to requests from the aged-care sector, as we've carefully considered where the state of the pandemic is up to, and we have made the decision to extend that support further because of the nature of the challenge that we face. The Minister for Health may wish to add to my answer. 14:09 Mr HUNT 00AMV Flinders Adding to the Prime Minister's answer to the question the Leader of the Opposition asked about actions: there are four principal actions we have taken over recent years to significantly and dramatically improve the quality. We recognise the statements made by the commission, which did, I would note, refer to actions over decades, not just over one short period, specifically: firstly, a massive injection of funding from $13 billion to $22 billion, $23 billion, $24 billion and $25 billion and then the additional $1.5 billion for COVID the Prime Minister mentioned; secondly, the calling of the royal commission and the extension of it; thirdly, the creation of the quality indicator program; fourthly, the creation of the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission, which so far this year has conducted 1,180 visits to different aged-care facilities to help protect, to help save and to help improve quality. COVID-19: Regional Australia 21 14:10 Dr WEBSTER 281688 Mallee My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport and Regional Development. Will the Deputy Prime Minister inform the House how the Morrison-McCormack government is supporting regional Australia's recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic through the extension of JobKeeper? 14:11 Mr McCORMACK 219646 Riverina I want to commend the member for Mallee. I want to commend her for her work on the border issues and I want to commend her for her courage in standing up for what she knows is right. Regional Australia, as the member for Mallee knows, is the engine room of our economy. It is going to lead the way out of COVID-19. That's why we, as a government, invest in the infrastructure needed to boost productivity, to boost safety, to add to water security and to make sure that tourism is what it needs to be right across the country—right across the nation from Manangatang to Manjimup, right across the Nullarbor Plain. That's what we're doing. We're making sure the right investments are in the right place at the right time to boost regional Australia. Investment in regional Australia is a critical part of the path out of COVID-19. There is over $100 billion in the pipeline over the next decade, supporting over 85,000 jobs, many of them in regional Australia. Thousands of these jobs are on the ground right now. The government's contribution to $50.4 million to the Western Highway in Victoria is supporting 65 jobs in regional communities. Our pipeline of investment plans jobs for the future—a vision for the nation for the future. Though we know, in these unprecedented times, we need to stick to the plan, we are making sure that we put that vision in place. JobKeeper extending through to March is making such a difference. Peter McAllister, the general manager of True Foods, which took the plunge and decentralised from Melbourne to Maryborough in 2011, creating more than 160 local jobs, has expressed a deep gratitude for the Treasurer and JobKeeper that is in place. He said, 'Without JobKeeper we would have laid off many of our 185 staff but, with the payment, we can train people and increase depth of operational knowledge. COVID has created serious mental health challenges with an uncertainty of employment, but JobKeeper has provided management with an ability to step in and provide hope and stability.' They're really strong, compelling words. Elliott Newspaper Group in Mildura, runs the local newspaper, the Sunraysia Daily—I've read it often. This year it's celebrating its centenary. Ross Lanyon, the chief executive officer of Elliott Newspaper Group, has said thanks to JobKeeper. The Sunraysia Daily actually ceased printing there for a stage, because of COVID-19, but, thanks to JobKeeper, it has been able to resume publication. Ross said: 'Without JobKeeper, we wouldn't be here. The difference is to be able to envisage a way forward because there is breathing space to plan, budget and manage the way forward. JobKeeper has removed the guillotine from over our head.' That's what he said. That's what others are saying. I've had so many people say that, but for JobKeeper, their jobs and livelihoods— (Time expired) COVID-19: Aged Care 22 14:14 Ms COLLINS HWM Franklin My question is to the Prime Minister. Why does the Prime Minister boast about a list of more than 15 announcements but not mention his biggest contribution to aged care—that is, his $1.7 billion cut which left aged-care residents more vulnerable to the deadly COVID-19 virus? 14:14 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook Again the Labor Party continue to make these assertions. Even ABC Fact Check have ruled against them on these things, as they did before the last election. At the last election, the ALP supported the government's policies when it came to in-home aged care. Despite having policies that would see $387 billion in higher revenue, from their higher taxes, how much were they able to put aside from that $387 billion to support more in-home aged-care places? The answer to that is nothing, absolutely nothing. By contrast, we put forward a plan for 10,000 additional in-home aged-care places. Not only have we delivered on that, but we went further than that, with a further 10,000 places and a further 6,000 places beyond that, continuing to ensure that we are doing everything we can to meet the very significant needs that exist in these sectors. When I say 'these sectors', I mean the in-home aged-care sector and the residential aged-care sector, where our funding goes up more than $1 billion every year. These are just statements of fact. These are things that the government has done. We understand as a government that there is much more to be done. We understand that the mountain we are seeking to climb when it comes to dealing with the challenges in aged care is significant. We understand, as we have, over each and every year of the past seven years, increased funding by more than $1 billion every year to ensure that we are meeting the challenges in aged care. And there is more to be done, because we still need to close that gap on the needs that are there. We will continue to do that each and every year, because, like everyone in this chamber, we want to ensure that elderly Australians are treated with dignity and with respect and can get the care and support that they seek, whether it's in a private facility, a public facility or a not-for-profit facility. We have backed that up by the significant commitment of resources each and every year of government. We have had the responsibility for these matters. The SPEAKER 10000 It's actually the Independents' question now. I'll just give the option. That's okay. We can come back to it. I'll just call the member for McKellar. I think that'll make it easier. It might be Bob's question. We'll just go with the flow. He was here yesterday. Mr Falinski G86 I'll do my best impersonation! The SPEAKER 10000 I am going to come back because I didn't have notice. Broadcasting might have had notice. I didn't have notice of that, so I'm going to stick to the terms of the agreement. We'll just go to the member for Mackellar. COVID-19: Economy 22 1 Mr FALINSKI G86 Mackellar My question is to the Treasurer. Can the Treasurer please inform the House how the Australian economy is going compared to other economies that have been similarly impacted by the pandemic? 14:18 Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Kooyong I thank the member for Mackellar for his question and acknowledge his experience in small business, in both the health and the financial services space, before coming to this place. He's no fan of modern monetary theory, but he is a great supporter of his constituents and of good policy in this place. COVID-19 has wreaked enormous havoc across the global economy. The World Bank has forecast that more economies will contract this year than at any time since 1870. The OECD have said that they expect the global economy to contract by six per cent this calendar year. In comparison, during the GFC at its height, in 2009, the global economy only contracted by 0.1 per cent. The International Labour Organization has said that, as a result of COVID-19, effectively 500 million full-time jobs have been lost. The impact on GDP in the June quarter, across the world, has been staggering. In the United Kingdom, it's been around 20 per cent. In France, it's been around 14 per cent. We recently saw the numbers from Canada, which were 11½ per cent. In Germany, it was 10.1 per cent; and, in the United States, it was 9.1 per cent. Tomorrow we will get the national account numbers for the June quarter, and the expectation is that the fall here will not be as large as we've seen in other countries around the world, indicating the remarkable resilience of the Australian economy—indicated by the fact that, of the 1.3 million Australians who either have lost their job or saw their hours reduced to zero since the start of this crisis— Dr Chalmers interjecting— Mr FRYDENBERG FKL around 700,000 have got back to work. More than half have got back to work. There are 340,000 jobs that have been created in the last two months. Of those jobs— Dr Chalmers interjecting— Mr FRYDENBERG FKL 58 per cent have gone to women and 44 per cent have gone to young people. The SPEAKER 10000 Member for Rankin— Mr FRYDENBERG FKL The fact of the matter is— The SPEAKER 10000 Just pause, Treasurer. To the member for Rankin, who interjects a lot: if you're interjecting on your own repeatedly, it's probably a bad sign, okay? Mr FRYDENBERG FKL The only numbers the member for Rankin is interested in are the ones he's tallying against the Leader of the Opposition! Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 No, the Treasurer will be relevant to the question. Opposition members interjecting— Mr FRYDENBERG FKL The only ones he's tallying are against you! Dr Chalmers interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Rankin! Mr FRYDENBERG FKL The only ones he's tallying are against you! The fact of the matter is that the Australian economy has been remarkably resilient, and our JobMaker plan is helping to get more people back to work. While those opposite will continue to talk down the Australian economy, we will continue to implement our JobMaker plan, helping to create a stronger economic recovery and to help more Australians get back to work. The SPEAKER 10000 We'll get back in sync. I'll call the leader of the Greens. Child Care 23 14:21 Mr BANDT M3C Melbourne [by video link] My question is to the Prime Minister. For many parents, child care is expensive, the waiting lists are often long and places aren't available where they need them. Today, parents, business and community groups are calling on the government to act by transforming Australia's system into Swedish-style quality, universal and accessible early childhood education. Prime Minister, will you use the upcoming budget to make child care universal and free? 14:22 Mr TEHAN 210911 Wannon I thank the member for his question. What we have done in government since we introduced changes to the childcare subsidy two years ago is make sure that those who earn the least get accessible care and affordable care. That has meant that, for parents, there has been a 3.2 per cent reduction in out-of-pocket costs since the childcare subsidy came into place— Ms Rishworth interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Kingston! Mr TEHAN 210911 not only that; it has led to participation increasing, and, in particular, female participation increasing. We've seen a six per cent increase in female participation. So the subsidy—the changes that we've put in place—has worked. It's enabled us to ensure that the support is there for the sector. It's also enabled us to provide support to the sector through COVID-19. Can I once again take this opportunity—and I'm pretty sure it's world educators day tomorrow—to thank all those early educators who have supported the childcare sector throughout this COVID-19 pandemic. The work that they have done is outstanding, and, on behalf of the parliament, I thank them for all the work that they have done, helping us carry the sector through COVID-19. It's been quite extraordinary what the childcare sector has done, especially for essential workers— Ms Rishworth interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Kingston is warned! Mr TEHAN 210911 throughout COVID-19. We've been able to keep 99 per cent of childcare facilities open throughout the pandemic, by providing support. And we are continuing to provide support to the sector, especially when it comes to childcare providers in Victoria and, in particular, in Melbourne, who are still facing an incredibly difficult time as a result of the stage 4 restrictions in Melbourne and the stage 3 restrictions in the rest of Victoria. Our hope is that, as Victoria recovers from the pandemic, we'll be able to keep those supports in place for Victorian childcare providers so that they will be able to provide that care when parents seek to get back into the workforce as those restrictions are lifted. The SPEAKER 10000 Just to get it back on track I'll go to the opposition, and then we'll be back on track. I didn't have notice of the Leader of the Greens trying to remote in with a question. As I said, we require notice—it was all there as part of the agreement. Unless we get notice you won't be called. Just to be very clear, I've got no notice today of anyone asking any questions remotely, at this point. COVID-19: Aged Care 24 14:25 Mr WATTS 193430 Gellibrand My question is to the Prime Minister. Elizabeth's mum contracted COVID-19 at Benetas St George's residential aged care in my electorate. Elizabeth says that when her mum was taken to hospital they found she had a secondary chest infection and a urinary tract infection and had been left in soiled nappies for hours on end. Why does the Prime Minister boast about a list of aged-care announcements when residents and their families know the tragic reality of the gap between the Prime Minister's announcements and his delivery? 14:25 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook First of all, for all those who have been involved with the very difficult conditions at Benetas St George's: there are 31 patients that have contract COVID at that facility and 28 members of staff, and six people have lost their lives to COVID at Benetas St George's. There are two residents who are currently in hospital. Benetas St George's notified the Department of Health that it had a positive case on 7 July, and the Department of Health tailored specific support as soon as this notification occurred. Testing of residents and staff commenced on 9 July. The Australian government has provided a range of surge workforce to assist the facility. Australian medical assistance teams also provided onsite advice. The Department of Health and the Victorian Aged Care Response Centre will continue to provide intensive support to Benetas St George's until its outbreak is resolved. All impacted aged-care services in Victoria are receiving assistance from the government, including case managers, PPE, testing support and workforce support. The initial testing, I noted, occurred on 9 July and regular retesting has occurred, including most recently on 31 July and 4, 7, 11, 18, 22 and 23 August. Staff and residents may be tested on separate days. Workforce included Aspen Medical clinical first-responder onsite; AUSMAT onsite on 14, 15, 16 and 19 August; and an interstate team. We are so thankful to those interstate teams that came from other parts of the country to assist with the workforce support that was needed in our aged-care facilities, particularly including at Benetas St George's. They are the responses the government has put in place to the very serious conditions that emerged at Benetas St George's that followed on from the significant community outbreak of COVID-19 across Victoria. We will continue to deliver those responses, including giving support to OPAN, which assists with communications with families, and including the provision of PPE out of the National Medical Stockpile. These are our responsibilities and they are what we are doing to deliver support to that facility. To all the families of those, particularly of the six people who have passed away in that facility, we extend our deepest sympathies and condolences. We also thank all the staff, including those who've come from other places to support and deal with the very serious and acute conditions that emerged at that facility. JobKeeper Payment 24 14:28 Dr MARTIN 282982 Reid My question is to the Treasurer. Will the Treasurer outline to the House how the extension of the Morrison government's JobKeeper program is saving businesses, especially in my seat of Reid? 14:28 Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Kooyong I thank the member for Reid for her question and acknowledge her extensive experience as a businesswoman, a psychologist and someone who has a PhD for her research around children with autism. I acknowledge that experience before coming to this place. JobKeeper has been a remarkable program. They're not my words; they're the words of the Governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia. At $101 billion, this is an investment in protecting people's lives and livelihoods. Today JobKeeper is supporting more than 3½ million Australian workers and around one million Australian businesses. We are seeking to pass through this parliament today legislation which will see the extension and the expansion of this remarkable program, with effectively an extra $30 billion being put to work on behalf of the Australian people. This legislation will also include important regulations around labour market flexibility. Labour market flexibility has been critical to the JobKeeper businesses being able to keep their doors open and keep their staff employed throughout this crisis. There are remarkable stories in every corner of this country about JobKeeper, such as, in the electorate of Bass, Flinders Island Aviation; in the electorate of Boothby, Central Audio Visual; in the electorate of Curtin, Barchetta cafe; and, in the electorate of Higgins, as we heard recently, Very Special Kids, a children's hospice. We have heard stories from right across the country, including that of F45 gym in the member for Ryan's electorate. Around the country there are remarkable stories. There's also a remarkable story in the electorate of Reid, and it relates to the Children's Tumour Foundation, a small not-for-profit supporting parents of children suffering from neurofibromatosis. It's based at Five Dock in Sydney, and it has five people on JobKeeper. This is what Ruth said about the remarkable JobKeeper program: 'It's a complete lifeline for us. It's been able to keep us going in these very turbulent times, when we've got more people impacted and needing our services more than ever before.' This is the JobKeeper program, supporting lives and supporting livelihoods. The JobKeeper program is helping to keep people in a job, the JobKeeper program is helping the national economy and the JobKeeper program is helping the wellbeing of millions of Australians. Aged Care, Superannuation 25 14:31 Mr ALBANESE R36 Grayndler My question is to the Prime Minister. Why is the Prime Minister not only neglecting older Australians of today in aged care but neglecting older Australians of tomorrow by failing to deliver on the increase to their retirement savings in superannuation that he announced on 7 November 2018? 14:32 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook Let me say first of all, because I know the Leader of the Opposition has raised this in other places—I know he's raising a separate issue here, but this is just to put pensioners' minds at ease when it comes to the impact; this is an issue of concern to older Australians, and I'm sure that the opposition won't object to me letting older Australians who are on the pension and those who are dependent on these types of benefits know this—that, because of the very extraordinary and irregular impact on the indexation of how these things work, the government will be making announcements to ensure— The SPEAKER 10000 Before the Manager of Opposition Business does—I won't give the manager the call at this point—I'm just going to say to the Prime Minister that the question had two parts. One was about aged care and the other was about changes to superannuation. So, whilst he might want to speak about the concern with respect to pensions, he'd need to get a question that asked that to talk about pensioners. It was very specific about aged care and about superannuation. Mr MORRISON E3L Mr Speaker, I just want to assure, in concluding on that element, that we will— Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 Members on my left! Mr MORRISON E3L If those opposite aren't interested in this issue then that is a matter for them. Mr Conroy interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 No, the Prime Minister will resume his seat. The Manager of Opposition Business will resume his seat. The member for Shortland has been warned. He will leave under 94(a). The member for Shortland then left the chamber. The SPEAKER 10000 I've just got to make the point to the Prime Minister that the question was very specific. It referred to aged care and superannuation. The Prime Minister has the call. Mr MORRISON E3L Thank you, Mr Speaker. We will address the matter that I was just referring to, and we look forward to making the announcements when the decisions have been made. I don't accept the assertions and smears that the Leader of the Opposition has made in relation to the government's position on aged care, and already during this question time I have outlined the responses that the government has made—in particular in relation to specific facilities when questioned on those matters by members opposite. I'll ask the Treasurer to add further to the answer on the other matters raised in the member's question. 14:34 Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Kooyong I was asked about the superannuation guarantee, an issue that the government is working through. When it comes to the issue of the increase in the superannuation guarantee, this is what the governor of the Reserve Bank, Dr Philip Lowe, said— Opposition members interjecting— Mr FRYDENBERG FKL It's relevant to the question. The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Gorton will cease interjecting. The Treasurer will resume his seat. The Leader of the Opposition on a point of order? Mr Albanese R36 Yes, Mr Speaker, on relevance. I asked very specifically about the Prime Minister's own commitment that he made on 7 November 2018 on superannuation. He said: 'Yeah, we've got no plans to change the legislation when it comes to the SGL that's been in place for some time— The SPEAKER 10000 The Leader of the Opposition will resume his seat. As I said, the question was about potential changes to superannuation. It might have had other sentences in it, but I think the Treasurer is in order to talk about superannuation and the government's position on any potential changes. Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Thank you, Mr Speaker. I would have thought the Leader of the Opposition would be interested in the words of the governor of the Reserve Bank. When asked about the increase in the superannuation guarantee, he said the following: … increases of this form do get offset by lower wages growth over time. It would certainly have a negative effect on wages growth. There will be less current income and if there is less income, there may be less spending, and if there is less spending, there may be less jobs. The Grattan Institute said the following: Increasing compulsory super contributions in the midst of a deep recession would slow the pace of recovery. ACOSS have also made comments about it, as well as COSBOA representing small businesses. Ms Plibersek interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Sydney is now warned. Mr FRYDENBERG FKL The reality, and you will see this tomorrow with the national account numbers, is that the Australian economy has been hit hard by COVID-19. We're working through these issues and taking into account the comments and the insights provided by a number of people, including the Reserve Bank of Australia. The SPEAKER 10000 The Leader of the Opposition is seeking to table a document? Mr Albanese R36 I do, Mr Speaker—the Prime Minister's transcript of 7 November 2018, in which he said: 'We want to make sure that Australian workers actually get these additional increases, which go to their future superannuation.' The SPEAKER 10000 It is probably a publicly available document. Is leave granted? Leave not granted. JobKeeper Payment 26 14:37 Mr STEVENS 176304 Sturt My question is to the Attorney General and Minister for Industrial Relations. Will the Attorney please update the House on how the Morrison government's JobKeeper flexibilities are helping to protect Australians from the economic effects of the pandemic? 14:37 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce I thank the member for his question. He understands how absolutely critical these flexibilities are. The dual approach of the government in dealing with COVID-19 has always been to navigate both the health and economic imperatives. The Treasurer noted that we've been saving lives and saving jobs, and trying to navigate both of those two imperatives in a balanced way. What the flexibilities that were built into JobKeeper No.1 and now the JobKeeper No.2 system did was save jobs—likely, hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country—and we are now hearing from the businesses and employers about those jobs that were saved. An RSL club in regional New South Wales said: 'The flexibilities these laws have permitted enabled us to retain all of our regular casual and permanent staff in paid employment during this period. If we had not received JobKeeper and the laws enabling these flexibilities, we would have been forced to implement redundancies.' An architecture firm in Adelaide said: 'JobKeeper flexibilities have been essential to our survival through this global pandemic. Without the government's introduction of these temporary legislative provisions, we would not have been able to retain employees and our business would have been at risk.' A restaurant manager in Brisbane said: 'Because of the flexibilities, we were able to get our staff to perform other tasks, such as maintenance, throughout the closure and keep these workers employed. The flexibilities have been so important to sustain our business during the closure, as well as during the reopening.' Our position in JobKeeper No. 2 has been very, very clear. We think that, if a business was on JobKeeper No. 1—so they'd had a turnover drop of more than 30 per cent—but they don't requalify for JobKeeper No. 2, but, nevertheless, still have a very significant decrease in their turnover, they're what we call a legacy business. For instance, if a business on JobKeeper No. 1 had a 70 per cent decrease in its turnover and now has a 20 per cent decrease in its turnover, we think that business should still be able to have the flexibilities available. Why? Because that saves the business and it saves individual jobs in the real world. The position of the members opposite is also very clear. In the words of the member for Watson, 'We don't agree with that.' What they do not agree with is the continuation, in a protected, clear, rational way, for another six months that will save Australian jobs and save Australian businesses. What's most disappointing about the fact that they simply do not agree is that we modelled that second six months of flexibilities on an agreement that was reached between the unions and the AHA, which members opposite endorsed, even though it did not have the protections that we have built in. (Time expired) Economy 27 14:40 Dr CHALMERS 37998 Rankin My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer to the Treasurer's announcement that 'the Morrison government is providing an unprecedented $314 billion in economic support, the equivalent of $12,500 for every Australian man, woman and child'. How much of this announced support has actually been delivered by the government? 14:41 Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Kooyong Well, let's go through it. In relation to the cash flow boost, 785,418 recipients have received $24.1 billion. In relation to economic support payments, phase 1—which is in relation to the $750 payment—7.3 million people received $5.5 billion. In relation to economic support payments, phase 2, 4.9 million people have received $3.7 billion— Dr Chalmers interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The Treasurer will pause. I've already asked the member for Rankin to cease interjecting. I've got to say, there are lots of complaints in question time. He's asked a very direct question and the Treasurer's answering it very directly, and he's still interjecting. He does not have to add it up for you. He's giving the figures. The Treasurer has the call. Mr FRYDENBERG FKL The member for Rankin should quit while he's ahead and say no more. The coronavirus supplement has gone to 2.3 million people, at $9.7 billion. In terms of JobKeeper, 996,388 businesses with more than 3½ million employees have received $42.27 billion. That program is costed at $101 billion. The reality is that we're getting on with the job of helping businesses stay in business and people stay in jobs. When it comes to our $314 billion, which is 15.8 per cent of GDP, we'd also like to see the states contribute more, because their contribution has been around 2.4 per cent of gross state product—that is in comparison to our 15.8 per cent. We hear from the member for Rankin. He is often complaining about debt and deficit but then asking us to spend more. The member for Rankin had been asking for a transition down from JobKeeper. Now he says he's not in favour of a transition. The member for Rankin said that people on JobKeeper were getting paid too much. Now he wants people on JobKeeper to be paid more. The member for Rankin is jumbled. His head is jumbled with all these different facts and figures. The member for Rankin should no longer be known as the member for Rankin; he should be known as Jumble Jim. The SPEAKER 10000 The Treasurer will withdraw that term. Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 Members on my left will cease interjecting. Mr FRYDENBERG FKL I withdraw the term 'Jim'. The SPEAKER 10000 No. The Treasurer will withdraw. Mr FRYDENBERG FKL I withdraw. The SPEAKER 10000 I'm just going to say to the Treasurer that he's not going to get the call if he does that. I'll tell you why I've been strict on this. He might find it funny now, but I know for a fact that, when the boot's on the other foot, ministers don't appreciate it, and they are the first to complain. The member for Berowra has the call. COVID-19: Health Care 27 14:44 Mr LEESER 109556 Berowra My question is to the Minister for Health. Will the minister update the House on how the Morrison government is supporting the health, including the mental health, of Australians through telehealth and record bulk-billing rates? Mr Frydenberg interjecting— Dr Chalmers interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 Member for Rankin! We're not going to have a sort of intraparliamentary debate over the course of the next question. You both need to contain yourselves or you can have the debate outside the chamber. The Minister for Health has the call. 14:45 Mr HUNT 00AMV Flinders I want to thank the member for Berowra. He has been a great advocate for suicide prevention in this place, along with the former member for Eden-Monaro, who has now retired. And there are so many—such as the member for Fenner, and the member for Reid on this side—who have been involved in the focus on mental health. One of the great challenges in the course of the global pandemic has been providing health care, and, in particular, mental health care. In order to deal with it, in March we established whole-of-population telehealth. There have been some questions today from the opposition about delivery. I'm very happy to inform them that 28 million services, since that time, have been delivered through telehealth. Over $1.4 billion has been invested in the provision of telehealth services. These are services that support elderly Australians in their own homes and in aged-care homes. They support all Australians—people who are immunocompromised, people who might have difficulties in leaving home—and they've been protecting doctors, nurses and healthcare workers at the same time. As a consequence, one of the things that have occurred is we've seen record bulk-billing rates rise still further, from just over 86 per cent to 87.5 per cent—which, I'm advised, is an all-time bulk-billing record—for the year to 30 June. This means that we're helping to not only provide the services but provide more affordable services. I think that's a positive outcome in these most difficult of times. Very significantly, of course, though, when we look at Victoria, we ask ourselves: why is it that five million Melburnians are under curfew because of a mass community outbreak? Five million Melburnians are unable to leave their homes for 23 hours a day unless it's for work, medical reasons or shopping. Why is it that we have shops and businesses closed because of a mass community outbreak? But, because of that, we've had a special need to deal with mental health. Fifty-nine per cent of mental health services in Victoria over the last month have been delivered via telehealth. What that means for a population under pressure, for a population facing a mass community outbreak, is that they've been able to get support for mental health and physical health through telehealth. And these things, together, are saving lives and protecting lives; they're giving people contact; and, above all else, they're giving people real and profound hope. COVID-19: Small Business 28 14:48 Mr BRENDAN O'CONNOR 00AN3 Gorton My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer to the Treasurer's announcement that the small and medium enterprise loan guarantee scheme is providing 'an unprecedented level of support to SMEs' and that it 'will help businesses move out of hibernation, successfully adapt to the new COVID-safe economy and invest for the future'. Prime Minister, how much of the announced $40 billion in support has been delivered? 14:48 Mr FRYDENBERG FKL Kooyong So far, 17,652 businesses have received $1.7 billion and, as you know, we've extended and expanded the criteria which allow those loans to have a greater tenor of up to five years. Previously, it was three years, up to a million dollars. Previously, it was $250,000. It's been a very important program. Opposition members interjecting— Mr FRYDENBERG FKL I don't know what the honourable member has against the government partnering with the banks to help small business. What do honourable members opposite have against supporting small business? What do they have against— Honourable members interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The Treasurer will pause. There are some people who are about to leave the chamber. Seriously, the level of interjections is unnecessary. The Treasurer. Mr FRYDENBERG FKL The harsh reality of COVID-19 is that it has had a significant impact on small businesses right around the country. We all know that small business owners are often the ones who are first into their office or into their shop and they're the last to leave. They work at the front of the office or the shop and they work at the back office. They have received unprecedented support from the Morrison government through this crisis and that support has been very varied. It's been through the JobKeeper payment, which has helped support their workers keep a job through this crisis; it's been through the cash flow boost, which has helped meet their working capital requirements through this crisis and it's been through the SME loan guarantee. And right now more than 17½ thousand businesses are benefitting from our government's partnership with the banks. JobKeeper 28 14:50 Mr GOODENOUGH 74046 Moore My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business. Will the minister please update the House on how the Morrison government's JobKeeper program is helping protect small businesses and their employees from the economic effects of the pandemic? 14:51 Mrs ANDREWS 230886 McPherson I thank the member for his question. He's a great advocate for small businesses, because he's had firsthand experience at running and operating his own business. He understands just how hard it is for our businesses. We are all aware of the ongoing impacts of this pandemic. This government has implemented, and is delivering, a number of very practical solutions that are going to help individuals, families, small businesses and communities. Let me start with the jobs task forces that we announced this morning. These are flying squads that are going to be going into the regions that have been the most hard hit. What those squads are going to do is that they're going to look to tailor support, to develop some local plans and to help people get back into jobs as part of the road to recovery. We know that successful businesses are the keys to creating jobs in our community. Of course, JobKeeper is very central to that plan. It certainly helps businesses to keep their doors open. There are countless stories that we have all heard about how JobKeeper has been a lifeline for so many businesses and, of course, for so many workers. Just one example is a business owner called Lorraine at the Peppermint Green Coffee House in Joondalup, in the member for Moore's electorate. She says that her eight staff are like family to her and that JobKeeper has meant that she's been able to keep them over a very stressful period when she was forced to close. That business is back up and running again and, as Lorraine says, they are contributing back to the community. It's very important to remember that, when we talk about the economic crisis, it's not just about the budget bottom line or figures on a business balance sheet; it's about people's lives. When businesses close there's an enormous toll that's taken. People lose their jobs and they fall behind on their mortgages. Families struggle with paying their household budgets and they endure emotional and financial stress. That's why the support that this government is offering is so important, because this is about supporting people at times that they need it the absolute most. What this government is doing is making sure that we are supporting individuals, families and small businesses in particular. We are making sure that Australia is clearly open for business. We are supporting those small businesses as they support their workers through this COVID-19 pandemic. COVID-19: Vaccine 29 14:54 Mr BOWEN DZS McMahon My question is to the Prime Minister. On 19 August the Prime Minister announced Australia had a deal with the drug company AstraZeneca to secure a COVID-19 vaccine, but AstraZeneca said there was no deal and a local manufacturer had not been found. Why do the Prime Minister's announcements never match the reality? 14:54 Mr MORRISON E3L Cook The shadow minister for health has a habit of coming up with all sorts of sledges that always end up proving not to be true, and I'll ask the Minister for Health to update further. 14:55 Mr HUNT 00AMV Flinders Unfortunately for the shadow minister for health, he neglected the second part of the discussion that day, where AstraZeneca actually wrote to the paper in question and rejected their statement, reaffirmed that which they'd said next to the Prime Minister and noted that they had struck an agreement with the government and that this is the first and the most important stage and is a written agreement between the government and AstraZeneca. I think the shadow minister will have a very difficult time in the future when he looks back on the fact that we will have delivered whole-of-population vaccines for Australians. That is the future to come—that we will have delivered that. We have a written agreement with AstraZeneca. We have signed that agreement. It's my name on that agreement. And, as the person who had worked it with them, as one of the team which had the authority of the Expenditure Review Committee to do that, we have put Australia in a position where we are now at the forefront of those countries which will have access to vaccines. AstraZeneca's is not the only vaccine, I would also mention. We are working with a variety of other companies around the world. We are working, in terms of Australian manufacturing and production, with CSL. So what we will see is that the Australian population will be given access to whole-of-population vaccines, on a free basis, which is one of the fundamental pathways for the road out for Australians. So we have containment and we have capacity. The ultimate capacity is that vaccination. It happens that we are in a fortunate position because we have Australian manufacturing capacity on top of our access. Indeed, we also have, within Australia, an over $350 million COVID vaccine preparedness and treatment program. That includes the investments in the University of Queensland molecular clamp—a $5 million investment—but also $25 million of additional funding for clinical trials, which was announced only in the last 10 days. So all of these things have come together as part of our capacity structure: primary care, aged care, hospitals and vaccines. In particular, we have a written agreement with AstraZeneca, which is the first and most important part. We have advanced negotiations with other companies. And we have production capability, as well as the capacity to be part of the Gavi COVAX international— (Time expired) COVID-19: Tourism 30 14:57 Ms BELL 282981 Moncrieff My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment. Would the minister please update the House on how the Morrison government's JobKeeper program is helping to protect Australia's tourism sector from the economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic? 14:58 Mr TEHAN 210911 Wannon Can I thank the member for Moncrieff for her question and can I commend her on the forum that she held on the Gold Coast, the Reimagine Gold Coast forum. I know that the local Gold Coast tourism sector played a big part in that forum. Her passion for tourism and for her local electorate was to the fore with that Reimagine Gold Coast forum. I know there are many Victorians who are waiting with bated breath to be able to go up and visit the Gold Coast, as I've no doubt there are many Australians who are making sure that they can go and visit the Gold Coast. Tourism is incredibly important to Australia. In 2019, the tourism industry was worth $152 billion. One in 13 Australian jobs depends on tourism. Ninety-five per cent of tourism businesses are small businesses. In 2019, Australia had met and surpassed the tourism visitation and spend targets under our 10-year Tourism 2020 strategy—a year early. All that, of course, was before COVID-19 struck. Importantly, our tourism sector is very strong domestically, with 70 per cent of our tourism industry driven by domestic visitation. We are there to support the tourism industry—as I know all Australians are—by making sure that they continue to use tourism as a way to take a holiday, go to events and do other things which will help all the small businesses in the tourism sector. But the government has also provided additional support through JobKeeper, cash flow payments, apprenticeship and trainee support, and assistance for financially distressed businesses. These are in addition to Tourism Australia's record—and growing—budget, which will be used to directly support the domestic tourism industry, through marketing campaigns, when it is safe to do so, especially internationally. We have also established a $1 billion COVID-19 Relief and Recovery Fund to support regions, communities and industry sectors that have been disproportionately affected, including the tourism sector. I thank the Deputy Prime Minister for his stewardship of that fund to make sure that we have been able to provide assistance, like $100 million in regional airlines funding assistance, $198 million in regional air network assistance, $94.6 million to support exhibiting zoos and aquariums, and $27 million for arts related organisations, key drivers of tourism. The government wants to make sure that we are there to support the tourism sector. We know that it's driven mainly by the small business sector and we know it's so important for jobs, with one in 13 jobs in Australia dependent on the tourism industry. COVID-19: Vaccine 30 15:01 Mr BOWEN DZS McMahon My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer to the previous answers. Isn't it the case that at least 17 countries have signed and sealed at least 49 agreements to secure potential COVID-19 vaccines? Together, these deals guarantee over six billion doses, but Australia hasn't actually signed a single deal for a single dose. Why has the Prime Minister provided false hope with a big announcement of a deal which simply doesn't yet exist? 15:01 Mr HUNT 00AMV Flinders I'm very pleased to respond to the member for McMahon's question. Let me quote, specifically, the response of AstraZeneca to this so-called claim. This is what they wrote to the authors of the article, in particular, at Pharma in Focus: 'We stand behind what was stated at this morning's press conference between the Prime Minister, Professor Kelly and ourselves. AstraZeneca is thrilled. Your interpretation is incorrect. We have not questioned the veracity of the letter of intent. We have never questioned the deal'—and I want to repeat the phrase from AstraZeneca, 'We have never questioned the deal'—'and we are not perplexed about the deal and the agreement. We are really disappointed with the approach Pharma in Focus has taken.' Deal, agreement: signed by Melissa Millard, Head of Communications, AstraZeneca. I am sorry if those two words offend the shadow minister. I realise that this is not the portfolio he wished for. It is not the position he chose, and it shows because there is not much work or research. He got very excited about two words, 'deal' and 'agreement', and they're the words from AstraZeneca. But, stepping back, where is Australia in all of this? We are in the fortunate position that, because of our onshore manufacturing capacity, because of the ability to work with CSL, because of the ability to deliver whole-of-population support, we have been able to identify, carefully, as one would want, the best in class of the vaccines, the most capable, the most prospective, the most likely to deliver an early outcome, a safe outcome and an effective outcome for the Australian population, and that's precisely what we've done, already, with AstraZeneca. But more is to come as well as the onshore manufacturing and, therefore, the delivery of whole-of-population vaccination outcomes. Do you know why we can do this? Because we've just delivered record vaccination rates in Australia as well for five-year-olds. We've also delivered on the PBS. We were not the ones that stopped the listing of medicines. We were not the ones that held up the funding for the PBS—in particular, for medicines for schizophrenia and medicines for endometriosis. These are the things that they stopped. We'll deliver whole-of-population vaccine, exactly as AstraZeneca has said, through whether you call it the deal or the agreement—both are their words—but that's what we'll deliver the Australian people. COVID-19: Arts 31 15:04 Mr SHARMA 274506 Wentworth My question is to the Minister for Communications, Cyber Safety and the Arts. Australia's creative and cultural sector contributes $112 billion to the Australian economy every year. Will the minister please update the House on what the Morrison government is doing to protect Australians in this industry from the economic effects of the pandemic, including through the extension of its JobKeeper program? 15:05 Mr FLETCHER L6B Bradfield I thank the member for Wentworth for his question. He's got a strong commitment to our cultural and creative sector, which, as he rightly says, generates $112 billion of economic activity each year. For everybody who cares about this sector, it's been troubling to see the impact of COVID, with performances cancelled, venues closed, artists losing their gigs. That's why our government moved quickly to respond, through JobKeeper and JobSeeker, providing support for those in the sector unable to work. While we moved quickly, sadly the shadow minister was out there deliberately spreading fear and uncertainty in the sector, making the completely factually incorrect claim that JobKeeper was not well suited to the arts sector. Well, let's have a look at the facts. Ninety per cent of people who work in the cultural and creative sector are in employment arrangements which make them eligible for JobKeeper. There are around 40,000 people in what the ABS calls the performing and creative arts subsector, and, in the first month of JobKeeper, around two-thirds of the people in that subsector received JobKeeper. In fact, to date JobKeeper has delivered $336 million to people in this sector, so the shadow minister was precisely and completely wrong. But, not content with spreading fear, what did this repeated visitor to Eddie Obeid's ski lodge do? He also moved a second reading amendment to the government's bill to deliver $130 billion of support to COVID affected Australians. He claimed, misleadingly, that this would have delivered more support to the arts sector. The facts are that, if his amendment had passed, it would have ended the entire bill; there would have been no support for any Australians, including those in the arts sector. Now we've had a serious of false claims from the shadow minister. He claimed there was no support for the arts for 100 days. That was wrong. Around $100 million flowed into the creative and performing arts subsector in April, through JobKeeper and through cash flow payments. And, of course, just a few weeks ago we announced our $250 million JobMaker plan for the cultural and creative sector. Labor were running out of new material by that point. The best they could do was claim that it didn't support the visual arts. I'll tell you what: they were wrong on that as well. As we come out of COVID, our cultural and creative sector has a vital role to play in lifting our spirits and telling our stories. Our side of the parliament has been delivering unprecedented support to the arts sector. Labor has just been trying to scare them. HomeBuilder 31 15:08 Mr CLARE HWL Blaxland My question is to the Minister for Housing. When the HomeBuilder scheme was announced, on a freshly laid lawn in a housing estate three months ago, the minister said it would spark a tradie-led recovery of our economy. The Treasury says that, as at 14 August, only 39 people have applied to renovate their home. Why does the government always make a big announcement but never deliver? 15:08 Mr SUKKAR 242515 Deakin The shadow minister has very, very old figures there. We've got a few updates to what he has outlined. We've had 3½ thousand applications. In the first week that Victoria opened up their applications for HomeBuilder, we had 1,100 applications in a week. Dr Chalmers interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Rankin is warned. Mr SUKKAR 242515 Since HomeBuilder was announced on 4 June, we've seen new home sales increase by 77 per cent— Mr Hill interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The minister will just pause for a second. The member for Bruce will leave under 94(a). The member for Bruce then left the chamber. The SPEAKER 10000 I've warned a number of people a number of times. Just to remind them, in case they've forgotten: they are the member for Sydney, the member for Rankin—and I've got all the others written down. I won't detain the House, but you should know who you are. If you don't, bad luck. Mr SUKKAR 242515 The shadow minister needs to engage with the sector more. If he did, he would understand that a 77 per cent increase in new home sales, in the month after HomeBuilder, led the head of the Master Builders Association to say, 'This is the most effective government stimulus that we have seen in decades'—a 77 per cent increase in new home sales. In the first week that Victoria opened up formal applications—there were 1,100 applications in Victoria alone. The Master Builders Association and the Housing Industry Association have been lauding this scheme day after day. If the shadow minister paid any attention to it, he wouldn't ask foolish questions like the one he just asked. This program is keeping hundreds of thousands of tradies in work—not just tradies on building sites, not just the bricklayers and the carpenters, but the manufacturing workers who make the bricks, glass and tiles and the timber mill workers who make the frames and trusses. The chief economist at the HIA, in contrast to what the shadow minister has just said, said the following: … HomeBuilder has arrested the decline in New Home Sales and will protect jobs in the sector into 2021. Treasury estimates that 27,000 new projects, whether they are new home sales or substantial rebuilds, will fall into the HomeBuilder scheme. The HIA and the MBA are far more optimistic than that. At the moment we've seen new home sales increase by 77 per cent in the first month since the announcement. We've seen the two main industry bodies, the Master Builders Association and the Housing Industry Association, repudiate everything the shadow minister says. We stand on the side of new home buyers and homeownership. Whether it's the First Home Loan Deposit Scheme, which has seen more than 10,000 people access their first home, or whether it's people who will receive this $25,000 grant, we are on the side of new home buyers and tradies who work in the construction sector, and the Labor Party can oppose it all they like. COVID-19: Women's Economic Security 32 15:12 Mrs WICKS 241590 Robertson My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Women. Will the minister update the House on how the Morrison government's economic support measures, including its JobKeeper program, are assisting women during the COVID-19 pandemic? Dr Chalmers interjecting— Mr Frydenberg interjecting— The SPEAKER 10000 The member for Rankin and the Treasurer! I'm about to go out on a job lot! The minister has the call. 15:12 Ms LEY 00AMN Farrer I thank the member for Robertson for her question. She, as part of the Morrison government, is closely monitoring the economic effects of coronavirus on all Australians, especially and including women. Our significant economic support of almost $305 billion—that's around 15.3 per cent of GDP—is helping cushion the economic shock. We are taking unprecedented action to strengthen the safety net for Australians who lose their jobs. Sadly, we know that a disproportionate number of those are women, mainly because they are heavily represented in sectors that have sharp decreases in paid work—hospitality, tourism and retail. The JobKeeper payment is helping keep Australians in jobs. We know this has been an incredibly welcomed measure, including in Robertson where Natalie, from CrocStars Swim School in Terrigal, contacted my good friend the member for Robertson to say: 'If it wasn't for JobKeeper, my staff would have gone upwards of 14 weeks without pay. The day this payment was announced I breathed a huge sigh of relief, knowing I could support those staff members who have been loyal to me during this difficult time.' That's the key feature of JobKeeper: it keeps women, whether they are employees or employers, connected to work and connected to each other. We are extending the JobKeeper payment until March 2021. We know that that will help those female dominated industries such as accommodation, food services and retail. Increasing women's participation in paid employment will assist in accelerating Australia's overall recovery as the economy begins to revive. It's encouraging to see that we've seen around 200,000 jobs returning to women as the economy has started to reopen in most places across Australia—none more challenging, I must say, than around our borders. As someone who represents the New South Wales-Victorian border, I was pleased to see the Premier, Gladys Berejiklian, coming to Albury today to say that border is not going to be closed for one day longer than it needs to be. Thank you, Premier. What's next? Well, we will refresh our $158 million Women's Economic Security plan. That has 17 initiatives. One that's particularly relevant to rural women is the Career Revive initiative, which supports women who step away, whether it be on farm or in their community, to come back to their career later. Women's economic security is about two things: it's about economic participation—workforce participation—and financial security. The Morrison government's commitment to supporting women through the pandemic and beyond is absolutely paramount. Mr Morrison E3L Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper. DOCUMENTS 33 DOCUMENTS Commonwealth Ombudsman 33 Presentation 33 15:15 The SPEAKER 00APG I present the report on the Commonwealth Ombudsman's activities under section 65(6) of the Building and Construction Industry (Improving Productivity) Act 2016 for the period 1 April to 30 June 2020 and the Commonwealth Ombudsman's quarterly report under section 712F(6) of the Fair Work Act 2009 for the period 1 April to 30 June 2020. MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE 33 MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE Coalition Government 33 15:16 The SPEAKER 00APG I have received a letter from the honourable the Manager of Opposition Business proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely: The failure of the government to deliver on its announcements in areas of critical importance to all Australians. I call upon those honourable members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places. More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places— 15:16 Mr BURKE DYW Watson Every question in question time today from the opposition went to the gap between the announcements from this government and the delivery, and we've worked something out: whether it's aged care, whether it's JobKeeper, whether it's debt and deficit or whether it's superannuation, if there's something that you really don't want to happen how do you make sure something won't happen? You get the Prime Minister to announce it, if you're really worried about something. I imagine this is a message to lobbyists all around the country who are working with a department towards an announcement: if at any moment the public servants say to you, 'Oh, we could get the Prime Minister to announce this,' stop it. Run a mile. Don't let it happen, because this is what happens in every instance. They don't seem to understand. Normally parliamentary debate goes back and forth as to whether or not the right programs have been announced, but here, with this government and with this Prime Minister, ever since he said, 'I'm ambitious for him,' we've really understood the difference between what he announces and what he does within a couple of days. The Treasurer today was asked a question, and he thought he was boasting. It's really interesting when someone's asked about a gap between what you announce and what you do and he stands up and says, 'Well, let me show you the numbers.' When he was asked, 'You promised $314 billion in economic support; what have you done?' the numbers that he reported to the parliament added up to just over a quarter of the announcement. Then we had another dixer from them today—it wasn't just our questions that were making this case; it was in their dixers as well—where they stood up and boasted that there would now be an additional $30 billion for JobKeeper, taking it to $101 billion. So they've added $30 billion, and it's still $30 billion less than what they originally announced. They originally announced that they would help six million Australians. They then decided to design the rules to make sure that six million Australians were not eligible. They cut out a million casuals, they cut out the visa workers, they cut out local government, they cut out arts and entertainment workers, they cut out aviation workers and they cut out people who work at universities. Then they said: 'Oh, isn't this great? We don't need to spend as much money as we thought we did.' They gave hope to six million Australians, and they let down half that number. It's a bit late now to be boasting that somehow they're adding extra support when it's still less than the original announcement. That gap is the story that is told in unemployment queues around Australia. Yesterday we had the Prime Minister boasting that aged care apparently is not a real problem at the moment. Why do we know it's not a problem? Because he could rattle off 14 announcements. If you've got your list of announcements and we still find somebody with ants crawling in an open wound, that tells the story of neglect. That tells the story of the gap between announcement and delivery. We heard the same when they thought they had got off scot-free on the Ruby Princess inquiry from New South Wales. They said, 'Oh, no, we've been told that we weren't in fact responsible; it was the state government.' But here is the problem: the problem was that they had actually announced that they were going to take responsibility. The Prime Minister had stood up and announced that the cruise ships would be placed 'directly under the command of the Australian Border Force.' The only reason they did okay in that royal commission was because they never delivered on what they announced. The only reason it wasn't their responsibility was because they hadn't done what they said they would do, which is going to lead us to what will be one of the defining broken promises of this government, because we all know where they are headed on superannuation. We all know exactly what's happening on superannuation. We know it's going to be the attack on retirees in all three ways: freezing the pension; stuffing up aged care; and attacking superannuation. Of course, we know they're going to claw back on superannuation. How do we know this? Because in November 2018 the Prime Minister announced they wouldn't. In November 2018, the Prime Minister made an announcement. He said: 'No, no, no, it's all legislated. It is going to go up to 12 per cent. Working people will get their money.' Well, they won't. The backbench started the drum beat. We know it's nothing to do with the pandemic. They've been in for seven years. This was meant to be coming in all of that time, and working Australians haven't been getting the money. And they have always argued, 'Oh, yes, but, if you get the superannuation increase, then you miss out on the pay rise.' Well, for the life of this government, they haven't been getting a pay rise or a superannuation increase, and that has been the lived experience of working Australians. Yesterday, we had a fine first speech from the new member for Eden-Monaro. Let's not forget the big story of Kristy McBain, the member for Eden-Monaro, becoming a national figure by standing up to this government and saying, 'We need support for bushfire-ravaged communities.' When they needed support, what did the government give them instead? It gave them an announcement. It announced on 11 May a $650 million boost for bushfire recovery. The Treasurer announced it. Before, I was critical that it was only about a quarter of what they announced. Well, for bushfire recovery, 1½ per cent of what they announced has been spent. Bushfire recovery is where people are dealing with having lost everything not just in what they're going through, personally but in what entire communities are going through. Of all the areas for there to be a gap between announcement and delivery, I've got to say that is one of the most offensive. Don't announce $650 million if you have no intention of spending it. Don't announce that you're going to help six million Australians with a wage subsidy if you only have the intention of helping half that number. Don't announce that you've got 14 new announcements on aged care if we're then going to get royal commission reports titled, Neglect. Don't announce that the most important thing in fighting the coronavirus is going to be for everyone to download the app and then find out after all this time it has helped us trace contact on 14 occasions. You get millions of Australians following the advice of the Prime Minister. Why do they follow the advice? Well, he made the announcement. He told us this was what we had to do. Download the app. That's right, get out from under the doona and all you have to do is keep your distance, wash your hands and download the app. They don't tend to run that run of three anymore. I don't know what happened to the app, but it certainly didn't do any of the things that were in the announcement. Then there were the responses we had today from the Minister for Health to the shadow minister for health. There was one thing that he would not say when he was saying: 'It's an agreement. It's a deal.' He wouldn't say how many vaccines are now guaranteed for Australia, because the answer is zero. The Treasurer would hide behind words and hide behind announcements, but, once again, the delivery was where it fell short. I guess we know this from a mob that, when they were in opposition, promised that every single budget from the time they came into office would be a surplus budget. We've now been here for a seven-year-old government—that, at the next election, are going to ask to be a 12-year-old government—and never will they once have turned a surplus budget. They had doubled the debt before anyone had heard of coronavirus, so don't hide behind the virus in terms of this. The thing that we know—it's not just that they overpromise and underdeliver. No, no—it's not even as complicated as that. They make announcements to avoid doing anything, because all they care about is the marketing. I tell you what: people out there don't live in a marketing world. People live with a government that either delivers or it doesn't, and we have, for seven long years now, a government that fails to deliver. 15:26 Mr PITT 148150 Hinkler First and foremost, can I welcome the member for Eden-Monaro to the parliament and congratulate her on her victory in the recent by-election. It's always a great pleasure to follow the Manager of Opposition Business, a very passionate individual—in seven years, I'm sure there's one opportunity somewhere. The Manager of Opposition Business talks about a number of catchphrases and catchwords, the first one being 'ambition'. Of course we're ambitious. We're ambitious for the Australian people. We're ambitious for where they might go. We're ambitious for our economy. We're ambitious for growth and jobs. We are ambitious for every single individual in this country and the opportunities that can be made for them. They talk about hope. Well, we of course are out there providing hope for the Australian people. This is an incredibly challenging time right around the world. There is a pandemic. With regard to lists of announcements, they are lists of investments. They are investments in our country. They are investments in lots of areas, including for those representatives from the opposition. To get onto retirees and economic management I think is pretty dangerous ground for those opposite. It is incredibly dangerous ground. I think the retirees around this country very clearly remember what happened at the last election and what was promised from those opposite in terms of an attack on their retirement savings and investments. The other point I would like to make, though, is around downloading the app, ensuring you keep your distance and you wash your hands—that continues to be very good health advice. We need to ensure that all Australians do abide by those basic hygiene requirements, because it does make a difference. It makes an actual difference to what happens around this country in terms of the pandemic and its effects on people, particularly around community transmission. The pandemic has been a very confronting challenge for all Australians, and of course we are concerned about the impact on individuals and the economy. But, on this side of the parliament, we continue to support not only business but individuals, and we do that through assistance measures like the JobKeeper payment, a wage subsidy to support business and not-for-profits and one which is providing support to some 3½ million Australians right around the country and right now. We are looking to ensure that cash flow is available so that businesses can pay their bills and wages. We've provided temporary cash flow payments of up to $100,000 that are available to keep eligible small and medium businesses operating, paying their bills and retaining staff. There are wage subsidies for apprentices and trainees. Apprentices and trainees find it incredibly difficult. They are on lower wages than adult wages, in the majority. They are usually in businesses which tend to be small businesses, which find it very difficult in the current environment. That's why it's so important that we continue to provide those subsidies to businesses that have apprentices and trainees that keep them connected to those businesses so that they can continue training, complete their apprenticeship or traineeship, come out the other side and add their skills to the Australian economy. The list goes on. Ten minutes simply won't be enough to cover all of it. A time-limited asset write-off of $30,000 to $150,000 for businesses with an aggregated annual turnover of less than $500 million—what does that actually mean? It means that an individual business that invests in a new piece of equipment can write that off, 100 per cent, in the year of purchase. I come from business. I ran a small business for 10 or 12 years, depending on whether you consider it the family farm, a consulting business or a training business. Can I tell you the enormous difference the capacity to write down 100 per cent of the purchase cost of an asset in the year that you purchased it would have made to me in the operations that I had. With credit and loans under the Coronavirus SME Guarantee Scheme, we are providing a guarantee of 50 per cent to SME lenders to support new short-term unsecured loans to SMEs. We're supporting the regional economy. We're supporting regional Australians through a $1 billion fund set aside to support communities, regions and industries that have been most significantly affected. Mr Deputy Speaker O'Brien, I know you're incredibly interested in the tourism sector. What does it mean for regional tourism? A $715 million package to assist our airline industry means bums on seats. It means individuals moving to other parts of the country who potentially stay in hotels, visit and go into those domestic regions where they can build on the economy. In recent weeks I've been throughout the north—I've been in the Territory, Far North Queensland and western Queensland—and I know there are some areas where it is incredibly challenging. Those areas which are almost completely reliant on international tourism are doing it very, very tough—Cairns, in particular. It's an incredibly difficult period of time for business in Cairns. What I know is that they're resilient and they're looking for new opportunities to expand and ensure that they can diversify their economy. That includes going further into resources, further into agriculture, and we will continue to support them to do that. That's why it's important that this billion-dollar fund continues to be rolled out. We are supporting hardworking Australians throughout the pandemic. It's not just the hardworking Australians, I have to say. Those opposite want to make merry about our pensioners, those who have retired and contributed to the Australian economy for their entire working lives. There are some challenges for them, as there are for all of us. That's why we've provided two $750 economic support payments for eligible pensioners, seniors, carers and students. It's made an enormous difference to their life, lifestyle and what they can do in their local regions. It's not just across the board. We are looking to support individual economies. As good local members, when you get the opportunity on your feet, you should always talk about your local electorate and what we're doing for them. In my local electorate, everything hinges on the Hinkler Regional Deal: over $170 million of Commonwealth investment, combined with support from the local government and some support from the Labor state government, who were dragged kicking and screaming to the deal. They never signed but have supported some roads projects, which is very positive. We are delivering on the ground $9.2 million to redevelop the Hervey Bay Airport. That work is currently underway. That means that in my local economy there are jobs being delivered with support from the Commonwealth. There are a number of other stages to come afterwards. There is $7.7 million to extend the Urraween Road through to Boundary Road and Hervey Bay. That doesn't sound like much in parliament to the individuals who are in here and have never heard of Urraween Road and Boundary Road, but this is an interconnector in Hervey Bay and means we can split that cross-flow and ensure, in particular, that emergency vehicles can get to the Hervey Bay Hospital through this new connecting road. It is a long-awaited construction—more than two decades, 20 years. The total investment is $21.7 million between the Commonwealth and local government, the Fraser Coast Regional Council. There is $7 million for a palliative care facility at Hervey Bay—Woollam Constructions has been appointed to lead the eight-month build. That'll be underway very soon. They're going out to contractors right now to deliver that facility. That is good news for those individuals who find themselves in incredibly difficult circumstances towards the end of their natural lives, and I'm very pleased that that is available. There's $4 million towards overtaking lanes on the Isis Highway, which should go out to contract later in the year, and $40 million for the redevelopment of the Hervey Bay CBD, working closely again with Fraser Coast Regional Council. But we continue to wait for the Queensland Labor government to make further commitments to jobs. Mr Deputy Speaker, I know you'll be surprised at this. We are actually funding some of these projects 100 per cent—not 50, not 75, not 80, but 100 per cent. Yet the Queensland government still won't deliver these projects. The one in particular that I want to talk about is down at the Bundaberg port, where we have put forward $10 million. Sugar Terminals Ltd has put up the remaining $2.3 million. The project is ready, the project's business case is completed, the design is done. What are we waiting for? We're waiting on approval from the owner of the port, which is the Queensland Labor government. So at a time of a pandemic, at a time when jobs are at an absolute premium, at a time when the Commonwealth continues to invest in regional Australia, at a time when the Commonwealth continues to put up the money—right now, 100 per cent funded—we have Premier Palaszczuk and the Queensland Labor government again holding up jobs in regional areas. I would say to them: it's not that hard; just approve the project. There are many other projects that are waiting for this connecting infrastructure to be done. It is a conveyor that can be utilised by other companies at the port facility. It will mean an increase in utilisation. It is very, very straightforward. All they have to do is approve it. I say again to the Queensland Labor government: stop standing in the way of jobs, stop standing in the way of projects, stop standing in the way of regions; get out of our way and let us get on with our economy. Once again, we'd be very pleased to see them approve the project. 15:36 Mr CLARE HWL Blaxland This government is great at slogans. They're really good at making up slogans. If they were an advertising company, they'd be a roaring success. But that's not what government is about. Ultimately, people judge us here on what we deliver. And this government is hopeless at delivery. The most tragic example of that is what's happening right now in aged care. There was a great announcement in one of the main committee rooms here in Parliament House back in May setting out a plan to keep aged -are residents safe. And what's happened since? If there was a plan it was a pretty awful one, because it didn't keep residents safe. As we stand here today, more than 450 aged-care residents are dead. I can't think of a more serious failure to deliver than that. But it's not the only one. There are lots of examples. Think about the press conference announcing the COVIDSafe app. This was our licence to get out of the house. The Prime Minister said it was 'sunscreen that you can put on and it would make you safe'. It had all this promise, and we all signed up. Millions of Australians bought into the idea. We said, 'We'll do it,' and we assumed that, if we did do it, the app would keep us safe—that it would help to trace down people who had the virus and stop the sort of second wave that we're seeing across Victoria now. How many people do you think the app has traced? How many people do you think the app has uncovered? Fourteen. It was a $2 million investment. Millions of Australians downloaded that app, and it has only found 14 people with the virus. This government is great at the slogan but hopeless at the delivery. It was the same with the arts announcement. Remember the big press conference with Guy Sebastian? There was $250 million to help the arts sector. How much money do you reckon has been spent so far helping out the arts industry? Zero. It was the same problem with the bushfires. There was more focus on the PR and not enough focus on the problem. The Facebook ad went out before the Army got out. We found out today in the contribution by the member for Watson. He referred to the $650 million bushfire recovery package. How much of that do you think has been spent? It was announced in May, and we found out this week that only 1½ per cent of that money has gone out to bushfire communities. It was announced in May and it is now September. Another terrible example is superannuation. There was a big promise before the election to keep it, and now they are walking away from that at 100 miles an hour. I tell you what, this will hang around this government's neck like an albatross. Everyone here gets 15.4 per cent super—and this government says 9½ per cent is good enough for everyone else! The Prime Minister gets 84 grand a year in superannuation. The Treasurer gets 60 grand a year in superannuation. All the Australian people are asking for—all we're asking for here—is a couple of hundred extra bucks for people in their superannuation every year. This government says, 'No, we can't afford that.' That's just plain mean, plain unfair. It's another example of a broken promise and failure to deliver. The final beauty is HomeBuilder. It was announced three months ago and it took 2½ months before people could even apply. The Declaration of Independence took less than a month to draft, amend and pass. This took 2½ months just to draft an online application form. We had the minister boasting today that 3½ thousand people have applied and, apparently, that's going to save hundreds of thousands of jobs. Do you remember 'renovation rescue'? You could renovate your house. It turns out there was a little bit of a hitch: you had to spend more than 150 grand. Expensive dunny! We find out now from Treasury that, as of the middle of August, only 39 people have applied for that grant. This government is great at slogans, but slogans don't create jobs, slogans don't save jobs and slogans don't pay the bills. This government is slowly being found out here, because we've got a million people unemployed. Another 400,000 people are expected to lose their jobs by Christmas. Tomorrow we're going to be officially told we're in recession. Recession means pain, pain for millions of Australians around this country. We need a bit less time on slogans and a bit more focus on fixing them, because Australians at the moment are saying to this government: 'Where the bloody hell are you?' 15:41 Dr GILLESPIE 72184 Lyne I rise to refute a lot of the intent of this MPI. As if we haven't delivered on things that are incredibly important to people, have the opposition been hiding with eyes wide shut? We have delivered JobKeeper and JobSeeker, the biggest wage support that any Australian Commonwealth government has ever initiated. We have delivered on our promise to support child care during the immediate period. It was made free for people. There is still support for child care coming through. There are initiatives that we have already delivered for small businesses, particularly those with apprentices, because we know we need to build our skill base. Nothing would be worse than to lose those people in apprenticeships, because they'll be the 'skill deliverers' of the future. We've helped many businesses through the tax changes, in improving cash flow for small and large businesses. We have also underwritten unsecured loans, to the tune of 50 per cent of the loan, to try and help small businesses where, even though they are getting JobKeeper or a benefit out of an improved cash flow initiative, their PAYE retained tax from their employees gets recycled into their business, to help keep people employed. We have delivered so much. The most critical services people have delivered are in the health portfolio. You've got to realise the length and breadth of the response—it is mind-blowing, what has been achieved in the health portfolio. In the first instance, we've been building hospital capacity, by negotiating with private and public hospitals, and increasing ICU and ventilator capacity. While there was a global race to get hold of personal protective equipment, we've built up our national medical stockpile of personal protective equipment. We've set up GP respiratory-led clinics. We've given extra money to the states for a large proportion of the extra costs, because of the COVID-19 pandemic. We have funded extra money into research, through the Medical Research Future Fund. We have announced an aged-care pandemic response plan. As to what the people on the other side are trying to make out: there was community spread of the disease, and, sadly, a few institutions got it. As we've seen around the world, with lots of elderly, frail people in close quarters, if the community spread gets in there it can have dire consequences. But you have to keep it in perspective. There has been financial support for the aged-care industry, starting back in March. Just two days ago, we announced another extra tranche of support, another $563 million, including support for those at home who have left aged care to go back to a home-care situation. There are further tranches of support for workforce retention. There's support for aged-care workers, particularly available to the Victorian situation. That's another $1½ billion. The mental health response pandemic plan has rolled out, with extra work for frontline health workers, for older people, for carers of those with mental illness, for Indigenous people, for people in the national disability scheme. We've set up—particularly again because of the problem in Victoria—a mental health task force with 15 more mental health clinics in both metropolitan and regional Victoria. We've increased funding for existing services in the digital space and also extended funding for headspace. Wherever you look, there has been support. We have tried to stimulate the economy in regional areas with our response, through local governments, getting the infrastructure rolling, to keep people in employment. But the big support through JobKeeper, JobSeeker, tax flow— (Time expired) 15:46 Ms CHESTERS 249710 Bendigo The previous speakers on the government side have completely missed the point of this MPI. All they've done is stand here and reiterate lots of glossy government announcements. We acknowledge that this government has made big glossy announcements. There wasn't a photo op the Prime Minister wouldn't attend. There wasn't a vest or a hard hat he wouldn't put on. There wasn't a worker he wouldn't stand next to. But they've failed to deliver. So standing here and repeating announcements not yet delivered misses the entire point of this debate. This is a government that gets a gold star in announcements, and fails—fails to deliver, at a time in Australia's history when we need a government that delivers, a government that does the work and does what it says it'll do. Talk about JobKeeper: this government had to be dragged, kicking and screaming, to a wage subsidy model. The restrictions had already been in place. Workers had been stood down. The hardest day of employers' lives, they'll tell you, were when they had to shut their businesses on the Thursday. They were closed. It wasn't until the following week that this government even made an announcement about JobKeeper, and they had to be dragged to it. On that announcement of JobKeeper: they grossly overestimated how many workers they would help; they excluded people who work in universities; they excluded casuals; they excluded people who work in the airline industry—and the list continues, not to mention how they failed to deliver what they'd committed to businesses. One particular measure which they outed themselves on in today's question time was that they committed $40 billion in loans to help small businesses survive, yet have delivered less than five per cent of that. The whole point of this funding was to help people in the early days of the pandemic. We are now in September. Businesses needed this support in March, April, May, June, July and August. You are behind in your delivery program. And why? Because you've already announced it, so you don't really care. It demonstrates a government that cares more about the announcement, more about the headlines and more about the evening news than about the actual community and economy and the people they claim to represent. Child care is one of the biggest failures of this government, in an area where the minister doesn't even know what's going on and with a Prime Minister who just makes it up as he goes along. They first extended JobKeeper to early childhood education, and it did help keep some people in that area. Then when the restrictions came back on in Victoria they cut JobKeeper. They kicked all the early childhood educators off JobKeeper. Then we started to hear that workers in the sector were being stood down. The government came out and guaranteed no worker would be stood down. Maybe they should pick up the phone and speak to early childhood educators in Victoria, because far too many have lost their jobs, far too many have had a significant loss in pay and loss in hours, yet this government won't talk to them. It's not a headline. This government has drastically failed with what is going on in aged care. They are up here trying to defend the indefensible. They've said they've made all these announcements, yet when I talk to people in my electorate about what's happening in aged care there's a big gap between what the government is saying and what's happening on the ground, particularly with the workforce. I want to acknowledge the hard workers, the people who are working in aged care, working back-to-back shifts, working seven-day rosters, to try and make sure that their facilities stay safe and that residents are protected. Not many of them have seen the retention bonuses that the government boasts about. Not many of them have seen the extra payments so they work in one facility—not many employers have actually applied for it, because it was so complicated or because they didn't technically qualify for it. Yet the government will stand here and claim, 'We've got a plan; it's under control,' when it is so grossly not true. It's not what's happening on the ground. It's not just what's been happening during the pandemic where this government has failed. It happened prior to the pandemic. It is what this government does. Prior to the pandemic they announced this great new fund for female-friendly change facilities to be built across regional Australia. Yet we discovered later that most of the money has been spent on pools, and even pools in northern Sydney—not really regional Australia. This government has failed. They announce big but deliver little. 15:51 Dr ALLEN 282986 Higgins Having listened to the member opposite speak, I don't know what planet she's on, because this country can be incredibly proud of what it has achieved. It has achieved the most incredible international outcomes, whether it is one of the lowest case rates in the world, meaning the lowest number of cases of COVID; one of the lowest fatality rates in the world, including in aged care; one of the lowest hits to our GDP or one of the lowest unemployment rates as a result of COVID. If we ask, 'What are the big issues that are important with regard to the last six months?' I think most Australians, if not all Australians, would say dealing with the health consequences of COVID, followed by the economic consequences of COVID. If we look at this MPI, which is about the failure of the government to deliver on its announcements in areas of critical importance, what is more critical, what is more important, than saving lives and livelihoods? If we look at the outcomes of those, we are absolutely doing a fantastic job as a country, and that is because the federal government has the trust of the public. They understand that we care about the health implications of this COVID crisis, and making the tough decisions to keep us all healthy, but then the economic implications. When this pandemic first started it was like there was a crisis of unknown proportions coming at us at speed. So you can imagine that there were huge numbers of decisions that had to be made. For a federal government to make such a huge number of critical decisions in such a short period of time is absolutely extraordinary. It's absolutely extraordinary that they've been made so swiftly, so effectively and to the benefit of so many Australians. The government's decisive actions have resulted in what is regarded as one of the most remarkable economic programs of support in the world, and that is JobKeeper. I haven't heard a single person say that JobKeeper isn't a wonderful economic support program. We now know that there are over 900,000 businesses, in fact almost a million businesses, around Australia that are benefitting from JobKeeper, and that includes 3.5 million employees in Australia who are receiving JobKeeper to help them to have a livelihood, to help them to get through this incredible crisis. For those who don't have JobKeeper there is JobSeeker. JobSeeker has been almost doubled to about $1,150 per fortnight with the introduction of the coronavirus supplement over the last six months, and that's now been extended to December 2020 at a rate of $250 per fortnight in addition to the underlying supplement. I've had so many locals call me and say, 'Our business was going to collapse without the support of JobKeeper.' Cafes, restaurants, retail and flight services—you name it—have been so relieved that they've had this temporary targeted support to get them through the tough times. But, unless we have dealt with the health consequences, we are not able to deal with the economic consequences, and we can see that happening in Victoria, because unfortunately the Victorian Labor government hasn't delivered on the health promises that we need in order to ensure that we can have good economic outcomes. That is really concerning because we know that at the national cabinet level we've had a very good Australian approach to how to deal with the COVID response, but unfortunately Victoria has let the side down. Unfortunately, the quarantining hotel fiasco, followed by a poor effort with regard to the COVID tracking and tracing and not using the COVIDSafe app, has resulted in an outbreak of community proportions that has put huge amounts of pressure onto our systems, particularly our aged-care systems, because, as everybody knows, this COVID, unfortunately, unfairly, targets those who are older Australians. But I do think it is worth mentioning that, despite this, the fatality rate in Australia in the aged-care sector is amongst the lowest in the world, if not the lowest in the world, with around a 0.1 per cent fatality rate. That compares to the fatality rate in the Canadian aged-care sector, which is 15 times higher; the rates in the Irish and Italian aged-care sectors, which are 30 times higher; or the rate in the UK sector, which is 53 times higher. What is quite incredible is that the fatality rate is so low in Australia. Absolutely every death is a tragedy. We are really very, very sad and deeply grieved about anyone who has died from COVID during this terrible, terrible pandemic. But in fact it is the actual response that stopped that. (Time expired) 15:57 Mr KHALIL 101351 Wills [by video link] If there was ever a better example of a government overpromising and underdelivering, I'd like to know, because the fact is that the Morrison government is all talk and no walk. It's all credit taking and no responsibility taking. It's all photo op and no follow-up. The member for Watson mentioned this government's propensity for marketing. It's as if we've been stuck in a perpetual marketing conference for seven years. We've had Mad Men on reruns for seven years. It would be laughable if it were not for the serious and terrible impacts on Australian lives because of their abject failure to deliver on their empty announcements. The Prime Minister takes all the credit for the good work of state premiers and territory chief ministers through the national cabinet, but, when the heat is on and mistakes are made, he goes into hiding or, worse, takes a swipe at them. He's made all these promises. He's announced this program and that program. There are all these announcements coming, but in the end the effect is that people are always left behind. People are always left out. Workers are left behind. Businesses are left behind. Just on the JobKeeper, they said they would support six million Australians. The real figure was three million. They said they would inject $130 billion into the economy. Then they revealed the stuff-up of the $60 billion shortfall, the biggest budget error in Australian history. They say they've injected $314 billion worth of stimulus into the economy, but how much have they actually spent? A fraction of that number. Small businesses are so important to our economic activity. They contribute to over a third of our economic activity, keeping millions of Australians in jobs, and they are responsible for paying wages to more than half of our workforce. Not enough is being done to support small businesses who need it most. The Morrison government has had this lack of urgency. It has left gaps in support and has not gone far enough in protecting small businesses. Labor called for a wage subsidy at the start of this pandemic, and Prime Minister Morrison resisted these calls, saying that it would be too technically difficult to implement, only to be dragged kicking and screaming to that decision by the union movement, by Labor, by the premiers and presumably by watching Prime Minister Johnson put a wage subsidy in place in the UK. He announced it a few weeks later. The effect of this delay is that support for small businesses came too late, and too many otherwise viable businesses have found themselves on the brink of collapse. We have heard from sole traders. They cannot qualify for the federal government's cash flow boost. The cash flow boost is aimed at small and medium-sized businesses, and it goes only to those businesses employing people. Sole traders are left out. Small businesses rely on casual workers. They have been left out—over a million Australians who are casual workers. This has hit small businesses hard. I've heard from local businesses in my electorate of Wills about how much this has hurt them. We're all doing our bit to support small businesses across Australia. The government needs fewer empty announcements and more substance for small businesses. Even in the arts, we've seen the emptiness of the announcements—standing alongside some pop singer or whatever and announcing $250 million in funding for the arts. It took the government a hundred days to do something, because they stubbornly insisted there was no problem. Of course, that package itself is partly made up of commercial-level loans. They made a separate announcement for the screen sector, and it turned out that even the production company that they used for that announcement wasn't eligible for funding. So the PM stages a photo op and then even fails to actually deliver for the people that he used in his own photo op. It's remarkable. To quote the great man former Prime Minister Paul Keating, Prime Minister Morrison is all tip and no iceberg. This government is all smoke and mirrors, hoping that Australians won't notice the shallowness of the photo ops and the shallowness of the empty announcements, hoping that Australians won't figure it out. But they will. They will catch up with you, Prime Minister, because Australians can smell a fake a mile away. 16:02 Mr TIM WILSON IMW Goldstein I want to start by thanking the member for Wills for that disjointed contribution. I always admire somebody in 2020 quoting a prime minister dating back to 1993 because they're relevant. As the Assistant Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and Financial Technology made the point, he's been exhumed from the crypt in Potts Point over the past 48 hours in a Zegna suit and a Ferragamo tie, but that doesn't— Mr Khalil 101351 He still looks better than you! Mr TIM WILSON IMW That was an interjection online! The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265991 We can disconnect you, Member for Wills. Mr TIM WILSON IMW Charming! I'd like to thank the member for Wills for that disjoined contribution. Mr Giles interjecting— The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265991 The member for Scullin is suggesting permanently! Mr TIM WILSON IMW Let's face it, despite the attempts by the member for Wills to criticise the government in his own little way, everybody across Australia right now knows the enormous challenges that all of us are facing. It doesn't matter where you are or who you are; there are Australians who are doing it tough because, for the first time in their adult lives, they've found themselves underemployed or unemployed. We know that there are self-funded retirees who are struggling to make ends meet. We know that there are pensioners who can't go out and see their families. There is a sense of isolation. There are schoolkids who have to learn from home. There are parents struggling to balance childcare responsibilities and raising their children while working online. Even the member for Wills has had to demonstrate that. At every point, what this government has done is provided the systems and the framework to aid and assist people so they don't fall through the cracks. Yes, we've had the JobKeeper wage subsidy, which made sure that employers could keep people on the books and put themselves in the best position to transition and reboot the economy when we get out, particularly when the Victorian wave ends and people are able to get back on their feet. Yes, we've got the JobSeeker boost and some extra payments for those people who found themselves unexpectedly unemployed. Yes, we've provided support to child care so that, where child care is available and assistance can be provided, we can aid and assist parents. Yes, we've provided half a billion dollars to mental health support and assistance, because we know—and I know this firsthand—that many Australian families, and Victorian families in particular, are struggling with mental health. I hope the member for Wills understands that, as well, in his engagement with his community. Stress and anxiety have, sadly, become a large part of people's daily lives. I was recently on a tele town hall with the Prime Minister and the Goldstein electorate, and, during it, Alison spoke of the concern she had for the daughter of one of her friends who, sadly, was at risk of suicide, and we made sure that she got follow-up support and assistance to address those mental health concerns. But it's not just at that extreme level; it's also at a more ongoing, daily level for many people—the stress and anxiety of keeping your business afloat, the stress and anxiety of not knowing what's coming next, the stress and anxiety about whether we're going to continue to have lockdowns. That's why this government has adapted, at every stage, to address it. Now, I recognise nothing short of perfection will ever do for the opposition. They will always set the bar at a level that no-one can meet except them, even though there are practical realities which mean they wouldn't be able to do it either if they were in government. But, because we went into this crisis with a strong budget, because we were prudent and responsible in the good years, we were in a position to be generous when times got tough and we were able to transform so many public services to help Australians in their time of need. There are many people who now can't even leave their homes—and, again I stress, people in Victoria. So what do we have? Telehealth services that were resisted for many years by different sectors of the communities were available within days, thanks to the health minister. The generosity of the support that was able to be provided was because of the efforts of the Treasurer and the Prime Minister. At every point, this government has focused on what Australians need to get through this stage so that we as a country can be in the best position to rebuild. (Time expired) 16:07 Ms COKER 263547 Corangamite [by video link] This is a government that promises the world but does not deliver. We are in the midst of a deep recession, a public health emergency and, in Victoria, in my state, a lockdown. People here in my community need help. They need leadership and they need a federal government that gets on with the job. Instead, this government continues to leave many Australians behind: aged-care workers, early years educators, workers in the university sector, casual workers, workers in the arts—and the list goes on. Months ago, the Prime Minister got up and announced the JobKeeper program. He claimed JobKeeper would support six million Australians, but the real figure was actually three million. Three million Australians missed out on support—a $60 billion stuff-up, the biggest budget error in Australian history, and one that has had devastating impacts on my community. We were told by this government that the economy would come roaring back and everything would be fine at the end of the six-month hibernation. Instead, in my electorate of Corangamite, many businesses are struggling to keep the doors open. Our small towns along the Great Ocean Road and the Bellarine Peninsula, which rely on tourism to survive, are suffering; and many small businesses, from the iconic Apollo Bay Bakery to the wonderful Great Ocean Road Chocolaterie & Ice Creamery, are only just holding on. We need to stop pretending that JobKeeper, JobMaker and 'job-candlestick-maker' programs are a comprehensive plan for jobs. They're not. What we need is a plan to help our economy get through this crisis—a plan for the future. We need paid pandemic leave; better support for casual workers, who are doing it tough; and more help for businesses to keep people employed. Nowhere is this more evident than in our childcare sector. The education minister declared 'Job done!' in June, when he announced a snapback to the old childcare system and ripped JobKeeper from the sector. The Prime Minister guaranteed early educators wouldn't lose their jobs in Victoria without JobKeeper. Well, that's not what's happening in my community. Two weeks ago I spoke to a local childcare educator who wished to remain anonymous, out of fear she would lose her job. But she was stood down last Tuesday, with no pay. She will not receive any government support. She will have no choice but to apply to Centrelink to survive. In her own words, 'This government has let me down.' She is just one of many workers in my community who have spoken to me about just how much damage this government has done to the childcare sector recently. These early-years educators are frontline workers. They're losing their jobs and their hours of work, and they feel forgotten by this government. The journey for these workers has been brutal. The government needs to wake up and it needs to start delivering for these workers. Nowhere is the government's total failure to deliver for Australians more evident than in aged care. What is happening in our aged-care homes is a national tragedy. The Prime Minister has boasted about the number of announcements the government have made in aged care, but they've failed to deliver the policies and resources our aged-care sector needs to survive this pandemic. Here in Victoria, older Australians in aged care are sick and dying. The government promised an effective surge workforce but didn't deliver. They promised PPE for all aged-care workers, but many of them continue to miss out. The government have also continued to leave more than 100,000 older Australians on the waiting list for homecare packages. This is a government led by a Prime Minister who is always there for the photo op but never there for the follow-up, and a cabinet that is more interested in headlines than actually helping people. The failure of this government to deliver on its announcements is hurting my community of Corangamite. It's time for the government to get on with the job. 16:11 Mr GOODENOUGH 74046 Moore I have listened to the various contributions of members opposite. When it comes to the areas of critical importance to all Australians, the Morrison government has been characterised by steady achievement and delivery, with a solid track record. Through sound economic policies and a series of free trade agreements with our international trading partners, the government has delivered growth and export income from the mining and energy sectors, creating thousands of new jobs. By maintaining strong fiscal discipline and spending restraint, our government has been able to strengthen the nation's finances, to be able to respond to national disasters, domestic emergencies and international shocks. These events have included the drought, the bushfire emergency and the global COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. The Morrison government has been in a position to provide an economic stimulus and welfare safety net to individual Australians and businesses unparalleled in the world. Meanwhile, our government has continued to keep taxes low and inflation under control. A low-inflation environment helps keep interest rates low, maintaining housing affordability for millions of Australian households and families paying off mortgages on their homes and small-business loans. The government has been cognisant of the increasing cost-of-living pressures faced by Australian families, our key constituency, who are experiencing a reduction in their disposable income, with reduced spending power. Recognising the financial pressure on households, our government is pursuing policies which minimise increases in the cost of fuel, electricity, gas and utilities. Labor's zero net emissions by 2050 target is unrealistic and will drive up costs and make our industry less competitive. Investment in infrastructure has been one of the hallmarks of the Morrison government, with a commitment to delivering $100 billion in infrastructure over 10 years, including roads, bridges, rail and buildings. This long-term transport infrastructure commitment will support job retention and growth, simultaneously assisting the economy in an effort to suppress the impacts of COVID-19. Around my electorate of Moore, the government is delivering the Mitchell Freeway extension to Alkimos, the northern suburbs railway extension to Yanchep, grade-separated bridges at Wanneroo Road and the expansion of the Joondalup hospital. In terms of health care, which is of critical importance to all Australians, the Medicare system has been enhanced. Subsidised access has been expanded to include new medications under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and also to a wider range of imaging and diagnostic services, pharmaceutical benefits, telehealth and professional consultations. For instance, recently subsidised access to medical devices such as continuous glucose monitors for diabetics has been expanded to cover a wider range of eligible patients. By continuing to provide an appropriate level of resourcing to the Department of Home Affairs, the Morrison government is ensuring our national security, in particular, by intercepting the smuggling of illicit drugs, weapons, contraband and prohibited imports at the border before they enter our country to be distributed through organised criminal networks and cause harm on our streets. I draw the attention of honourable members to the success stories of the Australian Border Force and the Royal Australian Navy intercepting shipments of illicit drugs destined for our communities. Similarly, strict enforcement of visas by persons entering Australia ensures the integrity of our immigration system and preserves our national security. Under the coalition government, defence spending has increased to beyond two per cent of gross domestic product to ensure that the Australian Defence Force has the necessary resources and operational capability to protect Australia's national interests within our geopolitical region at a time when many of the emerging nations in our region are expending a significantly greater proportion of their GDP on expanding their military. Australia's playing a key role in maintaining the security of our region by protecting key freight, trading and energy routes. The government is investing in our domestic defence industry and upgrading our defence bases across Australia and in the acquisition of vessels, equipment, armaments, technology the training of military personnel. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 203092 The honourable member's time has expired, and the time for discussion has concluded. BILLS 42 BILLS Coronavirus Economic Response Package (Jobkeeper Payments) Amendment Bill 2020 42

Coronavirus Economic Response Package (Jobkeeper Payments) Amendment Bill 2020

Consideration of Senate Message 42 16:17 Mr SUKKAR 242515 Deakin I move: That the amendments be agreed to. 16:17 Mr ALBANESE R36 Grayndler As members would be aware, Labor argued from the very beginning of this crisis that wage subsidies were an essential component of a response to keep people in employment, that what we needed was to keep the relationship between workers and their employer intact. That's why we argued for it when parliament first met and considered what changes would be required. People would remember that JobSeeker was the first response from the government. What they did was send out this message to Australian businesses that, if people missed out and were laid off, they'd get increased income support. Australian businesses got that message. What we saw was Centrelink queues form. Only then, after hundreds of thousands of Australians lost their jobs needlessly, did the government change its position on wage subsidies. The reason we have to discuss the bill before us today, the Coronavirus Economic Response Package (Jobkeeper Payments) Amendment Bill 2020, is that the government were reluctant; they were dragged kicking and screaming to it. They said, 'Oh, it'll only last until September.' We would snap back, and all support would be withdrawn. In spite of the fact that we had issues with some of JobKeeper and its implementation—the fact that some people were left behind and left out and the fact that other people were paid more than they were paid prior to the pandemic—we voted for it. We were responsible, unlike those opposite during the global financial crisis. We didn't think it was necessary for the Treasurer to make a $60 billion bungle and we pointed that out when that happened: the biggest fiscal mistake in Australian history. We were also, of course, very concerned that we had now entered into the first recession in 30 years, and the gap between the government announcement and delivery is there for all to see right across the board. Today we asked the question about the $314 billion economic support that the government says they have, and the Treasurer outlined $85 billion in support—a big gap, $85 billion or $314 billion; it's a very different scenario. Now, with the amendments that were rejected by the government, we have a circumstance of another anomaly that they know they are entrenching, which is that workers will be better off if they work for companies that are doing worse during this recession. Figure that out. If you're working for a company that is in decline, you will still be eligible to receive JobKeeper. But, if you work for a company that has lost JobKeeper, a company that has seen a 10 per cent decline in its revenue, then that business will be able to put people down from working five days a week to three days a week. A young hospitality worker who has two of their days cut could see their income fall from $753 to just over $450 a week. That is $150 less than they would receive if their employer had access to JobKeeper. This makes no sense. We raise this in good faith. I raised this with the Prime Minister. I talked with the minister about it. The response we got was: 'Oh no, we're comfortable.' I bet they are. But what we see is ideology come through—not missing an opportunity to attack industrial relations and not missing an opportunity to attack superannuation and the previous commitments which have been given. It's a retreat back to the old right-wing conservative frame of mind. They're so uncomfortable with the idea of government support, which is so necessary during a recession, that they have an irrational opposition to what was a very sensible proposition put forward in good faith in the spirit of 'We're all in this together.' When workers are worse off and paid less, it will be completely on this government, which is consciously making the decision to pay people less than they would earn if they were on JobKeeper. 16:23 Mr BURKE DYW Watson The amendments before us are amendments that the government had to put into the Senate because they rushed the legislation and got something fundamentally wrong. They're amendments to deal with accountants. They were asking accountants to fulfil particular obligations, particular certificates to be issued, which in the view of accountants they were not qualified to do and would not be capable of doing without conducting a full audit. This would then put an incredible cost on businesses at the exact time that they're asking for assistance. It's not surprising that that sort of mistake is being made. We were given the legislation at the beginning of last week. It was introduced to the House and went through in a day, but it didn't take long for us to notice the need for a different amendment. In fact, as soon as it was presented and we saw the 60 per cent what they call 'floor' on reduction of hours, we thought, 'Hang on, how will this work for someone on a low wage?' If you're on a high wage and you go down to 60 per cent of what you are on, you're still well above the JobKeeper rate. But we've decided during this crisis that there's a minimum wage that people should not fall below. That's what the JobKeeper and JobSeeker supplements are about. That's a decision that the parliament's made. And now the parliament has decided that there is a group that will be excluded from that minimum level of pay rate, and it's the lowest-paid workers in the country. Up until now, when they have been on JobKeeper—if you are on the minimum wage, $753.80 a week. It is not a lot to live on. But with JobKeeper there it meant your pay could only go down by $3.80 a week. Now it can go down by $300 a week. So, up until now in the crisis, for full-timers who thought they had the security of a full-time job, the decision of the parliament in providing a safety net for them meant that they could only take a $3.80-a-week pay cut. Now, with the reduction in hours, they can lose $300 a week. That's a lousy thing to do and that's why we presumed it was an error, because the legislation was being rushed. Yet we find ourselves now, having approached it in good faith—I've got to say, we offered pretty conciliatory speeches last week when we were asking the government to fix this. We have different styles of speeches, but those was well and truly on the conciliatory end because we presumed enough goodwill that the government would not be deliberately creating a circumstance where the government decides these businesses are no longer worth supporting. But it transfers the obligation to the Australians who are least able to carry a further financial hit and says, 'Well, they can now take a financial hit to the tune of $300.' The government uses the argument: 'This is the way to keep them in a job.' It's the same argument that gets used in the United States against having minimum wages at all. You can always argue, 'Lower the safety net, and people will keep jobs,' but people will be impoverished too. So we end up, after the debate that happened late last night in the Senate, with this circumstance. Two sets of problems had been raised with the government: a set of problems that was going to hurt low-wage Australians and another set of problems that was going to hurt accountants. The government decided one of those two causes had merit. We don't object to the stuff-up on accountants in the legislation being fixed, and we certainly are not going to stand in the way of the extension of JobKeeper; we called for a wage subsidy. But the reality of what the government has done right now—I don't think this moment can pass without it being squarely understood. Accountants said this legislation would cause significant problems for them, and the government fixed it. Working Australians said, 'This legislation will cut our take-home pay', and the government pushed it through. It teamed up with One Nation in the Senate and pushed it through. Out of this, there will still be a whole lot of people who get wage subsidies—and that's good; that's why we fought for it. But make no mistake: out of this, there will now be some employees who thought they had a full-time job who will lose the capacity to have control of it only being by mutual agreement. A $300 pay cut is real as a result of the behaviour of this government. Question agreed to. COMMITTEES 44 COMMITTEES Intelligence and Security Joint Committee 44 Report 44 16:28 Mr LEESER 109556 Berowra On behalf of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, I present the committee's advisory report, incorporating a dissenting report, on the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Cessation) Bill 2019. Report made a parliamentary paper in accordance with standing order 39(e). Mr LEESER 109556 by leave—I am pleased to present the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security's advisory report on the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Cessation) Bill 2019. This vital reform will be undertaken through the bill, which the committee reviewed in tandem with the statutory review. When introducing the bill, the Minister for Home Affairs, the Hon. Peter Dutton, said: The Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Cessation) Bill 2019 continues the coalition government's effort to address the threat of terrorism and to deliver on our commitment to keep the Australian community safe. It's central reform and it provides for ministerial decision-making with respect to the cessation of Australian citizenship, replacing the current automatic operation of law provisions. Under this model, the Minister for Home Affairs can cease a person's Australian citizenship if satisfied that their conduct demonstrates a repudiation of their allegiance to Australia and that it is not in the public interest for the person to remain an Australian citizen. The committee welcomes the introduction of the ministerial decision-making model and the associated increase in the opportunity for persons affected by citizenship cessation provisions to seek judicial review and, in relation to an ASIO-qualified security assessment, merits review. The committee has recommended that the bill be passed and has made a series of recommendations to amend the bill and explanatory memorandum, which provides for further safeguards. These recommendations are: (1) the explanatory memorandum clarify that the proposed section 36B of the bill require the minister to be reasonably satisfied of the matters listed proposed in subsection 36B(1); (2) the explanatory memorandum of the bill clarify that under the proposed section 36E(2) of the bill the minister must take into account the following matters—the likely effects of citizenship cessation on any dependants of the person whose citizenship the minister is proposing to cancel, a person's connection to Australia, and conduct that would be captured by chapter 8 of the Criminal Code; and (3) a requirement for the PJCIS to commence a review of the bill's functioning three years after the bill's assent. Following the implementation of these recommendations, the committee recommends that the bill be passed. These recommendations are the result of the committee's comprehensive analysis of the bill and are reflective of the seriousness with which both sides of parliament approach citizenship cessation. Citizenship cessation is effectively a form of modern exile, and the committee has ensured that any decision to remove a dual national's Australian citizenship is undertaken with care and with regard to all relevant factors in each individual's case. Some people may ask why this power is necessary. It's true that this is a tough bill, but it's also a necessary bill. If a dual national Australian citizen plans and acts to harm, maim and kill their fellow citizens through acts of terror then we must be prepared to impose costs for such behaviour. The offences for which a dual citizen may lose their citizenship include terrorist activities using explosive or lethal devices, treason, sabotage, espionage, foreign interference and offences associated with the planning, preparation and carrying out of terrorism. The lowest penalty for these offences is 10 years imprisonment, with most attracting imprisonment of 25 years to life. Those who choose the dark path of terrorism reject the gift and responsibilities of Australian citizenship. In answer to this behaviour, the Australian people, through this parliament, provide the ultimate sanction in stripping them of their Australian citizenship. We are a liberal society founded on the values of freedom and community. These are protected and upheld by the law. If some people are so hateful of these things that they use terror and violence to destroy them, then we want no part of them. The Australian people have standards for membership of the community, and this bill upholds those standards when challenged by extremist and violent behaviour. I commend the report to the House. 16:33 Mr DREYFUS HWG Isaacs [by video link] by leave—I'll have a further opportunity to speak about the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Cessation) Bill 2019 when it is brought on for debate, so I'll be brief. The intelligence and security committee has today unanimously welcomed the government's proposal to replace the existing operation of law citizenship loss provisions sections 33AA and 35 of the Australian Citizenship Act 2007 with a new ministerial decision-making model of citizenship cessation. In the course of its inquiry into the operation and effectiveness of the existing terrorism related citizenship loss provisions last year, the committee received concerning evidence from ASIO about the operation of sections 33AA and 35 of the Australian Citizenship Act 2007. Under those provisions, any dual national citizen of Australia loses their Australian citizenship automatically, if they engage in proscribed terrorism-related conduct that repudiates their allegiance to Australia. ASIO told the committee that the fact that those two provisions operate automatically may lead to unintended or unforeseen adverse security outcomes. As ASIO explained: In some instances, citizenship cessation will curtail the range of threat mitigation capabilities available to Australian authorities. It may also have unintended or unforeseen adverse security outcomes—potentially including reducing one manifestation of the terrorist threat while exacerbating another. There may be occasions where the better security outcome would be that citizenship is retained, despite a person meeting the legislative criteria for citizenship cessation—for example, where the Australian Federal Police has criminal charges that could be pursued if the person were to remain an Australian citizen. By contrast, a ministerial decision-making model of citizenship cessation would allow those potential adverse security outcomes to be better managed or avoided completely. As ASIO also told the committee: A ministerial decision-making model of cessation would allow ASIO and other relevant agencies scope to advise against citizenship cessation in circumstances where the outcome would be prejudicial to security or where the security risk could be better managed utilising other options. At present, the current operation of law provision does not provide operational agencies with the flexibility required to utilise citizenship cessation to maximum effect. Like ASIO, the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor found that sections 33AA and 35 of the Australian Citizenship Act operated in an uncontrolled and uncertain manner. In August 2019 the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor recommended that those provisions be repealed urgently and replaced with a ministerial decision-making model of citizenship cessation. Fundamentally, that is what the citizenship cessation bill would do and that is why Labor members support it. But the ministerial decision-making model introduced by the citizenship cessation bill can be improved. For starters, the government has failed, without adequate explanation, to implement a number of the monitor's other key recommendations, such as the monitor's proposal in relation to the availability of merits review. Labor members have tabled a detailed additional comment to the committee's report, setting out our concerns with the bill and our concerns with the committee's report. The committee has made three modest recommendations, none of which would require amendments to the citizenship cessation bill. Labor members urge the government to adopt all three of these very modest recommendations, and in particular recommendation 3, which would give the committee a further opportunity to review the terrorism related citizenship cessation provisions in three years time. In the additional comment, Labor members have urged the government to make a number of significant amendments to the citizenship cessation bill itself, including the implementation of a number of the other key recommendations by the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor. However, given the importance and urgency of repealing and replacing sections 33AA and 35 of the Australian Citizenship Act, Labor members have also stated that the adoption of our suggested amendments is not a condition of our support for the bill. We urge the government to expedite the passage of the citizenship cessation bill, so that two dangerous provisions of the Australian Citizenship Act can be immediately repealed and replaced with a more sensible model of citizenship cessation. MOTIONS 46 MOTIONS Assistant Treasurer 46 16:38 Mr CLARE HWL Blaxland I seek leave to move the following motion: That the House: (1) notes: (a) extensive media reporting the Assistant Treasurer was involved in wide-scale branch stacking; (b) clear evidence the Assistant Treasurer saw and approved plans for electorate staff to engage in branch stacking— Mr Sukkar 242515 I move: That the Member be no longer heard. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 74046 Please continue, Member for Blaxland. Mr CLARE HWL I seek leave to move the following motion: That the House: (1) notes: (a) extensive media reporting the Assistant Treasurer was involved in wide-scale branch stacking; (b) clear evidence the Assistant Treasurer saw and approved plans for electorate staff to engage in branch stacking; (c) reports the Assistant Treasurer used taxpayer money to pay one of his best friends to produce party political material soliciting donations for the Liberal Party; (d) the Assistant Treasurer's conduct breaches both paragraph 4.1 of the Prime Minister's Ministerial Standards and paragraph 2 of the Special Minister of State's Determination; (e) the Prime Minister has failed to take any action against the Assistant Treasurer, who is doing too much branch-stacking and not enough HomeBuilding; and (f) in the middle of the first recession in three decades, the Assistant Treasurer should be focussed on helping the Australian people and doing his job, not helping himself; and (2) calls on the Assistant Treasurer to attend this House and make a statement for a period not exceeding 30 minutes explaining his actions to the Australian people. Leave not granted. Mr CLARE HWL I move: That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent the Member for Blaxland from moving the following motion immediately— That the House: (1) notes: (a) extensive media reporting the Assistant Treasurer was involved in wide-scale branch stacking; (b) clear evidence the Assistant Treasurer saw and approved plans for electorate staff to engage in branch stacking; (c) reports the Assistant Treasurer used taxpayer money to pay one of his best friends to produce party political material soliciting donations for the Liberal Party; (d) the Assistant Treasurer's conduct breaches both paragraph 4.1 of the Prime Minister's Ministerial Standards and paragraph 2 of the Special Minister of State's Determination; (e) the Prime Minister has failed to take any action against the Assistant Treasurer, who is doing too much branch-stacking and not enough HomeBuilding; and (f) in the middle of the first recession in three decades, the Assistant Treasurer should be focussed on helping the Australian people and doing his job, not helping himself; and (2) calls on the Assistant Treasurer to attend this House and make a statement for a period not exceeding 30 minutes explaining his actions to the Australian people. He has a perfect opportunity to see if his defence stacks up— 16:41 Mr SUKKAR 242515 Deakin I move: That the Member be no longer heard. A division having been called and the bells having been rung— The SPEAKER 00APG Lock the doors! Mr Conroy interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Order! Member for Shortland, you've already been thrown out and now you're back. It can happen again. The question is that the member for Blaxland be no further heard.

The House divided. [16:46]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

40 AYES Allen, K Andrews, KL Bell, AM Connelly, V Coulton, M Dutton, PC Falinski, JG Fletcher, PW Flint, NJ (teller) Frydenberg, JA Gee, AR Gillespie, DA Goodenough, IR Hawke, AG Hunt, GA Leeser, J Ley, SP Littleproud, D Martin, FB McCormack, MF McIntosh, MI O'Dowd, KD Pearce, GB Pitt, KJ Porter, CC Price, ML Ramsey, RE (teller) Robert, SR Sharma, DN Stevens, J Sukkar, MS Taylor, AJ Tehan, DT Tudge, AE van Manen, AJ Wallace, AB Webster, AE Wicks, LE Wilson, TR Wyatt, KG 35 NOES Albanese, AN Aly, A Bird, SL Bowen, CE Burke, AS Burney, LJ Butler, MC Butler, TM Chalmers, JE Chesters, LM Clare, JD Claydon, SC Collins, JM Conroy, PM Elliot, MJ Freelander, MR (teller) Gorman, P Gosling, LJ Haines, H Hayes, CP Hill, JC Jones, SP King, MMH McBain, KL McBride, EM Murphy, PJ O'Connor, BPJ Phillips, FE Plibersek, TJ Rishworth, AL Sharkie, RCC Stanley, AM (teller) Steggall, Z Thistlethwaite, MJ Zappia, A 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.

16:49 The SPEAKER 00APG Is the motion seconded? The member for Whitlam. 16:49 Mr STEPHEN JONES A9B Whitlam This does not stack up. This minister must go! The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Whitlam will resume his seat. The minister has the call. 16:49 Mr SUKKAR 242515 Deakin I move: That the Member be no longer heard. The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the member be no longer heard.

The House divided. [16:50]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

40 AYES Allen, K Andrews, KL Bell, AM Connelly, V Coulton, M Dutton, PC Falinski, JG Fletcher, PW Flint, NJ (teller) Frydenberg, JA Gee, AR Gillespie, DA Goodenough, IR Hawke, AG Hunt, GA Leeser, J Ley, SP Littleproud, D Martin, FB McCormack, MF McIntosh, MI O'Dowd, KD Pearce, GB Pitt, KJ Porter, CC Price, ML Ramsey, RE (teller) Robert, SR Sharma, DN Stevens, J Sukkar, MS Taylor, AJ Tehan, DT Tudge, AE van Manen, AJ Wallace, AB Webster, AE Wicks, LE Wilson, TR Wyatt, KG 34 NOES Albanese, AN Aly, A Bird, SL Bowen, CE Burke, AS Burney, LJ Butler, MC Butler, TM Chalmers, JE Chesters, LM Clare, JD Claydon, SC Collins, JM Conroy, PM Elliot, MJ Freelander, MR (teller) Gorman, P Gosling, LJ Haines, H Hayes, CP Jones, SP King, MMH McBain, KL McBride, EM Murphy, PJ O'Connor, BPJ Phillips, FE Plibersek, TJ Rishworth, AL Sharkie, RCC Stanley, AM (teller) Steggall, Z Thistlethwaite, MJ Zappia, A 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.

16:53 The SPEAKER 00APG The question now is that the motion moved be agreed to. 16:53 Mr BUTLER HWK Hindmarsh This minister is more grass fielder than home builder, and he joins a list of ministers who should go— The SPEAKER 00APG The member will resume his seat. I call the Assistant Treasurer. 16:53 Mr SUKKAR 242515 Deakin I move: That the question be now put. The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the question be now put.

The House divided. [16:55]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

40 AYES Allen, K Andrews, KL Bell, AM Connelly, V Coulton, M Dutton, PC Falinski, JG Fletcher, PW Flint, NJ (teller) Frydenberg, JA Gee, AR Gillespie, DA Goodenough, IR Hawke, AG Hunt, GA Leeser, J Ley, SP Littleproud, D Martin, FB McCormack, MF McIntosh, MI O'Dowd, KD Pearce, GB Pitt, KJ Porter, CC Price, ML Ramsey, RE (teller) Robert, SR Sharma, DN Stevens, J Sukkar, MS Taylor, AJ Tehan, DT Tudge, AE van Manen, AJ Wallace, AB Webster, AE Wicks, LE Wilson, TR Wyatt, KG 34 NOES Albanese, AN Aly, A Bird, SL Bowen, CE Burke, AS Burney, LJ Butler, MC Butler, TM Chalmers, JE Chesters, LM Clare, JD Claydon, SC Collins, JM Conroy, PM Elliot, MJ Freelander, MR (teller) Gorman, P Gosling, LJ Haines, H Hayes, CP Jones, SP King, MMH McBain, KL McBride, EM Murphy, PJ O'Connor, BPJ Phillips, FE Plibersek, TJ Rishworth, AL Sharkie, RCC Stanley, AM (teller) Steggall, Z Thistlethwaite, MJ Zappia, A 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.

16:56 The SPEAKER 00APG The question now is that the motion moved by the member for Blaxland be disagreed to.

The House divided. [16:57]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

43 AYES Allen, K Andrews, KL Bell, AM Connelly, V Coulton, M Dutton, PC Falinski, JG Fletcher, PW Flint, NJ (teller) Frydenberg, JA Gee, AR Gillespie, DA Goodenough, IR Haines, H Hawke, AG Hunt, GA Leeser, J Ley, SP Littleproud, D Martin, FB McCormack, MF McIntosh, MI O'Dowd, KD Pearce, GB Pitt, KJ Porter, CC Price, ML Ramsey, RE (teller) Robert, SR Sharkie, RCC Sharma, DN Steggall, Z Stevens, J Sukkar, MS Taylor, AJ Tehan, DT Tudge, AE van Manen, AJ Wallace, AB Webster, AE Wicks, LE Wilson, TR Wyatt, KG 31 NOES Albanese, AN Aly, A Bird, SL Bowen, CE Burke, AS Burney, LJ Butler, MC Butler, TM Chalmers, JE Chesters, LM Clare, JD Claydon, SC Collins, JM Conroy, PM Elliot, MJ Freelander, MR (teller) Gorman, P Gosling, LJ Hayes, CP Jones, SP King, MMH McBain, KL McBride, EM Murphy, PJ O'Connor, BPJ Phillips, FE Plibersek, TJ Rishworth, AL Stanley, AM (teller) Thistlethwaite, MJ Zappia, A 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.

BILLS 50 BILLS Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 50

Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020

Second Reading 50 17:00 Ms STEGGALL 175696 Warringah The purpose of this bill is to implement the government's Job-ready Graduates program and make other amendments to the higher education support package in Australia. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 74046 Order! Excuse me, Member for Warringah, do you mind stopping? We have the member for Corangamite in continuation by virtual presence. 17:00 Ms COKER 263547 Corangamite [by video link] Yet this government is trying to ram through this legislation which would mean 40 per cent of students would have their fees increased to $14,500 a year, doubling the cost for thousands of them. I've spoken to many of these young people in my electorate about what impact these proposed changes will have on their lives and their education. One young woman who attended a recent forum I ran with the member for Sydney about these proposed changes was Lily Watterson. Lily is a bright, articulate, passionate young woman who is currently a student at Surf Coast Secondary College in Torquay. Lily hopes to study an arts degree next year. I want to share with you Lily's words about the impact of this bill. She said: 'I live regionally, so I definitely can't commute to uni every day, and having this added pressure of the fees more than doubling is just crazy. There is no way I can afford to move to Melbourne and support myself. I've got a single parent, so it's not like I'm going to get my rent paid for every week.' Lily is not alone. I am truly worried for so many young people in my community who won't be able to afford to go to university because of these changes. And it's not just high-school students who will be affected; current university students will also be impacted. Ana Machado Colling is another intelligent young woman who attended the forum. She has already done a Bachelor of Arts and hopes to go on to a master's. This is what she told me: 'A lot of us have found ourselves unemployed due to COVID, and study has become a strong alternative for us. For a master's degree to cost something like $80,000 is just impossible. It will go over our HECS-HELP, which means we'll have to pay upfront. I don't understand how that's feasible for someone living out of home, paying rent, studying full-time.' Over and over when I speak to young people in my community, they're concerned and anxious about these changes. They're worried about the heavy burden of debt. They're trying to alter their plans, plans that they've had for years and years, because of the threat of these changes. They're being denied the opportunities that I had, that many others in this chamber have had and that previous generations have had. I want to talk now about the particular impact this bill will have on the humanities. This bill would more than double the fees for thousands of people studying the humanities, locking many young Australians out of the chance to study in this field. I'm a proud graduate of the humanities. I studied drama and literature as an undergraduate and went on to study media communications at postgraduate level, as well as teaching. I'm so grateful for the tertiary education I received. It has taught me much about the world around me, and I use the knowledge and skills I gained at that time every day. I also believe that the humanities are more important than ever. The big problems we face right now—declining trust in our political system and institutions, like this parliament; inaction on climate change; income inequality; and injustice—are social problems, problems of collective action, and it is the humanities which equip us to deal with these social problems. As Robert French, the Chancellor of the University of Western Australia and former Chief Justice of the High Court, has said: Humanities is the vehicle through which we understand our society, our history, our culture. Studying the humanities helps us to reflect, to inspire, to analyse, to create, to move people, to understand and to change the world around us for the better. Importantly, studying the humanities also helps young people get jobs—good jobs, rewarding jobs, well-paid jobs—in the modern workforce. According to recent research, people with humanities degrees have higher employment rates than science and maths graduates. This government claims it's trying to redirect young Australians towards industries where they can get jobs, but it has absolutely no evidence to back this up. What this government is actually doing is making it harder for young Australians to study courses that help them get jobs. It's important that at this time of a pandemic we have strong university and TAFE sectors, and we know that Australia is now in the midst of a deep recession. I cannot think of a worse time for this government to make it harder for young Australians to study the humanities. I urge the government to move beyond this petty attack on the humanities and think about creating jobs and opportunities for our next generation. Give young people hope for the future and stop punishing them. One of the aspects of this package that I find particularly troubling is the significant impact it will have on regional areas like mine. The government have said they want to help more young people in regional areas, but this bill won't actually leave regional, rural and remote universities, or their staff and their students, better off. It will leave them worse off. This is because regional universities deliver a greater proportion of courses that will have a funding cut than non-regional universities and because, under the government's proposal, nearly twice as many regional and remote students will have to pay the highest rate of student fees. I am proud to represent regional Victoria. Parents in my community want their children to have the opportunity to go to university. They know that getting a great education is a ticket to a great job and a lifetime of opportunities for their kids. They do not want to see their children priced out of an education. This legislation will also have serious implications for university jobs, particularly in regional areas. Universities support 14,000 jobs in regional Australia. They support jobs in my electorate at Deakin University. Funding cuts to regional universities will mean fewer jobs in our regions for academics, for support staff, for administrators and for service providers. Deakin has already flagged that 400 jobs will go due to the pandemic. I'm fighting hard to try and keep these jobs, to keep these people's livelihoods, and I will continue to oppose bad policy that results in fewer jobs in my electorate of Corangamite. The Morrison government likes to talk a big game on supporting the regions, but time after time after time, from changes to broadcasting to cuts in services and now these dangerous changes to higher education, this government has let us down. I'm proud of Labor's record on education in regional areas. Labor's policies in government saw enrolments of students from regional and remote areas increase by 50 per cent. I don't want to see that go backwards. In closing, this bill is cruel, it is unfair and it is bad policy. It cuts billions from the sector while doing nothing to help young people get into high-priority courses and jobs. It will make thousands of students pay more than double what they now pay for their qualification, and it will continue the Liberals' track record on years of neglect and cuts to our higher education sector. The young people in my communities who have had a chance to meet and talk to me about this bill are so passionate, they're so clever and they're so articulate. They want to study at university, they want to get good jobs and they want to contribute to our community. I feel so much for them not just because of the big challenges they've faced this year but because this government, the Morrison government, is planning to make their future so much harder. As a mother of two daughters, aged 17 and 18, I've seen firsthand just how tough this year has been for our younger generation. Studying at home, coming home from university, having to study online—it is very challenging. For all those young people in my community who might be following this debate, I want you to know: I hear you, I stand with you, and Labor will fight for you. 17:10 Ms STEGGALL 175696 Warringah The purpose of the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 is to implement the government's job-ready graduates program and make other amendments to the higher education support package in Australia. The measures contained in this bill seek to directly intervene in the Australian education market to incentivise students to study the degrees that this government and minister believe will be the jobs of the future. This legislation restructures the higher education support scheme to allocate more funds to degrees in science, technology, engineering and maths at the expense of arts, commerce, communications and law degrees. Whilst in the past I have called for the government to do more to support STEM students and I continue to do so, it should not be at the expense of humanities and other subjects. I'd like to acknowledge the workers of the university sector, who are struggling at this time. The government supported university staff are ineligible for JobKeeper, and many are losing their jobs. I continue to call on the government to develop a tailored package for this sector that is seeing many, many jobs being lost. The minister announced this legislation in June, and an exposure draft was provided to the public on 12 August and open for just five days of consultation. This is not good governance, and this is not proper consultation. Each of the university peak bodies made submissions in the consultation phase highlighting the weakness of this approach. Despite a variety of views from the university sector with regard to the merit of this legislation—I should note that they're especially tailored around the locations of universities and in particular whether they are regional universities set to benefit from the legislation—they are united in their calls for further consultation through the referral of this bill to the Senate committee on employment and education. I strongly support this referral, and that has been a call heard loudly from the electorate as well. There are a number of areas where this legislation could be improved to make it more equitable, and I would urge the government to, rather than rushing and doing the job badly, do it well. In particular, there's one area that does beg the question of why it's included because it really has nothing to do with job-ready graduate packages—that is, the student progression provisions; the 50 per cent completion rule. That has brought quite a bit of concern to many students. The bill removes the eligibility for all student loans and prohibits universities from enrolling a student as a Commonwealth supported student if in a bachelor or higher qualification the student has undertaken eight or more units and not successfully completed at least 50 per cent of them and in any other case where the student has undertaken four or more units and not successfully completed at least 50 per cent of them. While I agree that there is an issue with non-completion of degrees and bad debts being incurred by the government, this provision is too narrow and punitive and should be removed, and that is supported by the university sector. It does not allow for any discretion or consideration of the circumstances which may have led to a student having such difficulty in completing or passing their subjects. The bulk of the feedback from my electorate concerns the impacts of this legislation on the humanities and students studying those degrees that will be disadvantaged. The government is directly intervening in the market to push new students towards courses in science, technology, engineering and maths—STEM subjects—by redirecting funding so that a greater share goes to what are alleged to be job-ready courses while arts and law degrees, for example, become more expensive. In my meeting with the minister and his staff, he pointed me to the evidence that the sectors with the highest rates of job growth were professional, scientific and technical services; health and social assistance; and education and training. However, the data presented said little of the skills required to support the jobs in those industries. Many in those industries have said they also require graduates with arts, commerce and STEM backgrounds. There's an artificial manipulation here of the jobs market. I support the focus on STEM, but it should not be at the expense of arts, commerce and law degrees. What you seek to achieve from tertiary education and university study is so important. It is about critical thinking, innovation, communication and creativity. These are essential components of the future of our economy and our society. These skills are fostered by degrees that will now be more expensive for students and potentially out of reach. People who have these skills will be essential to making the STEM economy a reality in Australia. The courses that have seen the greatest funding cuts have the breadth that enables young students to explore the full range of possibilities for future employment before narrowing down into a career choice. As well, universities are not job factories. There is a role for encouraging diversity of thought, conduct of research and reflection on history. That will now be discouraged as a result of this policy. The changes will have a greater impact on the decisions of people from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, as price signals make a greater difference to this cohort. This is disincentivising students from studying the arts. It will decrease the diversity of students in those degrees, leading to a weaker outcome for Australian universities, our people and, ultimately, Australian society. Because the biggest impact will be on our youth, you can't touch on this without taking into account the mental health situation and the dire impact that this could have. The mental health of young people has to be a key consideration of this government. These changes may further damage the health of our young people because this is creating uncertainty about their direction of study. The latest study to come out of the Brain and Mind Centre at the University of Sydney predicts—and these are frightening statistics—that, over the next five years, the economic impact of COVID-19 will result in a 30 per cent increase in suicides by 15- to 24-year-olds. As a mother of teenagers, these statistics terrify me. As a lawmaker, they challenge me, and they should challenge everyone in this place. I've spoken with 24 youth ambassadors representing the schools across my electorate. Mental health is the No. 1 concern for all of them. Exam stress and HSC rankings already weigh on their minds. They have the fees for the degrees they've already chosen. They've already committed to their pathway of study. They are in the final stretch of their secondary education journey. They now have to face a potential increase, by over 110 per cent overnight, to their chosen course of study. This will dramatically increase the level of stress on these young people. The university peak bodies are conflicted in their support for this legislation, because, on one hand, it locks in the indexation of funding which has been frozen since 2017, which they so desperately need, but, on the other hand, they will receive less funds overall per student accepted. In relation to more places, the changes proposed by the government are budget neutral, so the government are using the existing budget to fund more university places, which effectively reduces the government contribution to degrees from 58 per cent to 48 per cent per degree. Consequently, student contributions will need to increase proportionately, from 42 per cent to 52 per cent. The Group of Eight, which represents Australia's leading universities, have estimated that, in 2021, their per-student funding, through the Commonwealth Grant Scheme, will decrease by five per cent, and total per-student funding, incorporating the student contribution amount, will reduce by six per cent. It would be naive for the government to not appreciate that this is going to have to come from somewhere. This is going to affect the quality of education for domestic students, it is at odds with the government's supposed post-COVID needs and it is drafted without the full appreciation of the likely consequences. The current draft legislation asks that more is done, with less support, at a time when, collectively, the university sector is facing a significant revenue downgrade in 2021 and 2022 due to border closures and reduced numbers of international students. It seems at odds with what governments will require the universities to achieve for the nation post COVID. For example, in relation to the pressure on the universities, under the old system a science degree would have received $28,958 in combined student and government funding. In the new system the same degree received $24,200, creating a shortfall of $4,758 per student. STEM courses are also more expensive to provide and teach. They rely on more university resources than arts or law degrees but universities are expected to meet these costs. It's insufficient to meet expected demand for university places across the board at this time. The innovative research universities have called for a minimum of 10,000 additional places, on top of the increase captured by this legislation, to really meet demand in terms of jobs. They argue it does not cater for the increased demand due to the recession caused by COVID-19 and increased demand from older students and the new cohort of young people. I encourage the government to refer this bill to the committee for further refinement. I thank the minister for the briefing and for understanding and getting more information as to the basis for the legislation, but I encourage the government to take up the following four actions. The implementation should be delayed by at least two years to accommodate the current cohort of year 11 and 12 students who have already chosen their subjects. To qualify for STEM courses, students need to have studied relevant prerequisites during high school, none of which are compulsory under the current curriculum. To gain entry to STEM courses students will be forced to take bridging courses, adding further financial burden, anxiety and uncertainty for school leavers. The existing fee structure for existing students wishing to pursue further study in their field should be grandfathered. They are already committed to their pathway. Similar to the previous amendment, the legislation should not disincentivise students wishing to pursue further study in line with their current degree. There also needs to be an additional budget allocation to fund the Industry Linkage Fund and the Indigenous, Regional and Low SES Attainment Fund. The bill provides for demand-driven funding for eligible Indigenous people but the definition restricts Indigenous persons to those who live in regional and remote areas. In a situation where over a third of Indigenous persons do not live in regional or remote areas and a high priority needs to be given to reducing the gap in further educational attainment for all Indigenous persons, I would encourage and urge the minister to extend the definition of an eligible Indigenous person in the bill. It should be broadened to include all Indigenous persons. This would better align the bill with the government's recently announced approach to Closing the Gap and the revised further education target. I personally have had the privilege to study both a bachelor of arts in media and communications and a law degree. The opportunity to study what I was interested in has enabled me to be here to represent the people of Warringah, so I cannot in all conscience endorse legislation that will make it more difficult for others to have the same opportunities that I have had. I don't support this legislation, and I strongly support the government to refer the legislation to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee. 17:24 Mr KHALIL 101351 Wills [by video link] Labor opposes the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020, as it is fundamentally going to make it harder and more expensive for young Australians to go to university. While the bill is promising more places, they will be achieved with no extra Commonwealth funding but by reducing the average funding for each student going to university. The cost burden of these extra places will instead be borne by the students themselves. Forty per cent of students will have their fees increased. Some increases are up to 113 per cent. On average under this legislation, students will pay seven per cent more for their degree. All this is during a time when providing young people with the opportunity of a higher education is more important than ever, especially with the impacts of COVID-19. We're in the depths of a recession, and youth unemployment has gone through the roof, rising by more than 90,000 in recent months alone. This is a significant missed opportunity to invest in our young people. Instead, this government is choosing not to invest in them and not to support them to succeed in their chosen careers. I can't fathom why this is. Is it ideologically motivated? It can't be anything but that, because what the government are really proposing here is that the costs for degrees that they don't like—and I'll come to that in a moment—go up. I can only presume it is for ideological reasons that the costs of humanities degrees are going up. Students studying law, accounting, administration, economics, commerce, communications and the humanities will be paying more for their degrees than people doing medicine or dentistry degrees. These costs will more than double for people studying humanities, jumping from some $27,216 to $58,000 for a four-year degree. This is not just about covering costs for more job-ready degrees, which is the government's argument. It actually fundamentally diminishes and undermines the essential, critical importance of humanities to civil society, to our society. I graduated with a law/arts degree, and I know that many of my colleagues in the chamber would have got arts degrees, law degrees or economics degrees. I was afforded that opportunity for a good education despite my particular socioeconomic circumstances. But, under a cost structure that undermines humanities degrees, the question has to be asked: would I or millions of other Australians who are not particularly wealthy—whether they're new migrants, as we were, or working class, as we were, or in regional or rural areas—be able to get a degree that gives them a knowledge base and the critical reasoning skills that you get out of a humanities degree, which would allow them to work towards senior and leadership roles in the law, politics, industry and the corporate sectors? It's a legitimate question. Is the government deliberately limiting access to this type of education and to these types of skills only to wealthy Australians who can afford what is now going to become the luxury of an arts degree? There is nothing fundamentally wrong with trying to meet skills shortages by making some courses more available and more affordable, but it should not be done at the expense of the humanities. Of course science and engineering degrees are important. We've heard from Bronwyn Evans, the CEO of Engineers Australia, who's said: … the … Government's announced changes … may … lead to increased inequality and a harmful reduction in the diversity of skills necessary for a modern workforce. … … … An increase in university fees risks increasing structural inequality for women and people from low socioeconomic status … backgrounds who choose to study humanities, law and other courses that will now leave them in even more debt. The thing that this government cannot understand and cannot ever get over is the fact that a tertiary education is not just about vocational or job-ready technical training. It's not just a sausage factory; it's also about knowledge and critical thinking. A vibrant, robust, civil society is made up of far more than technical expertise. Robert French, the former High Court Chief Justice and now Chancellor of UWA, has said: Humanities is the vehicle through which we understand our society, our history, our culture. I continue to quote: I'm not talking about the more obscure courses. The mainstream of humanities allows teachers and universities to transmit our history and our society to students. The humanities are vital for the work of our political leaders, leaders of corporations, leaders of public authorities. I'm very happy for an emphasis on science, engineering and maths; we should also emphasise humanities. It's not an either-or. This government seems to think you have to set them up against each other. We oppose this bill for a number of reasons. One of the ones I want to emphasise is that we should not, in any way, as a Commonwealth be denying or limiting the access to those skills, to that education and to that skill set that you get from a humanities degree. We should not be denying that or limiting that to people from a particular socioeconomic background, whether they be disadvantaged, starting out as new migrants or of a particular ethnic background. By extension, this bill from the government seems to go in that direction. It undermines the importance of a liberal arts focus on history, civics, social sciences, arts and culture, critical thinking and reasoning, as I described, which are more important to humanity and societies than ever before, especially as we enter this era of artificial intelligence, quantum computing and big data analytics. Those skills you get out of a humanities degree are more important than ever—more important for leadership, more important for analysis and more important for navigating and problem-solving for the future. We know that authoritarian governments are harnessing AI and STEM for their own purposes. We need a democratic counterpoint to what is happening in those states, which means that the humanities, the arts and the social sciences are more important than ever. We should be expanding access to those skills not limiting access to those skills. Dan Woodman, President of the Council for the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, said in his media release: Some of the fastest growing job areas for university graduates are new, many of which require exactly the skills and experiences that the study of HASS subjects can provide. Content Specialists, Customer Officers, Data Scientists, and Sustainability Analysts are in high demand. These jobs did not exist five years ago, and a strong humanities or social science degree provides a foundation for working in these and the new, related fields that will inevitably emerge in the coming years. This is the short-sightedness of this government and what they're doing with this bill. The other part of it that is ridiculous is that there is no evidence that humanities degrees make students less employable than other degrees. In fact, the job prospects of humanities students are very healthy and are in demand, as I've just pointed out. According to recent research, people with humanities degrees have the same employment rates as science or maths graduates. Experts are saying that the price is unlikely—and this is part of the government's thinking here: that they'll put a pricepoint on this—to have any effect on student choice. But it's going to have a dramatic effect on the funding of universities, and the funding of universities, particularly during this coronavirus crisis, is in dire straits. So many jobs have been lost. So much teaching and learning and research capability has been lost. It's just going to make that much worse. One of the great Labor traditions is ensuring that an education never remains out of reach of anyone wanting to obtain one, particularly a tertiary education. Not everyone can get a university agree—absolutely. That's why we support TAFE and want to put funding into TAFE and vocational training. But, if people want to access a university agree, they should be able to obtain one. We in Labor put our money where our mouth is, unlike the Liberals. After years of neglect under the previous Howard government, Labor boosted investment in universities from $8 billion in 2007 to $14 billion by 2013, and Labor policies when we were last in government saw an extra 220,000 Australians get the benefit of a university education. I was one of those young people who got the benefit of previous Labor governments, the Hawke-Keating governments—and, one could argue, the Whitlam government—giving more people access to university. I got access to an education, and a quality education, despite my socioeconomic background. That's part of our DNA. That's what real equality of opportunity is about: it's giving people access to a quality education so that they can fulfil their potential. We have also focused on making sure that people who are disadvantaged get that opportunity, overcoming those structural disadvantages, making sure that enrolments for financially disadvantaged students increased, and they did, by 66 per cent; that Indigenous undergraduate student enrolments increased, and they did, by 105 per cent; that enrolments of undergraduate students with a disability went up, and they did, by 125 per cent; and that enrolments of students from regional and remote areas went up, and they did, by 50 per cent. This is in contrast with this government, this Liberal-National government, that just doesn't get it. They don't believe in it. They don't understand it, or they're blind to it. We know that the COVID-19 crisis has hit many, many Australian universities hard. In my own electorate of Wills, we have a very high student and academic population who work at nearby universities like RMIT and University of Melbourne. Universities outside of capital cities have also been hit hard, and some have been subjected to huge funding cuts and hundreds of job losses which have serious flow-on effects to the regional community they support. Instead of investing in our universities and our young people and opening up opportunities for them, this government and this bill seek to cut the university sector's guaranteed funding by around a billion dollars a year. That would be the effect of what this government is trying to do. So universities will be receiving less money to do more. COVID-19 has disproportionately affected universities, and for months now Labor has been urging the federal government to step in and help universities, to save jobs. However, we've already seen 3,000 jobs lost and there's a forecast of 21,000 job losses in coming years. And this government doesn't even just sit on its hands; it goes the other way. It seeks to cut further and make it more difficult, and it's done nothing that gives us an indication that it understands the importance of university education and universities to our society. It's gone out of its way to actually exclude public universities from JobKeeper, changing the rules three times to ensure that they don't qualify. It's a disgrace. Today, Curtin University in Perth announced they needed to cut employment costs by a whopping $41 million. Close to my electorate, the University of Melbourne has cut 450 jobs and there are projected losses of a billion dollars over three years. We're not just talking about students; we're talking about academics, tutors, admin staff, library staff, catering staff, ground staff, cleaners, security—all of the people who make up university life and university work. We know that we as a nation will require an additional 3.8 million university qualifications by 2025. These will be required across sectors and will be critical for our economic recovery and growth, and this government, with this bill, is not only wilfully blind to that; it's going in a different direction. This so-called reform is a complete mess. It can't be amended. It can't be fixed. It leads to more-expensive degrees, no guarantee of more places and less money for universities. As always, this Prime Minister's detail and announcement don't match reality. 17:39 Mr JOYCE E5D New England I must say it's a pleasure to be in this building today. I've been rostered off for most of it, but I promise: if there's a vote, I'll leave. The reality that we now have is this. We are walking into a mountain of debt, and it's a debt that the Labor Party, if they had their way, would actually make even bigger. That means that we're going to have to have a reality check, not on how we got into debt but how we're going to get out of it. Getting out of it—and this is one thing I don't hear anywhere—means you're going to have to have some very honest conversations about where you spend money, where you invest money and where you intend to get a return. So the future is to be one of debt. There are threats from overseas that are becoming paramount, and we're seeing more of them, especially from China. We must have exponential growth to try and bring our economic circumstances back into something that's manageable. And, where the government invests, it has to get a return. It's an unfortunate reality that, if you just skidded through on an arts degree, you probably would have been better off doing a trade—becoming an electrician or a carpenter. I'm an accountant. I've done the books for both, and I can tell you which ones make more money. Basically, people who are competent in the trades make substantially more money than people who have a matter-of-fact degree, especially an arts degree. So this is the reality that we have to deal with, and if we didn't have the debt that was started right back in the issues surrounding the GFC and the stimulus package—and I might note for this House that I didn't vote for any of them, not one of them—then we could probably have a more generous capacity in a whole range of degrees. But, if we are going to invest, we must invest in where the future lies, and the future is going to lie in the STEM degrees. Last night we heard about a new avenue opening up before us: how affordable it's going to be to launch a satellite. We're seeing private companies coming into this space, whether it's Virgin or Elon Musk. They have capacity now to take part in that new frontier. Once it was the domain of the Soviets and China and NASA; now it's coming to private enterprise. One of the fastest-growing countries in that area is Australia. Australia has great capacity. But, for that, we need the people with the skill sets. Another issue I always had was with the NBN and what happens when you invest in a technology. You can invest in water or dams; there's no replacement for that. But, when you invest in technologies, be careful, because they become out of date. Now, with the investment in the new technology, they're talking about broadband speeds from satellites of terabytes per second, which of course means that the NBN will be out of date and obsolete and you can book it as an impairment on your nation's books—an $80 billion or $90 billion impairment. Once more, to be in that space, you're going to need people in the sciences. You're going to need people in those degrees that are at the cutting edge. In the future of this nation, one of the great strategic advantages we'll have will be in agriculture. But you are not going to survive in agriculture unless you're at the very top. If you think you're going to just be in agriculture then you'll just be in agriculture with Somalia and Kenya and Mongolia and a whole heap of other countries that are just in agriculture as well. But if you want to actually make a premium for our nation then you'll have to be at the very top, and to be at the very top means that you have to have the skill sets, whether they're in such things as genetics or nutrition or pastures. Those skill sets are absolutely essential. We can look back through history to see why we are sustained at the moment and why we can sustain a world population of between seven and eight billion people. It's because of the investment we made in the so-called green revolution—the utilisation of fertilisers and other agricultural inputs. That's the only reason we have the capacity to feed the world's population as it is now. Now we've eaten that up, and, as we go on towards 10 billion people, we're going to have to make that next quantum leap. And where are the skill sets going to have to come from? I'm just being a realist: they're not going to come from the arts faculty but from people in the sciences, who have those skill sets. For the satellites, the people will not come from the arts faculty; they'll be the people with the skill sets in physics and chemistry and mathematics. The telecommunications of the future are going to comefrom people with those skill sets; they will not come from the arts faculty. We're dealing right now with the COVID-19 pandemic , and people are in a race. We know the first person to develop a vaccine will own half of Babylon . They'll be the richest person in Babylon . And they're all lining up. We ' ve got Oxford University , and I note there are some concerns about the source material . M y own position, I have to say, is that I don't agree with material from an aborted person being utilised as the base material for the development of vaccines. I have to say that because it is my philosophical belief . But , moving on, w e've also got the Chinese who are moving forward in that space, racing forward ; we've got the Americans racing forward , and we've also got the University of Queensland racing forward. At this stage, i t looks like Oxford is at the front of the pack . And where are the se people coming from ; where are their skill sets coming from ? They're coming from the science faculties. As marvellous as the arts are—and I love having a conversation with a person of letters ( I have written a book myself, not that I profess to be a person of great literary merit ) and of course it's an incredibly beautiful thing — we have to deal with the reality of the world we're about to walk into. Soon, in the coming years , our debt will pass a trillion dollars. And it isn't just a word. I t doesn't stop there. It keeps marching forward. We' re going to be leaving that debt for our children and grandchildren, because we ' re never going to repay it , and giving them the task of trying to manage it . So we have to provide the nation with people with the skill sets to do it, and the skill sets of those people, as much as we would love them to come from a knowledge of Shakespeare , are probably going to come more from a knowledge of chemistry and physics, mathematics , biochemistry , biomaths and those areas. I'm not saying for one second there is not merit and virtue in any de gree. If we hadn't, way back before 2010, start ed spending money and putting it on the credit card like there was no tomorrow , then we wouldn't have to make a decision between this one or that one. But we do. We do. And those decisions and that corner that we're in are going to become more pronounced, whether we're the government , or the Labor Party and their associates are the government. It won't matter. The Expenditure Review Committee will follow the same patter, the same discussion , and it will be about this: s avings —o r , more to the point, 'Y ou don't have to worry about spending , because there ain't no money there. ' There is no money to spend. P art of this process, and I'm trying to be as honest as that, as chair of the committee, is that there will be a need for the near ly four million degrees that the previous speaker, the member for Wills, was telling us about. There are no arguments about that . But we've got to make sure that we focus that investment by this nation—b ecause , overwhelmingly , university degrees are paid for by the taxpayer. They're n ot paid for by the student . And I've got four kids who go to university . They're paid for by the taxpayer and they'll be paid for by the taxpayer in the future. The person who's out on the building site as a labourer, the person who' s in the shed as a shearer, the person who ' s on the road as a plant operator, the person who ' s on the farm and never went to university — they're the people who are actually paying for the university degrees that other people are getting, and you 've got to ask what ' s fair to them. It's not just a position seen through one set of eyes. There 's the beneficiary , but there's also the benefactor —a nd the benefactor is the taxpayer, a nd , in many instances , the taxpayer never went to university . S o they also have a right to be heard in this debate and they also have requirements that need to be addressed. The DEPUTY SPEAKER E0D The question is that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question. 17:49 Mr PERRETT HVP Moreton [by video link] I speak today on the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020. There's so much wrong with this bill that I don't know where to start, but how about I commence with the Orwellian title, the bit that says 'supporting regional and remote students'? There is nothing in this bill that will support regional and remote students, nothing at all. The National Party members of the coalition should hang their heads in shame for betraying the bush. Maybe that's why it wasn't mentioned by the previous speaker, because this bill makes it harder and more expensive for all students to go to uni whether they live in a region or a remote part of Australia or not. Under this policy nearly twice as many regional and remote students will have to pay the highest rate of student fees. The Treasurer takes the gold while bush kids get the shaft. Regional universities will be much worse off. Regional universities, like the University of New England, in Armidale, deliver a greater proportion of courses that will have funding cut than non-regional universities. So much for the National Party standing up for their regional communities. They are patting themselves on the back for their lobbying efforts when they really just folded faster than superman can on washing day, in greenlighting this policy. It's the bush communities, the regional communities, that will suffer more than others. What this bill will actually do and what the government says of it are two very different things. The government says the purpose of this policy is to provide additional university places and to redirect university enrolments to areas of study linked to jobs that are in demand in the labour market. This, perhaps, seems like a reasonably sound basis for a policy, on the face of it, if only this legislation actually did that. The effect of the bill, however, is to increase the student fee load and cut funding provided by the Commonwealth. Treasurer Frydenberg gets the saving while young Australians actually pay more. How is that fair, particularly in these times of a COVID pandemic? Basically, overall our universities will receive less funding to teach students and the university sector will be facing a funding cut of around $1 billion a year. That cut is on top of the $16 billion projected revenue drop from international students being locked out of the country and the $2.2 billion in cuts already made to university funding by the Liberal and National Party government. Students will be paying more for their degrees. On average, students will be paying seven per cent more for their degrees. Students studying humanities will see their fees jump from $27,216 up to $58,000 for a four-year degree. Forty per cent of students will be paying more than double for the same qualification. Their fees will be increasing by $14,500 per year. We're not talking about medical degrees here. The degrees that will double in price are degrees in the humanities, commerce and communications—degrees that this government thinks produces graduates that are less employable. I am pretty sure that there are actually quite a few graduates of those disciplines occupying the government benches in the current parliament. The minister claimed, in a media release on Sunday, that degree holders with the lowest full-time employment rates after three years included humanities and communications graduates. In fact, if the minister had done his own homework he would know that recent research shows that people with humanities degrees have the same employment rates as science or maths graduates. But rather than admit that he got it wrong, the minister reportedly blamed his senior media adviser—and still didn't provide the correct data. Even worse than misreading this data, Minister Tehan's policy will actually do the opposite of what he promises. The government wants to encourage enrolments in maths, science and engineering. That is a noble and strategic aim, but what the bill actually does is reduce the money that universities will receive to provide these courses. Consequently, there will be a disincentive for the universities to provide more places in these courses or to provide these courses at all. The government claims that this policy will create 39,000 new places over three years, but even if it does that would be woefully inadequate in terms of meeting demand. There is nothing in the policy to account for the expected increased demand due to the recession or for the increased enrolments due to the so-called 'Costello babies' now reaching university age. This policy is a mess. It's a dog's breakfast. It will cut billions from the university sector, a sector hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, but even before that the Liberals had been cutting and neglecting this crucial and important sector. This is a sector that is a foundation of the Australian economy. It is our fourth-largest export industry. The Liberals in their 2017 MYEFO cut $2.2 billion from universities and re-capped undergraduate places, so 200,000 students miss out on the opportunity of university places because of that cap. We know that, if the Liberals had their way, students would already be paying $100,000 for their degrees. They've forced students to pay off their HELP debts earlier, when they earn as little as $46,000, which is only $9,000 more than the minimum wage. This year, international students have been locked out, and that has caused a massive hit to our universities' coffers. Those full-fee-paying foreign students actually help to fund the degrees of other, Australian students. For months, Labor has been asking the federal government to step in, help universities and save jobs. Instead, they've ignored the member for Sydney and done nothing—less than zero, in fact. So far, thousands of jobs have been lost across the country, and there are more to come. More are being announced regularly. Campuses have been closed. Not only have the government done nothing to help universities; the Prime Minister has gone out of his way to exclude public universities from JobKeeper. Three times he has changed the rules to ensure that universities are ineligible. Regional universities have been particularly hard hit. The impact on these communities is going to be devastating. Universities in regional communities support 14,000 jobs, including not just the academics, the tutors, the admin staff and the library staff but the catering staff, the ground staff, the cleaners and the security staff—and on it goes. They are big employers in cities like Cairns, Townsville, Rockhampton, Toowoomba, Wollongong, Armidale, Bathurst, Newcastle, Ballarat, Bendigo, Whyalla, Port Augusta, Launceston and Burnie, to name a few. All of those workers have families, and they're just trying to get through this challenging year and put food on the table and a roof over their heads. But the Morrison government hasn't lifted a finger to help them. The universities themselves are doing remarkable work during this very difficult time. Look at their researchers working around the clock to find a vaccine—a big shout-out to the University of Queensland especially. They have some promising trials occurring right now. Universities may end up saving humanity, but they can't rely on this Morrison government to protect their jobs. This bill will also have greater impact on two other groups: women and First Nations people. Many of the degrees which will incur the fee increases have larger enrolments of female students and First Nations students. Twice the number of First Nations students will be enrolled in the highest-fee-paying courses, and the average female student's contributions will increase by 10 per cent. The First Nations students' contributions will increase by 15 per cent. That will cost those students $9,550 a year. This bill also includes provision for students to lose access to government support if they fail more than half their subjects. This is a punitive measure that is not going to help students to be job ready. This policy, coupled with the funding cut, will see reduced support for students who are struggling—perhaps only temporarily struggling—and just need a helping hand. Even worse, the policy would create an incentive for universities to lower standards so fewer students fail. This is another ill-thought-out policy that won't achieve its stated aim. This bill has been criticised by experts in the university sector as well as industry groups. Bronwyn Evans, the CEO of Engineers Australia, says: … the … Government's announced changes … may … lead to increased inequality and a harmful reduction in the diversity of skills necessary for a modern workforce. The Australian Council of Deans of Science says: 'Cost is not a critical driver for students to study STEM, and it will not serve to generate more STEM-capable graduates if the funding changes undermine the capacity of universities to produce them. The funds that will come to university science to produce graduates will shrink by 16 per cent under the Job-ready Graduates proposal—less from each student and less from the government.' Julie Bishop, the Chancellor of ANU and a former Liberal minister, says: My concern is that under these new arrangements, there is a greater incentive for universities to take in a higher number of law, commerce and humanities students than there is to take in students in engineering and maths … that appears to be contrary to the government’s policy intentions. That message from Julie Bishop could not be clearer. It's remarkable that a government minister, Minister Tehan, could get this policy so wrong, but not when you realise the policy assumptions that Minister Tehan has relied upon. Flaw No. 1: the experts say students will not choose their study discipline through price signals. Flaw No. 2: the pricing model used to calculate average university teaching costs is weak, and the authors of the research caution against using their finding for that purpose. Flaw No. 3: the job demand modelling is based on labour market forecasting done before the COVID crisis, which is highly likely to skew those figures. So this policy now before the chamber is a putrid, stinking mess—and a dangerous one at that. The students in year 12 right now are the ones who will be most disadvantaged by this policy. The seniors of 2020 need a helping hand. They have had such a tough, uncertain year already. No other year 12 cohort has had to endure a final year of schooling quite like the one they have endured—online classes and less face-to-face time with their mates and teachers. They've had their sports and cultural activities curtailed, many have had their formals cancelled, and perhaps there will even be no schoolies in Queensland for most of them. Now the Prime Minister is going to make it harder and more expensive for many of them to go to university. I know how excited I was at the end of my schooling—the promise of learning in an environment that fostered ideas and promised a future paved with opportunity and a new career. I understand the importance of education both from my time as a student—and from being the parent of students—and from my time as a teacher. Labor has always valued education. It is a great transformational social policy area. Lives are changed, lives are saved and lives are improved. When in government, Labor ensured that a university education was never out of reach for our best and brightest. Labor invested in universities, boosting university investment from $8 billion in 2007 to $14 billion in 2013. From 2012 we opened up the system with demand-driven funding so that an additional 195,000 Australians were able to go to university, and we ensured that structural disadvantage did not preclude a university education. An extra 220,000 Australians were given the opportunity of a university education under Labor policies. We know that if you lock someone out of an education you can lock them out of employment. This government doesn't seem to understand that. Investing in Australian universities is good for all of us, but this policy before the chamber is a complete mess—a great steaming mess. No amendment can fix this. The minister needs to rip it up, do some homework and start again. I cannot support this bill. No person who believes in education could. 18:02 Mr BANDT M3C Melbourne [by video link] This bill, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020, must be stopped. This bill would double the cost of many university degrees and cut university funding. This is a dog act from a bunch of selfish politicians who got free university themselves and now want to bury young people under a mountain of debt. Make no mistake: if this bill goes through, it could take 20 years to pay off a three-year arts degree. And it's not just going to be the cost of arts degrees that doubles; everyone will be hit, some worse than others. Law and business degrees are going to rise by about 28 per cent. For all those other courses where the government says, 'Oh, no, it's okay, we're going to leave you better off', don't believe the spin. This bill also means universities get less money for teaching, and students, on the whole, have to pay more. At the moment the balance is about 58 per cent to 42 per cent between the government and students. This bill is going to shift that so that students end up paying about 48 per cent, not 42 per cent, of the costs of universities. In other words, universities are going to get less and students are going to have to pay more—some will have to pay double what they are now—and it could take them up to 20 years to pay off the cost of a three-year degree. Why is this happening? Very simply, it's happening because the Liberals do not want people to get educated, because then they might not vote for them. That's what this is all about. This is an ideological attack from a government that has it in for universities and for people getting educated in this country. They look at the United States and think, 'What a great way to go.' In the United States you can only go to university if you're rich, or if your parents start saving from the day that you're born or sell their house. That is the vision that this government has for Australia. Not many people look to the United States and think, 'Jeez, we'd like to be more like them when it comes to education,' but that's what this Trump-following government does. This bill will make Australia a more unequal society like the United States, where education is the privilege of a few, of the rich, instead of being for everyone. Education in Australia should be a right. It is not a privilege, it is a right. Everyone should have the right to go to university or TAFE or do whatever level of education they want. And you shouldn't be worried that if you go to university you're going to graduate with a debt the size of a small mortgage that might take you decades to pay off. But that's what this bill will do. That will mean fewer people will go to university, because they will be worried about carrying that debt for most of their lifetimes. That's what this bill is designed to do—deter people from going to university. As I said, the Liberals are worried that, if you go to university, you might get educated and you might then decide not to vote Liberal. So they are attacking universities right across the board. We know they've got it in for universities. In the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, the Prime Minister got up and beat his chest and pretended to be concerned about jobs. One area where he could save jobs is in universities, because they are government funded. But what did he do? Instead of giving them a lifeline so they can keep employing people, he pulled it. He gave JobKeeper to the private sector but then pulled it from universities, so universities now have to sack thousands of people across the country. The government is pushing universities to sack people in the middle of a recession. If you look at any other place around the world, at any other time in history, the lesson is very clear. In the middle of a recession or a depression, what you do? The government, where it can, invests to keep people on the payroll, to keep employment high. Otherwise, you end up with Depression-era jobless queues snaking around the corner. What does this government do? It oversees the sacking of people from universities—and it is deliberate. This is about social engineering from the Liberal government. This is about the government saying there are certain people it doesn't want educated—people who are poor or come from a working-class background or who might not think the same way as the Liberals. The Liberals only want people going to university if you can afford to pay for it—and not everyone in this country can. This is something the Liberals probably don't understand. My dad was the first person in his family to go to university. It wasn't something that wasn't done in his family. It was a very working-class family. He was able to go to university because it was free—or close to free. He knew that he would be able to afford it and wouldn't graduate with a massive debt hanging around his neck. As a result of that, he managed to go on and give back to his community in a way he would not have been able to do had he not gone to university. He helped set up Lifeline in South Australia. He studied courses at university that helped him look after other members of the community. Similarly, my mum was able to learn to become a teacher and go and do other courses as well. All of that is under threat if bills like this one get passed. People will then worry about whether they will be able to afford to pay it off and whether it is really worth the investment. And then they decide not to go to university, which is precisely what the Liberals want. When it comes to university fees, if the Liberals are looking around at how much university should cost, I've got a simple answer. When it comes to university, the only acceptable cost for a degree is zero dollars. That's what it should cost to get a university degree in this country. And we can afford it if we stop giving handouts to billionaires and big corporations. If we have a fair, progressive tax system in this country and we don't go ahead with giving tax cuts to billionaires, which Liberal and Labor voted for, which is going to cost the budgets billions of dollars, if we decide to make our society equal we can have free education for everyone in this country. It is not a pipedream. Yes, things have to be paid for. And the question is: what is the fairest way to pay for it? Is having arts students paying double the debt and having a debt hanging around their neck for 20 years the fairest way to pay for it? Or is not giving tax cuts to millionaires the fairest way to pay for it? Maybe we could rethink the Labor and Liberal tax cuts to millionaires package, stop giving handouts to those who can afford it, and instead have free education in this country. That is what we need to do now, more than ever, as we deal with the effects of the coronavirus, because we know the coronavirus has brought about an economic crisis in this country, and the burden of that has been disproportionately felt by young people. Before the coronavirus crisis started, three out of 10 young people in this country either had no job or not enough hours at work. I think that's a national crisis and a national shame. Within a month of the coronavirus distancing restrictions happening, it jumped up so that four in 10 young people either didn't have a job or didn't have enough hours of work. And the jobs that many young people were looking forward to—it's going to take a long time for those industries to get back on their feet. Areas like arts, hospitality, tourism and education will not go back to the way they were before, if they go back at all, because of social distancing restrictions that may well linger from the coronavirus. So young people are looking at a very bleak jobs future, indeed, under this government. What we should be doing is offering young people—not more debt, not more attacks—a guarantee and some hope. We can do it if we have the courage to stand up to the billionaires and stop giving out unfair tax breaks to big corporations. We could fund, instead, a guarantee for young people, where every young person in this country has a guaranteed place at a university or TAFE, has a guaranteed income that they can live on, or a guaranteed job, if they want it, working on some nation-building, planet-saving projects as we invest in industries to tackle the climate emergency and make Australia more creative and equal. We have two ways out of this crisis. We either stand up to the big corporations who've been making a mint while this crisis has being going on and stop giving handouts to millionaires and billionaires and, instead, say, 'You've got to pay your fair share,' and we can take that money and use it to invest in nation-building, planet-saving, job-creating projects and give young people a guaranteed place at university or TAFE—a guarantee that's free—a guaranteed job or a guaranteed income they can live on, or we can go down the road that the government is taking us. That is where Australia turns into a US-style unequal society: if you want to go to university, you'd better hope you've got rich parents who can start saving from your birth; otherwise, it'll be out of your reach. We'll end up with a society, under this government, where young people can't find a job either. The government has a very big track record in blaming people for not finding jobs that aren't there. When you've got 13 or so people competing for every one job vacancy that's there, when you have young people facing, on the government's projections, high unemployment for months if not years to come, you can't punish them even further by putting them into more debt because they choose to go to university. The government is forcing people to make a terrible choice. They're saying, 'If you go to university you're going to end up with a debt that's saddled around your neck for 20 years or so,' and, on the other hand, they're saying, 'By the way, there are no jobs available in the job market, so what are you going to do? We're going to cut JobSeeker or the unemployment assistance as well.' The government is giving young people the middle finger with this bill and saying that it does not care about the future of young people. This bill must be stopped, because it would fundamentally alter who is able to get a university education in this country and what Australia looks like. It's an attack on equality in Australia. It's an attack on democracy in Australia. Most of all, it is an attack on young people. Young people have been suffering enough. It is time to bin this bill, to say we need free education and say we'll stand up to the millionaires and the billionaires and the big corporations and make them pay their fair share so that in this wealthy country of ours everyone is entitled to a university education, no matter how much money they earn or where they come from. This bill must be stopped. 18:14 Ms TEMPLEMAN 181810 Macquarie The Prime Minister speaks of giving hope but his actions aren't matching his words, and this legislation, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020, is an example of that. This legislation takes away hope, takes away hope from young people, and it should not be passed by this parliament. We're in the midst of a recession. Youth unemployment has gone through the roof, rising by more than 90,000 in just the last few months. There are fewer job opportunities for people leaving school. They have little hope of planning a gap year for next year to expand their horizons, so study is the obvious route for them. And what does this Prime Minister want to do? He wants to jack up the cost of a university degree for those thousands of students. This legislation makes it harder and more expensive for Australians to go to university. It saves the government about a billion dollars, but students will pay more for degrees. Thousands of students will pay more than double for the same degree that other students are currently looking at. Forty per cent of students will have fees increased to $14,500 a year. That might not seem a lot if you're paying $30,000 at an elite private school for your year 12 education. But, for most families, that $14,500 is a killer. That's the difference between being able to say, 'Yes, we're pushing you to go to university' and 'Wow, that's a debt that's going to take a long time to repay.' Right upfront, I want to deal with one of the misconceptions of this legislation. The government say that they want to encourage students to take certain degrees to be job ready. I'll deal with some of the nonsense of that statement shortly. But, to this issue of encouraging people to take certain courses, such as maths, science and engineering, among others: as always, what the Prime Minister delivers doesn't match the promise. This legislation actually reduces the money universities will receive to deliver those very same courses. It provides a disincentive for universities to enrol extra students in those STEM disciplines. People studying the humanities, commerce and communications will pay more for their degree than doctors and dentists. They'll also take maybe twice as long to repay the costs of those degrees. Yet there is no evidence that these degrees make students any less employable than other degrees. In fact, the most recent research shows that people with a humanities degree have the same employment rates as those with a science or maths degree—87 per cent, no matter which degree you're doing. In this place, there are many of us with a communications degree. I didn't go and study communications because I thought I would use it to become a member of parliament. You don't know what your journey's going to be when you're an 18- or 19-year-old university student. Those degrees offer a pathway. Every member of the Prime Minister's cabinet went to university—many went for free—but they don't think anyone else's kids deserve the same opportunity. I want to talk to you about the sorts of kids who are going to be scared off a university education if this bill passes, thanks to this Liberal government—the kids who, when they start their degree, don't know what they want to be when they grow up, but for whom it is a step in the journey of being an employable, contributing member of our society. I'm not going to give you the statistics; I'm going to give you just one person's story. This is part of Ellie's story. She's given me permission to tell it. By the end of year 11 at her Blue Mountains public high school, Ellie was living out of home. She was bright, and she wanted to finish year 12 and go to university. She didn't really know what university would be like. No-one in her family had been to university. Getting through year 12 was a struggle, but she did it, supported by some wonderful teachers. With some special consideration, her marks resulted in an offer of an arts degree at the University of New South Wales. Even then, a decade ago, she was really uneasy about the debt that she'd be building up by doing this degree. People were saying to her: 'Well, what's an arts degree? What does it give you at the end? What job does it skill you for?' Ellie lived with me during her first year of university, and no doubt it was a struggle still. Meeting the deadlines for essays would bring on waves of self-doubt about whether she was capable of it. Friends not at uni would tell her that she could always quit. But my message to her was: of course it's hard—it's meant to be hard, and your brain is meant to work hard, but it will get easier. And it did. Ellie's degree allowed her to explore all sorts of disciplines, from philosophy to languages, global development, psychology and international relations. She got to have a taste of all of those. She took a bit longer to finish her degree, because it took her a while to work out which discipline was for her. In the end, she thrived and discovered a love of how society works and of social justice issues. She was offered an honours year, and she completed that, learning even more the ability to explore, sort and make meaning of large volumes of information and ideas—exactly the sorts of skills we need in this information-rich age that we live in. On finishing her degree, Ellie moved to Darwin and, after persistence, found herself working in a variety of government departments, including on the Territory government's response to the Royal Commission into the Detention and Protection of Children in the Northern Territory, and she worked on policy around the foster child care system. She learned how policy is developed and how is it, or isn't, implemented. When she began her degree, if I'd said to her, 'Hey, Ellie, this is where you'll be; this is what you'll do,' she would not have believed me. I couldn't imagine where she would go, but I knew she would find herself on this journey and become a really valuable member of our public service. But she hasn't stopped there. She would not have imagined that she would now be living in Newcastle, working in the mental health sector and doing her PhD, doing research around the carers of people with mental illness. I asked Ellie just the other day if she would have pursued an arts degree at university a decade ago if she'd faced a $14,000-a-year bill for it, and she said, 'No way.' Her decision at the time was already a leap of faith. This is the sort of student that this government wants to deny an opportunity—an opportunity to explore their potential. They're saying to people, 'You have to be rich to get a university degree in certain humanities subjects,' or in commerce, or in business, for goodness sake! This cannot be denied to all those students who have potential, who haven't yet had the opportunity to reach that potential. Those opposite talk about aspiration. How dare they say that a student like Ellie shouldn't aspire? They say that she should know her place—that she should not have the same future that they want for their children. So where are we now? Let's think about the timing of this legislation. It is so unfair that the government is raising this matter as year 12 students are facing what we all look at as the toughest year any year 12 has had in their schooling and as they're preparing for their final exams. They've had a year of uncertainty. Many of us have been parents of year 12 students and we know what it's like in a regular year, let alone a pandemic. While there's a world of uncertainty for them, here the Morrison government is throwing uncertainty and trepidation into their future university aspirations. The bottom line is that this law would shift the cost of education further to students, and the Commonwealth would be contributing less. In spite of this, we know that it's not that people don't want to go to uni—they do. Right now the demand for university places has surged. In New South Wales, twice as many people have applied for university this year as last year, and yet the cap remains, and there are not going to be enough extra places to meet this increase in demand. Where they've promised new places, the government have provided no new funding. In fact, there's an extra kick in this for aspiring university students living in the Blue Mountains and the Hawkesbury. The electorate of Macquarie has been classed as a low-growth area. What does that mean? That means we get a lower allocation of university places. It must suit the political leanings of those opposite to make these sorts of decisions, to make sure that many people in large swathes of Western Sydney, which is the fastest-growing area in New South Wales and probably in Australia, will have even fewer options to go to university. Under these reforms, the whole package of reform that this bill sits within, there is less support for low-SES students—that is, disadvantaged students. While those opposite might crow about some benefits in some regional areas, those benefits are taken away from Western Sydney. Western Sydney is paying the price for this government refusing to put more money into the system. For months now we have been calling out the government's approach to universities. It has constantly tried to take funding away and limit the ability of universities to offer the sorts of education we want our children to have. JobKeeper is a classic example of that, and the Prime Minister has done nothing to stop job losses. He has failed to provide JobKeeper for universities, even changing the rules three times to make sure that universities are not eligible for JobKeeper. And we're not just talking academics, we're talking tutors, admin staff, library staff, catering staff, grounds staff, cleaners and security—all of these people who work within the confines of a university campus who are now desperately trying to make ends meet. We know that the job losses are already more than 3,000, with thousands more to come. University Australia is forecasting 21,000 job losses in coming years, and yet the Prime Minister talks about giving people hope. By this very action, by this legislation, hope is what's being taken away. Interestingly, when I started my communications degree, like most people, I didn't think about where it would go, but if I were going back in time now, having to think not just about the journey but about the price that I would pay for that journey, I don't know if I would have made that choice either. I was ambivalent. I picked a degree and said, 'I will see what it's like.' One of the things we're taking away from our young people is the opportunity to make a mistake, to pick the wrong degree and to then be able to start on something else. Everything I've seen about young people shows we just need to get them to take that first step. I just don't know how those opposite can live with themselves knowing that they are removing that sort of hope from so many people. Really, all I think about is how dare they do this. How dare they do it to young people and their families. It's parents and teachers who, right now, are trying to keep an even keel for students at this time. How dare they dictate to young people what their future studies should be. How dare they tell young people by their actions that they should study this but not that. How dare they say to young people that learning for its own sake is not enough and everybody should value learning. We talk about that going through school: that we should learn to love learning. To value some learning above others, when all learning, whether it's university or TAFE, has value, is an absolute disgrace. And how dare they deny the Ellies of today the chance to be ambitious. How dare they take away hope, but that's exactly what this legislation does. 18:28 Ms KEARNEY LTU Cooper [by video link] I'd like to acknowledge that I'm speaking on the land of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation, and I pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging. What a friendless bill this is. It is so friendless that even the coalition's partner the Nationals don't even really like it. This is a dangerous bill. It's dangerous because it will mean that Australia and Australians will be far the worse for it. It is dangerous because it has the potential to see this country go backwards. It's dangerous because it will stymy the potential that we know Australia harbours, that we harbour in the minds and the future growth of our youth. It's dangerous because it tells some of our brightest and most ambitious young folk that they are not valued, that their talents are not wanted and that their potential is not worth the time or the trouble to invest in. What kind of government would say and do that to our future? Despite the hubris and the marketing speak of the minister, this is a bill that will make it harder and more expensive to go to university. This is a bill that gives universities fewer resources and then asks them to do more with less. This is a bill that does not begin to expand places nearly enough to meet the huge growth in demand we've already seen from students who want to go to university or TAFE. This is a bill that says it's promoting science and engineering when in fact it actually does the exact opposite, and it is a bill that says social sciences or humanities have no value. It's a disgraceful and dangerous bill. Perhaps if the member for Wannon had undertaken a degree in social sciences, he might have actually helped draft a bill that assisted kids to go to university. You'd think that a government would want that. As it currently stands, the bill will make it harder and more expensive for our kids to go to university. As the National Tertiary Education Union said, it's a headline-grabbing assortment of student fee hikes and student fee discounts that has cunningly hidden the government's most important decision—to make real cuts to university funding and real increases to the average fees paid by Australian students. I'd like to acknowledge my colleague the member for Sydney for her incredible work on this. She is the real deal. She knows what it takes to be the smart country, to unlock potential and to make kids feel valued for who they are and for what strengths they have. Labor's position on this is loud and clear: we do not support this bill. We do not love this bill. Deputy Speaker, let me count the ways and take you to the depths and breadths of the problems with this bill. Firstly, many students will pay more, some much more than others. This Liberal government had to be dragged kicking and screaming to support people in a pandemic. Thanks to the union movement and thanks to Labor, they were forced into a position where they had to agree to a package to help those affected by the crisis. But, of course, they left many people out, and we've had a lot to say about that. The fact is that this government does not like supporting everyday people. We know how they feel about Medicare. They think if you're sick, you should pay for your own health care. If you're unemployed, bad luck—it's your fault. If you're young, you don't deserve help. If you're old—well, we know what they think about that. And if you want a good education, you can pay for it yourself. Only last week, I think it was, the Treasurer confirmed this when he wistfully invoked the memories of Thatcher and Reagan, confirming that he and his government don't believe in society. They think there are only individuals out there, on their own, with their bootstraps. So it's no surprise to see that the central purpose of this legislation is to push the cost of education onto students, onto individuals. As I said, it's in the Liberal Party's DNA to make individuals bear a larger share of the cost of their education and for the government to bear as little as possible. On average under this legislation, students will pay seven per cent more for their degrees. Forty per cent of students will have their fees increased to $14,500 a year—doubling the cost for thousands. Some students will see increases of 113 per cent. That means people studying the humanities, commerce and communications will pay more for their degrees than doctors and dentists. Year 12 students have persevered through incredible uncertainty this year. The last thing we should be doing right now is making it harder and more expensive for kids to get into university or saying to them, 'Your strengths, your potential, are not valued.' We are in the depths of recession. Youth unemployment has gone through the roof, rising by more than 90,000 in recent months alone. True to the Liberal government, they say, 'Bad luck'. As the member for Sydney said earlier, how dare you limit the potential of some of our kids. In a country like Australia, every child should have the opportunity to go to university to fulfil their own potential. The second main problem with this bill is that it is a pea and thimble trick. Universities will get less to do more. If you actually believed the minister, you would think this bill was flooding the higher ed sector with money, but the effect of this bill, as I said, is to actually increase the student fee burden but at the same time reduce the Commonwealth funding to the sector—and not by a small amount, either. It will cut $1 billion from universities. The average funding per student paid to universities will drop by 5.8 per cent. By reducing expenditure in the higher-cost disciplines, the government is expecting universities to deliver high-quality teaching and student support with even less funding. These cuts are on top of the $16 billion projected revenue drop due to the loss of international students and the $2.2 billion cuts already made to university funding by the government. La Trobe University in my electorate has been hit hard: hundreds of jobs lost and no access to JobKeeper. As we know, the government specifically changed the rules in universities to access JobKeeper. But wait; there's more. The third major problem is that it has built in perverse incentives. It's completely unclear what on earth the member for Wannon was trying to achieve here, but the incentives in their legislation work against the stated aims of the government's own policy. Either they think the Australian people are stupid or they themselves are not really very bright. In areas where the government want greater enrolment, they are paying universities less per student. To be clear, while promising to support the study of maths, science and engineering, this legislation reduces the money that universities will receive to provide those courses. It provides a disincentive for universities to enrol extra students in these disciplines and a perverse incentive to enrol students in other areas which will deliver more funding. I ask you: go figure, Deputy Speaker. A fourth issue with this bill is: what's wrong with studying humanities? What's wrong with studying commerce or social sciences? I think this is the part of the legislation that infuriates me the most. It's an attack on humanities degrees with the assumption built in that graduates of these degrees amount to nothing or add no value. In fact the job prospects of humanities students are very healthy. According to recent research, people with humanities degrees have the same employment rates as science or maths graduates. Humanities degrees are the ones that teach students how to critically study the world. As Robert French, Chancellor of UWA and former High Court Chief Justice, said: Humanities is the vehicle through which we understand our society, our history, our culture. I'm not talking about the more obscure courses. The mainstream of humanities allows teachers and universities to transmit our history and our society to students. What's wrong with having more experts in the humanities? What's wrong with having more experts in child welfare? What's wrong with having experts in family and domestic violence, in helping disadvantaged youth in drug and alcohol recovery, or in international relations? What's wrong with having more authors and more people shaping our cultural growth? And what's wrong with having success stories like that told by the previous speaker, the wonderful member for Macquarie, about the young woman, Ellie, who is so successful in doing research improving lives? We need more critical thinkers, especially when we have people like the member for Hughes peddling dangerous myths, when my inbox is swamped with people sucked in by crazy conspiracy theories and when international diplomatic expertise is vitally important. Surely we need more people to study humanities, not fewer. This bill is reckless. It makes it more expensive to go to university. It cuts university funding. It doesn't even set out to do what it's supposed to do. It locks kids out of their full potential, and it will send Australia backwards. This bill is a dangerous bill, and, no, we do not support it. 18:39 Ms CLAYDON 248181 Newcastle I'm very proud to stand in this chamber, along with my Labor colleagues, in strong opposition to this bill before the House, and I am also very pleased to support the amendment moved by the member for Sydney earlier today. I thank her for standing up for young Australians and for tertiary education in this country. Both young Australians and the tertiary education sector have a lot at stake with this legislation before the House. I note that there have not been an overwhelming number of government speakers on this bill, which is a little surprising, given the purported significance of this bill according to the ministers. The Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 is a very obvious and shameful attack by the Morrison government on universities and young Australians alike. It rips $1 billion out of universities, right at a time when the sector is already on its knees. It makes getting to university harder and more expensive for young Australians. It forces students to pay higher fees, on average, and thousands will miss out on a university education altogether because the Morrison Liberal government is failing to produce enough places. The government likes to pretend that this legislation is designed to encourage students to take up courses like STEM, yet it is slashing the amount that universities will receive for these very same courses. How on earth does that make sense? At the same time, it is waging a fevered ideological attack on the very foundations of critical thinking—the humanities—by hiking the cost of these courses by 113 per cent. Let's not forget that every single one of the Prime Minister's cabinet ministers went to uni. Indeed, they've got 51 degrees between them. It was good enough for them, but now they want to pull the ladder up behind them so that future generations can't benefit. This will hit thousands of young Australians hard and at the very worst possible time in our nation's history. Almost one in five Australians under the age of 20 and more than one in 10 of those aged between 20 and 29 have lost their jobs since this pandemic hit. Now, with youth unemployment sitting at more than 16 per cent, the only alternative to university for many Australians is going to be a dole queue. This is an outrageous proposition. We know that our universities should be a critical part of our economic recovery plan. Instead, the Morrison government is starving them of funds. I'm particularly concerned about the impact this plan will have on my university, the University of Newcastle, and on our world-class enabling programs in particular, which have had all loadings removed from Commonwealth Grant Scheme funding. This legislation also instates annual growth funding of 3.5 for regional campuses, but, shamefully, the University of Newcastle won't be able to access this, because it's been classified as metropolitan despite an excessive regional presence. Make no mistake, this legislation is damaging, it is reckless and it is going to hurt our young people and hold back our economic recovery. Universities make a massive contribution to our country and our economy. They support a staggering 260,000 jobs, including 14,000 in regional communities like mine. But the sector is now in dire straits as COVID-19 restrictions shut the door on international students and slash billions of dollars from universities' income. It is estimated that, without support, 21,000 university jobs will go in just the next six months. In fact, it's already started, with thousands of job cuts already announced by universities across Australia. With such devastating consequences you'd think the government would do anything to provide a lifeline to this critical sector, wouldn't you? Astoundingly, they haven't. Indeed, at every turn, at every opportunity, the Morrison government have refused point blank to help. They've even gone out of their way to exclude public universities from JobKeeper, changing the rules three times to ensure they did not qualify. Now they're levelling a further billion dollars worth of cuts at possibly the worst time in history. Australian universities hold the key to our recovery and indeed our future prosperity, but this government seems hell-bent on kicking them when they're down. I'd like to just go to a couple of parts of this legislation in detail—matters I flagged in my opening remarks. As I mentioned, this plan more than doubles the fees for people studying humanities now. They will go up from $27,216 to $58,000 for a four-year degree. The government tries to justify this with a shameless ruse about prioritising job-ready courses. Of course, we know this to be a nonsense. Indeed, it has now been thoroughly demolished by data that came out this week showing humanities graduates have exactly the same post-study employment rate as those who studied science or maths. This is clearly a brazen attempt by the Liberal government to socially engineer outcomes by hiking the costs of degrees that they don't want people to study. But why? If it's not just about jobs, what on earth is going on? Some say it's the outcome of conservative ideology and a longstanding disdain for the humanities. Others think this gives the Liberals too much credit for acting in line with any sort of values. They would argue that this is about partisan politics pure and simple. So great is the Liberals' fear of a critically thinking and, it must be said, disproportionately progressively voting citizenry that they'll use any means they can to cut this off at the source. Whatever the motivation, it is not rooted in evidence, and our entire nation will be the poorer if it proceeds. On the other side of the fence, we have the STEMM funding. The government tell us that they want to encourage more students to study science, technology, engineering, maths and medicine. That's great. These are all strong skill sets from the University of Newcastle, I can assure you, and there will certainly be plenty of opportunities for these graduates from STEMM and their skills in the years to come. But the government's argument about STEMM rapidly comes unstuck when you learn that, rather than encouraging universities to enhance their STEMM offerings, they're slashing the funding that universities receive for these courses. You might recall, Deputy Speaker, that I just said what strong suits these subjects are for the University of Newcastle, but they don't get to benefit in any way, shape or form from additional funding. Indeed, this legislation is creating a disincentive for universities to offer STEMM places. Let's be clear. This isn't about fostering the great scientific and mathematical minds of the future; it's about cutting funding to universities, pure and simple. This bill slashes $1 billion at a time when we are going to need an extra 3.8 million Australians to get a tertiary education by 2025. This is unconscionable and absolutely against the national interest. I'd like to turn now to a matter about the enabling programs which I feel very passionate about, as indeed does my community. The complete lack of certainty about ongoing funding arrangements for enabling programs is deeply worrying. Enabling programs offer people an alternative pathway to university, and they've been doing so for decades. There are now tens of thousands of university graduates who might have never gone to university at all had it not been for an enabling program. Regrettably, the bill before us today removes all enabling course loadings from the Commonwealth Grants Scheme funding, when its replacement program is not yet developed or included in this legislation. It gives zero certainty to the Indigenous, regional and low-SES attainment funding that would support all the enabling students who are currently eligible. On the contrary, if this fund proceeds as it has been foreshadowed, up to 60 per cent of enabling students, including those with disability and those who don't fit neatly into equity categories, may be ineligible for funding. This could potentially slash support for this important program by over $20 million if other provisions are not made. As the nation's oldest and largest provider of these programs, the University of Newcastle—indeed, our entire region—has the most to lose with any reduction in enabling support. The university supports thousands of disadvantaged students into degrees through three enabling programs, including a very large proportion of first-in-family university students—like my sister, like me, that generation of kids coming through first in the family to ever step foot inside a tertiary institution. With close to 20 per cent of current University of Newcastle students undertaking an enabling course before commencing their undergraduate degree, any reduction in resources from these programs would impact severely on the university's ability to deliver on its equity mission for disadvantaged students. If the university were forced to charge fees for these life-changing programs to make up the shortfall, we know that up to 80 per cent of students simply would not proceed at all. This would be to their great personal detriment. It would also be a very real loss to the university, our region and our national productivity and capability. It's gravely disappointing that the university sector has had no support from the federal government through the COVID-19 crisis. This will make a bad situation even more dire in my community. Enabling programs are known as positive, life-changing experiences that thousands across Newcastle and the Hunter region and the Central Coast—I acknowledge the member for Dobell in the chamber—have benefited from. More than 40,000 graduates of the University of Newcastle have come out of an enabling program. That's because they have a university that demands an equity consideration in their education. They strive to be both excellent and equitable. When the Abbott government tried to charge fees for students to participate in enabling programs, which is the last time a Tory government had a crack at this, I was inundated with heart-felt calls and messages from current and former students as well as university staff about the terrible impact this would have on our community and beyond. I can see no sensible reason to rip support for enabling programs out of the legislation, given their remarkable and undeniable success. Given there has been no consultation on how the IRLSAF, as proposed, will work and given the new arrangements for equity funding aren't scheduled to start until 2023, it seems highly premature to remove course loading from enabling programs now. At a time when we should be giving disadvantaged Australians every opportunity to get a quality education, support for these important programs should be bolstered not diminished. Last week I wrote to the minister about this issue. I called on him to commit to ensuring that no changes are made to enabling programs until there is a clear pathway delineated for equity funding. I also asked for his assurance that current and future enabling students and our university won't be detrimentally affected by these changes. There's so little time left, this evening, but I do wish to say in closing how distressed I am about the changes to regional classifications that are also part of this university. This legislation means that not counting the University of Newcastle as a regional university—despite the fact it has campuses in Taree, Moree, Orange, Port Macquarie and Coffs Harbour, a very big regional footprint—will mean a massive loss of funding for this university. I look forward to seeing the members for Robertson, Lyne and New England stand up and reject this legislation. 18:54 Dr CHALMERS 37998 Rankin Thank you for the opportunity to contribute to this really important debate about university funding and university education more broadly and, at its core, the opportunities that we make available to our people, particularly our young people. Tomorrow, late morning, we will learn what a lot of Australians already know and will have confirmed, that Australia is in the deepest and most damaging recession of any of our lifetimes. We will learn when we get the national accounts tomorrow that Australia is in a diabolical recession. I think that should make all of us pause and reflect not just on what that means for all of our people—especially our young people—but also on what we want Australia, the best nation on earth, to look like after this nightmare has ended, what we want to be able to say about what we did here and what we want to be able to say about this generation of political representatives and the opportunities that they've made available to generations that follow us. One of the things about recessions is that they rob people of opportunities—one of the reasons why we are in such a serious state as a nation, as the economy goes backwards at a faster rate than it ever has since these records were first kept. We have one million unemployed Australians already, and the government expects another 400,000 Australians to join them between now and Christmas. These are pretty confronting numbers. They remind us, as we are reminded daily, that recessions rob people of opportunities. Recessions also have a disproportionate impact on different parts of our country, people of different ages, people of different genders, people from vulnerable backgrounds, people who need a little bit of help to access and hitch their wagon to the tremendous engine of opportunity that higher education can provide. That, again, is really what this legislation is about. Our job—our responsibility, our obligation, our calling—is to make it easier for more people to grab the opportunities of a nation like ours, especially but not only when those opportunities are so difficult to come by. This recession accelerates some of the things we were most worried about in our economy, our society and our communities even before most of us had heard of COVID-19. It accelerates some of the inequality, it accelerates some of the social and economic immobility—some of those issues that we were already quite concerned about. The circumstances we find ourselves in make those problems much, much worse. I have talked before about how our responsibility needs to be to avoid sacrificing a generation of Australians to this recession. We can't have a lost generation. We can't look back on this time and conclude about our own actions here that we did nothing when it came to losing a generation—sacrificing a generation, discarding a generation—to the worst impacts of this recession that we're going through right now. We need to be absolutely certain that our objective here is to leave nobody behind during the recession and to hold nobody back in the recovery. That is our task. In order to do that, when it comes to education, our young people in particular—not that it is just young people who access a university education—are probably the most vulnerable people impacted by what is going on here. We need to make it easier for them to access opportunity, not harder. That means making it easier for them to access a university education, not harder—and that goes to what those opposite are proposing in this bill, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020. The member for Sydney, the member for Newcastle and other speakers, in their high-quality contributions tonight, have pointed out that the reason we will oppose this bill is that it makes it more expensive for more Australians to go to university. It makes students pay more for their degrees. It means thousands of students will pay more than double for the same qualification. It cuts billions from the sector while doing nothing to help young people get into high-priority courses and jobs. Unfortunately, this effort to diminish higher education—to diminish our universities, to make it harder for our people, including our young people, to access the opportunities which we were all able to access, which were within our reach—makes that harder for a number of reasons. But I think the most damaging conclusion—the most damaging impulse, the most damaging instinct—that those opposite have drawn from this crisis that we confront together as a nation is that this is an opportunity for them, an excuse for them, to indulge some of their longstanding ideological obsessions. And, unfortunately, universities and university students are caught in the crosshairs of the government's ideological obsessions. Sometimes it feels like those opposite are trying to continue and prolong the experience that they might have had in student politics on campus or something like that. It seems like too many of them are here to prosecute some kind of vendetta against the higher education system, the university system and university students that have come after them. So many of them were able to access the opportunities which are so crucial to making your way in the world of work, but they want to deny those opportunities for so many people—including, disproportionately, the types of students which are represented on this side of the House and certainly in my community. One of the things that I'm proudest of is the efforts of the Labor side of the parliament throughout history in making higher education more available and more accessible to people from communities like the one that I represent. This bill takes that effort backwards rather than forwards. It is part of a bigger ideological play. We know this because it's not just universities those opposite are going after; they're also using this as an excuse to go after superannuation, for harsher industrial relations and to go after pensions. All of these things are of a piece. What they speak to is a government that isn't sitting down during the course of this crisis and working out what is the best version of this nation after the recession subsides. They're sitting around and working out: 'How do we indulge some of these ideological obsessions? How do we, in the hope that too many people are distracted by the near-term pressures of the first recession in almost three decades, sneak through changes on uni, pension, super or industrial relations'—the list goes on and on. I think that's a shameful conclusion for them to draw. The country is counting on them. When we consider what the economy looks like, what our society looks like and what our nation looks like after this crisis, it can't be a harsher version of Australia. It can't be a version of Australia where opportunities are harder for people to grasp. It can't be an Australia where there's a small group of people who find it easy to access opportunity and to get ahead, and more and more Australians who find it harder and harder and harder. This is not the vision of Australia that we on this side of the House will sign up to as we contemplate the recovery from this recession. If we are to recover strongly we need to make sure that more people can access those opportunities and that more and more people have a stake in our national economic success, when that success returns. We have a lot to be proud of in this country, but one of the things we should be proudest of is how we provide those opportunities. We shouldn't be the type of society where your bank balance determines the type of education or the type of opportunities that you can access. So we won't be supporting this bill. We have made that very clear; the member for Sydney and others have made that point with characteristic eloquence. We can't sign up to things that make it harder for people to get by and get ahead. We can't sign up to something which uses this recession, the first recession in three decades, the deepest and most damaging recession in our lifetime, as an excuse to make university life harder for people to access in this country. 19:04 Mr DAVID SMITH 276714 Bean I rise to speak in favour of the Labor amendment and in opposition to this bill, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020. I do this on behalf of students and university staff, and their representatives and their families, across Bean. The government has been almost completely absent from this debate, as this is a bill difficult to defend. So many of the announcements of the government have been long on sizzle and short on sausage. This bill, and the Job-ready Graduates Package, is even short on the sizzle. Let's put this upfront: this bill is bad for the university sector. It will cut billions from a sector already under financial pressure at a time when we should be investing more across our higher education sector. This bill is bad for year 12 students. It will make it harder for these young people to get a degree and a job, in what is likely to be the deepest recession of our lifetime. It tries to force young Australians into hand-picked fields, possibly undermining their own aspirations and job opportunities. At a time when there are likely to be fewer gap years, the path to university will be harder. This bill is bad for future students. It will cost-shift onto students. It goes beyond the proposed 2017 reforms—there's a red flag!—and shifts the Commonwealth's share of tuition costs backwards, to 51 per cent of the load. This bill is bad for the economy. It does not make sense that, when we need to invest in university and TAFE education, this bill will cut university funding. At a time when we have one million unemployed, we should be investing in education and skills, investing in the knowledge of our future workforce, investing in the productivity of the nation. This bill is bad for our regional university sector and our local professions. It will reduce base funding for many of the careers we rely on in the capital, and indeed across the region, and will likely impact low-SES students. What will the bill achieve? There has already been significant public and expert criticism of the bill and the associated Job-ready Graduates Package on a wide range of matters. These include flawed underlying assumptions, a limited evidence base, unintended consequences and perverse incentives in the policy as it's designed. Some of the key criticisms include that many students will actually pay more, some much more, than others. Students will, on average, pay seven per cent more for their studies. Around 40 per cent of all students will have their fees increased. Fees will more than double for people studying humanities, jumping from $27,000 to $58,000 for a four-year degree. The package will not support enough places, despite the rhetoric. Claimed additional student places will be achieved with no additional funding, by reducing the average funding for each student going to university. It's all smoke and mirrors. There is nothing in the reform for increased demand due to the recession or to account for the increased number of children now reaching university age. If those over the other side don't think this is an issue, applications to universities have already more than doubled compared to last year. Under the bill, universities will get less to do more. The university sector will face a cut in their guaranteed funding of around $1 billion per year. The average funding per student paid to universities will drop by 5.8 per cent. For example, the fee per student will drop by 16 per cent for engineering, eight per cent for nursing and six per cent for education—critical occupations. These cuts are on top of the $16 billion projected revenue drop due to loss of international students and the $2.2 billion cuts already made to university funding by the government. There are in-built perverse incentives that work against the very policy objectives that this government claims it wishes to achieve. In areas where the government wants greater enrolment, it is paying universities less per student, and, in areas where the government wants to discourage enrolment, it is paying universities more. Further, the claimed policy assumptions are flawed. Experts, including the Council of Deans of Science and the Chancellor of the ANU, the Hon. Julie Bishop, are convinced that student choice will not be swayed by price signals. The government's job demand modelling is based on labour market forecasting done prior to COVID and is highly likely now to be wrong. Let that sink in for a moment. Further, humanities graduates are just as in demand in the labour market as maths and science graduates, but the cost of humanities degrees will more than double. The argument about supposed job-readiness or attractiveness is a complete furphy. Further, the package will have a worse impact on regional universities. Despite an apparent redistribution to regional, rural and remote universities, analysis of the course pricing changes suggests that they will be worse off. The legislation is likely to have a worse impact on women and First Nations people. Average female student contributions will increase by 10 per cent. Average First Nations student contributions will increase by 15 per cent. Twice the number of First Nations students will be enrolled in the highest-fee-paying courses. And, finally, the package is punitive and unnecessarily interferes in student progress. I think it's important that local members represent their communities and their local industries in this chamber. I'm a proud advocate for the Public Service and for our national cultural institutions. I am also a strong supporter of our local world-class higher education sector. The University of Canberra has similar concerns to some of those that I've outlined. The University of Canberra is an institution with a civic mission for Canberra and the region and has a focus on the professions that provide for the workforce needs of Canberra and the immediate region. They strive to produce job-capable graduates, and they have highlighted to me that the Job-ready Graduates Package represents a cut in base funding for key courses—that is, a cut in per-student funding across many subjects, including environmental studies, engineering, clinical psychology, teaching and nursing. If we take a minute to look at the health and nursing field, the per-student annual funding in the allied health field will be cut by more than $2,045 per student, and nursing will be cut, on a per-student basis, by $1,729. Under this package, it is uncertain how clinical placements will be funded. I ask members of this chamber to reflect on the support these workers have provided during the COVID crisis. If you have had a COVID-19 test in Canberra, your test may well have been conducted by a University of Canberra graduate. Indeed, it is likely that UC students are also active as contact tracers, and the university is likely to have trained nurses to use ventilators in a simulated environment. To give further context to the University of Canberra's contribution to the ACT's health system, here are a few statistics. In 2019, they graduated 250 nurses, and 87 per cent started work in the ACT. Last year also, they graduated 325 allied health professionals, and 78 per cent started work in the ACT. One must ask the question: does the package reflect the value our community places on our health professionals and potential health professionals? The answer is no. For the university, it does not end there. For science, the per-student annual funding cut is over $4,000. Let's look at teaching under this package. The per-student funding cut is more than $1,000. Teaching is another profession that has been under the spotlight during the COVID crisis. The university has a commitment to the ongoing education of our local educators, which saw 70 local teachers commence the new capital region Master of Education program in 2019. Under this package, it's uncertain how the teaching practice component will be funded. The University of Canberra also has concerns about inequity in the package. The Graduate Outcomes Survey—Longitudinal released this week shows high levels of full-time employment for University of Canberra graduates, across all areas of study, three years after completing their qualifications. This survey showed nationally that full-time employment rates for humanities, culture and social sciences, at 87 per cent, were basically the same as for science and maths three years after graduation. This shows that the government's rationale for fee setting across disciplines is misplaced. Like other institutions, the University of Canberra also has concerns about late inclusions around unit failure and removal of Commonwealth support for students. These may particularly impact the most disadvantaged students in the sector, including those from First Nations or lower-SES backgrounds. We should be seeing a package that furthers opportunity rather than strips opportunities away, and Labor does not want to see increased disadvantage because of these reforms. There are many others with concerns about this package, including those representing the sciences and engineering. Bronwyn Evans, the CEO of Engineers Australia, had this to say: The … Government's announced changes … may … lead to increased inequality and a harmful reduction in the diversity of skills necessary for a modern workforce. … … … An increase in university fees risks increasing structural inequality for women and people from low socioeconomic status … backgrounds who choose to study humanities, law and other courses that will now leave them in even more debt. The Australian Council of Deans of Science had this to say: Cost is not a critical driver for students to study STEM. And it will not serve to generate more STEM capable graduates if the funding changes undermine the capacity of universities to produce them. The funds that will come to university science to produce graduates will shrink by 16% under the Job-Ready Graduates proposal; less from each student and less from the government. Innes Willox, CEO of AiG—that well-known radical!—said: A large financial burden is being shifted to these future workers who will fill important professional roles required by industry. It's a time to invest in science and research, not cut funding to critical courses and drive perverse incentives into the market by increasing the price of other degrees. It's a time to invest in knowledge, not cut funds and cost-shift. We've already lost thousands of workers across the higher education sector, and these changes will put more pressure on the sector workforce. Just stop and think for a minute. Those on the other side of the chamber who profess to care about the economy, lift your gaze from the ministerial talking points provided to you and consider this: if skilled immigration is limited in the short to medium term, and we are in a recession with likely large job losses in the science and research fields, then we must invest in the knowledge capital of our population, and we must invest now. I agree with Dr Alan Finkel, the Chief Scientist, who argues: There are several ways to improve productivity but knowledge capital, through new technology, skills, R&D and efficient services and production processes, is the most significant factor. He argues further for these investments in R&D, saying: R&D also has positive spillovers, meaning that knowledge can result in increasing returns to scale up production cheaply, and can generate significant benefits for those other than the primary investors as discoveries are made and spread. To conclude: while promising to support the study of maths, science and engineering, this legislation reduces the money universities will receive to provide those courses. It provides a disincentive for universities to enrol extra students in these disciplines. Whilst talking up the importance of STEM careers, the government continues to cut STEM roles in CSIRO and in the DST Group in Defence. Unfortunately, as always with this Prime Minister, the detail doesn't match the announcement. Either the Prime Minister and the minister are misleading Australians about the intention of this bill or they don't know how university funding works. The reform is a complete mess for students, for our community and for the university sectors, and it will be bad for our regional economy here in Bean. It's short on sizzle, short on sausage and long on fizzle—a fizzle we can't afford. That is why Labor opposes the bill. The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the question be put.

The House divided. [19:22]
(The Speaker—Honourable. Tony Smith)

40 AYES Allen, K Andrews, KL Bell, AM Connelly, V Coulton, M Dutton, PC Falinski, JG Fletcher, PW Flint, NJ (teller) Frydenberg, JA Gee, AR Gillespie, DA Goodenough, IR Hawke, AG Hunt, GA Leeser, J Ley, SP Littleproud, D Martin, FB McCormack, MF McIntosh, MI O'Dowd, KD Pearce, GB Pitt, KJ Porter, CC Price, ML Ramsey, RE (teller) Robert, SR Sharma, DN Stevens, J Sukkar, MS Taylor, AJ Tehan, DT Tudge, AE van Manen, AJ Wallace, AB Webster, AE Wicks, LE Wilson, TR Wyatt, KG 34 NOES Albanese, AN Aly, A Bird, SL Bowen, CE Burke, AS Burney, LJ Butler, MC Butler, TM Chalmers, JE Chesters, LM Clare, JD Claydon, SC Collins, JM Conroy, PM Elliot, MJ Freelander, MR (teller) Gorman, P Gosling, LJ Haines, H Hayes, CP Jones, SP King, MMH McBain, KL McBride, EM Murphy, PJ O'Connor, BPJ Phillips, FE Plibersek, TJ Rishworth, AL Sharkie, RCC Stanley, AM (teller) Steggall, Z Thistlethwaite, MJ Zappia, A 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.

19:29 The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question.

The House divided. [19:31]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

41 AYES Allen, K Andrews, KL Bell, AM Connelly, V Coulton, M Dutton, PC Falinski, JG Fletcher, PW Flint, NJ (teller) Frydenberg, JA Gee, AR Gillespie, DA Goodenough, IR Haines, H Hawke, AG Hunt, GA Leeser, J Ley, SP Littleproud, D Martin, FB McCormack, MF McIntosh, MI O'Dowd, KD Pearce, GB Pitt, KJ Porter, CC Price, ML Ramsey, RE (teller) Robert, SR Sharma, DN Stevens, J Sukkar, MS Taylor, AJ Tehan, DT Tudge, AE van Manen, AJ Wallace, AB Webster, AE Wicks, LE Wilson, TR Wyatt, KG 33 NOES Albanese, AN Aly, A Bird, SL Bowen, CE Burke, AS Burney, LJ Butler, MC Butler, TM Chalmers, JE Chesters, LM Clare, JD Claydon, SC Collins, JM Conroy, PM Elliot, MJ Freelander, MR (teller) Gorman, P Gosling, LJ Hayes, CP Husic, EN Jones, SP King, MMH McBain, KL McBride, EM Murphy, PJ O'Connor, BPJ Phillips, FE Plibersek, TJ Rishworth, AL Stanley, AM (teller) Steggall, Z Thistlethwaite, MJ Zappia, A 0 PAIRS

Question agreed to.

19:38 The SPEAKER 00APG The question is this bill be now read a second time.

The House divided. [19:38]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.
Bill read a second time.
Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced.
Debate interrupted.

ADJOURNMENT 74 ADJOURNMENT 19:40 The SPEAKER 00APG It being past 7.30 pm, I propose the question: That the House do now adjourn. Mr Porter 208884 Mr Speaker, I require that the question be put immediately without debate. The SPEAKER 00APG Just to ensure members don't need to swap sides, as we're in the middle of divisions, I'll put the question this way: the question is that the House do not adjourn.

The House divided. [19:42]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.

BILLS 75 BILLS Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 75

Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020

Third Reading 75 19:44 Ms PLIBERSEK 83M Sydney Mr Speaker, I'm seeking to move that so much of the standing orders be suspended as is necessary to allow the member for Sydney to move that this House notes that the bill before the House (1) makes it harder and more expensive to go to university, (2) cuts a billion dollars of government funding from universities and (3) betrays students who have struggled through remote learning during this year, when COVID-19 has hit them so hard. This bill, the dirty secret— The SPEAKER 00APG I'm just going to ask the member for Sydney to sit down. Mr Tim Wilson interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG I recognise the member for Goldstein's voice. He has a habit of thinking he's helping, but he's often not. Unless the member for Sydney can convince me otherwise, I would like her to explain to me where there's been a precedent where, leaving the adjournment aside, the House has resolved the question on the amendment, resolved the second reading—we're now at the point where leave would be granted for the third reading, and you're seeking to move a motion in the middle of that? Mr Burke interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG No, no, I've asked the member for Sydney. Mr Burke DYW I want to raise a point of order. The SPEAKER 00APG I bet you do! Mr Burke interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG I'll hear from the Manager of Opposition Business. You may well have an example, but that doesn't always create a precedent. 19:46 Mr BURKE DYW Watson Mr Speaker, transport legislation was before the House in 2013, moved by Warren Truss. And some members who were here at the time will remember that night, where the government sought to do exactly as it did tonight, which was to gag debate not through a debate management motion but through a series of procedurals, as we have right now. Mr Falinski interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Member for Mackellar, I'm just trying to listen to the Manager of Opposition Business and I don't think you all want to be here longer than you need to. Mr BURKE DYW I don't often put forward precedents set by Speaker Bishop— The SPEAKER 00APG From 2013? Mr BURKE DYW Yes. The SPEAKER 00APG Yes, I'm just checking. Mr BURKE DYW But, under standing order 47(c)(i), suspensions of exactly this nature were ruled to be in order because they were specifically about the conduct of the debate of the bill that was before the House. The reason, ordinarily, that we have to be between bills is that suspensions that are normally being moved have nothing to do with the bills that are before the House. Every single clause of what the member for Sydney sought to move is about the bill that the government is currently trying to prevent the House from having a discussion of. That's why, under those standing orders, it's a reasonable thing for a member to stand and seek to have a suspension of standing orders to be able to debate those specific issues, all of which are relevant to the item under discussion, as happened at the end of the year in 2013. The SPEAKER 00APG I just say to the Manager of Opposition Business: looking at that standing order, I'm familiar with it because I think that standing order was attempted to be invoked on me on the first day I was Speaker, in another capacity. And, knowing the Manager of Opposition Business's attention to detail and his diligence, I'm making the assumption that that is the only example that he can find in the Practice. What that standing order, reading it now, refers to is motions for suspension of standing orders, and he's quite right, as it states: (a) A Member may move, with or without notice, the suspension of any standing or other order of the House. … … … (c) If a suspension motion is moved without notice it: (i) must be relevant to any business under discussion and seconded; and (ii) can be carried only by an absolute majority of Members. It's not referring to legislation between the second and third reading debates. If the Manager of Opposition Business was correct, we would see this happening after the second reading before leave is granted for the third reading. And, frankly, my judgement is that the process of legislation would be pretty chaotic in this place. I completely accept the point of the Manager of Opposition Business that that occurred once in 2013, but, as reluctant as I am to say this, I don't agree with all previous Speakers' rulings. I'm trying to ask leave for the third reading. Is leave granted for the third reading? Mr Burke DYW No. The SPEAKER 00APG Leave is not granted. 19:49 Mr TEHAN 210911 Wannon I move: That so much of the standing orders be suspended as would prevent the motion for the third reading being moved without delay. 19:50 Ms PLIBERSEK 83M Sydney I do not agree with the motion that the minister has just moved, because at the very heart of this proposal is a billion dollar funding cut from those opposite. This year, when youth unemployment is so high— 19:50 Mr TEHAN 210911 Wannon I move: That the motion be put. A division having been called and the bells being rung— Ms Plibersek interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Sydney has been warned in question time. An opposition member interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG I'm just saying to the member for Sydney: she's been warned in question time. A division having been called and the bells having been rung— The SPEAKER 00APG Lock the doors. Mr Frydenberg interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Treasurer, cease interjecting, again. Dr Chalmers interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Member for Rankin and the Treasurer, seriously—I'm going to get a chamber for the two of you, up in the spare House of Reps office! The question is that the motion be put.

The House divided. [19:55]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.

19:55 The SPEAKER 00APG The minister? No, sorry, Minister—we've got to do the question on the substantive motion. The question is that the motion moved by the member for Sydney be agreed to—or disagreed to. The question is that the motion moved by the minister be agreed to. The Manager of Opposition Business? Mr Burke DYW I think we've had a suspension motion to allow the minister to move something—is that what we've done? I'm trying to work out where we're up to. The SPEAKER 00APG Well, the minister moved that the question be put— Mr Burke DYW Right. The SPEAKER 00APG Right! Honourable members interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Well, he did. It's even up there on the board. He did. Honourable members interjecting— The SPEAKER 00APG Well, that's the question I put, and you've all voted accordingly. He did, the second time. So he's moved that the question be put, okay? The question is that the motion for the suspension of standing orders be agreed to.

The House divided. [19:58]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.

19:59 Mr TEHAN ( 210911 Wannon — ) ( ): I move: That the bill be now read a third time. 19:59 Mr BURKE DYW Watson I move: That the debate be now adjourned. The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the motion moved by the Manager of Opposition Business be disagreed to.

The House divided. [20:02]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.

20:04 The SPEAKER 00APG The question now is that the bill be now read a third time. 20:04 Ms PLIBERSEK 83M Sydney I move: That the House delete the word "now" and insert the word "not". The SPEAKER 00APG That is the only amendment that can be made under the standing orders for a third reading. Ms PLIBERSEK 83M It is a disgrace that those opposite, having given only six days to allow comment on the draft legislation, are trying to gag us in here tonight and have denied the opportunity for a Senate inquiry. And do you know why? It's because the dirty secret at the heart of this legislation is a billion dollar funding cut from government to universities, making it harder and more expensive for kids. Think about the kids and the way they have struggled this year to finish their schooling. Think about the remote learning in year 12 as they have been trying to prepare for their final exams Those kids have had as bad a year as you can imagine for year— The SPEAKER 00APG The member for Sydney will resume her seat. The Leader of the House. 20:05 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce I move: That the question be now put. The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the question be now put.

The House divided. [20:06]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.

20:09 The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the bill be now read a third time.

The House divided. [20:09]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.
Bill read a third time.

20:10 The SPEAKER 00APG The Manager of Opposition Business has indicated he wishes to rise on indulgence briefly. 20:10 Mr BURKE DYW Watson Mr Speaker, during the divisions, I was contacted by both the member for Melbourne and the member for Clark, wanting it to be put on the record that they would have voted with the opposition on the large number of divisions we've just had. ADJOURNMENT 81 ADJOURNMENT 20:11 Mr PORTER 208884 Pearce I move: That the House do now adjourn. The SPEAKER 00APG The question is that the House do now adjourn. House adjourned at 20:13

The House divided. [20:12]
(The Speaker—Hon. Tony Smith)

Question agreed to.

NOTICES 82 NOTICES

Tuesday, 1 September 2020

The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Dr Freelander) took the chair at 16:00.

CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS 84 CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme 84 16:00 Mr BOWEN DZS McMahon Today is Eczema Awareness Day, and Monday 14 September is World Atopic Eczema Day. Deputy Speaker Freelander, as one of the nation's most pre-eminent paediatricians, you understand more than anyone in the House the importance of these days to lift awareness of eczema, because it is very badly misunderstood. A lot of people think that eczema is a condition which only affects young people or is only a mild malady—a rash on the back of the hand or something like that—but the truth is it is much more serious. There are over 1.6 million Australians experiencing eczema as we speak, and some of those—in fact, around one in five—suffer from a more severe form of the condition. Severe eczema is not just a rash; it's a chronic inflammatory condition. It is painful, it is itchy and it includes dryness, cracking, redness, crusting and oozing. These physical symptoms often have mental health implications. Forty per cent of Australians with severe eczema suffer depression and anxiety, and 85 per cent have trouble sleeping. Put simply, their quality of life is badly and sometimes permanently affected. This is no minor issue. The good news—and there is good news—is, thanks to medical research and innovation, for the first time in 30 or maybe 40 years new treatments are offering hope to people with severe eczema. The first of these new treatments to be available in Australia is a drug called Dupixent. I heard firsthand about the benefits of Dupixent at an event in Parliament House in February. Sufferers described how this drug had turned their condition and their lives around. These were very moving stories, including from some very young people. This is very encouraging because the Therapeutic Goods Administration, the TGA, has approved the drug as safe and effective and PBAC, the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee, the independent experts, have recommended to this government that it be listed on the PBS. In making the recommendation, the PBAC acknowledged the significant reduction in the extent of the disease and improved patient quality of life, as well as the high clinical need. This recommendation came in March. It has been recommended to government. It has not yet been listed on the PBS. The Minister for Health talks a big game when it comes to PBS listings but he doesn't play a big game. He doesn't actually deliver anywhere near as much as he says he does. The Minister for Health should list Dupixent on the PBS. It is a life-changing drug. There is no excuse. It was recommended six months ago. We've given the minister time. I didn't expect him to list it a day after it was recommended or a week after it was recommended, but he has now had six months. This costs $1,600 a month—far too much for most Australians. Australians are suffering more than they need to because the minister hasn't listed Dupixent. He should list it on the PBS. Petition: Telecommunications 84 16:03 Mr CONAGHAN 279991 Cowper I rise to present a petition entitled 'Improved mobile coverage for Repton'. This petition has been considered by the Petitions Committee and is found to be in order. The petition, commenced by Mr Peter Tristram of Repton in my electorate, contains a number of signatures appropriate for its presentation today. However, in truth, it contains over 300 signatures from the residents of Repton. Repton is a community of approximately 700 residents and lies on the coast a short 23 kilometres south of Coffs Harbour. The main occupations in Repton are 31 per cent professionals, 14.2 per cent technicians and tradies, 12 per cent community personal service workers, 10 per cent labourers and 10 per cent managers and so on. This petition highlights the difficulties that those residents face in obtaining mobile telephone reception for work and safety. In fact, having been to Repton on countless occasions, I know that it is more often than not the case that there is no reception, so imagine trying to work at home during COVID-19 lockdown. It was very eloquently pointed out by Mr Tristram that, if landlines are down because of outages, mobile phones are the only means of contact in emergency situations. This was precisely the situation late last year when we had our own bushfires. Repton RFS captain Mike Ryan heads up three crews of 70 volunteers serving Repton and nearby Mylestrom. From August to December 2019, they'd been out every week preparing and assisting other crews from Kempsey all the way down to Queanbeyan. Between 12 November and 15 November, New South Wales Rural Fire Service forecast ember attacks on Repton and Mylestrom. That night, Repton RFS crews door-knocked every single house in Repton and Mylestrom because there was no coverage to send out bulk SMS messages. Fortunately for many, the predictions did not eventuate. Since that time my office has arranged from Telstra a mobile booster, and its assistance has been helpful but limited. We've also written to the main communication providers requesting that they include Repton in the next round of the Mobile Black Spot Program. I agree with the penultimate paragraph of Mr Tristram's petition, which states in part, 'We respectfully submit that in 2020 it is unacceptable and dangerous that a vibrant rural residential community does not have adequate and safe mobile telephone reception.' I will continue to work with the residents of Repton to ensure they receive the services that they need and deserve. I present the petition to the House. The petition read as follows— Mobile Coverage 85 CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS 85 CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS Shortland Electorate: Medicare 85 16:06 Mr CONROY 249127 Shortland Today I'm updating the House on the Morrison government's continued attacks on Medicare and bulk-billing for the people of Shortland, who I'm proud to represent. Since January, Shortland and the entire Hunter region has been designated as metropolitan for the purpose of determining the bulk-billing rebate GPs receive. Ms Claydon 248181 Outrageous! Mr CONROY 249127 It is outrageous, Member for Newcastle. Before this, Shortland was rightly classified as being regional. Shortland is a regional electorate; it is not metropolitan in any way. There are two local government areas in Shortland—Lake Macquarie and the Central Coast Council. I would ask the Minister for Regional Health—who confirmed to me in writing that the government would not be changing this classification—to visit Shortland. I'd gladly show him around. I'd show him the small lakeside community of Chain Valley Bay and dare him to tell the residents they live in a metropolitan area, and I'd show him the beautiful coastal jewel of Catherine Hill Bay and dare him to tell the residents they live in a metropolitan area. Finally, he might visit the suburb of Mount Hutton, five minutes from my electorate, where many residents have no mobile phone reception in their houses, and tell them they live in a metropolitan area. A government member interjecting— Mr CONROY 249127 I'll take the member opposite's interjection. There aren't many coalmines in a big city. That is why this is a regional electorate. Bulk-billing is important to the people I represent. Shortland is the sixth-oldest electorate in Australia. Over 20 per cent are over the age of 65, and there are 22,500 age pensioners. This group relies on Medicare and bulk-billing. However, many practices have told these pensioners that they are no longer able to bulk-bill them. I've met with the Hunter General Practice Association and they've made it abundantly clear to me that GPs do not want to charge their patients they previously bulk-billed; however, the reality is that, because of this reduction in the rebate they now receive, many practices would not be commercially viable and would close if they continued at the previous bulk-billing rate. Let me spell it out. If the government cuts the amount they pay GPs, which is what this is—those GPs will suffer a Medicare cut—those GPs have two choices: they either charge their patients or they go out of business. That is what this horrible, hopeless government is forcing upon doctors in the Shortland area. Then, in turn, when facing these increased costs, my constituents will be faced with the situation of having to decide whether to do the weekly shopping or see their GP. They are telling GPs that they won't be able to continue with regular appointments because they can't afford it. These are some of the most disadvantaged people in the country, with chronic health conditions. Because of this heartless decision, their conditions will just become more and more chronic. One alternative to consulting a GP is for them to attend an emergency department—something that will add more and more cost for the taxpayers of this country. This cut to Medicare is a disgrace, and I will continue to fight it on behalf of all the residents of Shortland. Gramp, Mr Colin, AM 86 16:29 Mr PASIN 240756 Barker Today I rise to offer my condolences and acknowledge the extraordinary life of Colin Gramp AM, who passed away in his beloved Barossa Valley aged 98. Known for his contribution to the wine industry, Colin was a community leader who worked tirelessly to grow the reputation of that iconic Barossa. He follows a long line of winemakers, including his great-grandfather, Johann Gramp, who was the first person to plant vines at the world-renowned Jacob's Creek in 1847, after migrating from Bavaria. In 1953, Colin Gramp and the Gramp family revolutionised the Australian wine industry by introducing cold pressure fermentation. At a time when 80 per cent of the wine produced in Australia was fortified wine, this change in fermentation practice helped develop Australian wine into the $45 billion industry it is today. From 1947, Colin was a technical director of G Gramp & Sons, growing the business exponentially before that business was sold in 1976 to what would become the world-renowned Jacob's Creek winery. While he was still at school, Colin unfortunately suffered tragedy, losing his father, Hugo Gramp, in a plane crash. When he spoke of this loss, Colin was saddened not only by the loss of his father but by the realisation that he would never get the great opportunity to work alongside and under his father as his father had done with his grandfather and great-grandfather. Despite the plane crash, when duty called during World War II, Colin bravely volunteered to serve in the Royal Australian Air Force. Between 1942 and 1945, Colin served as an air gunner and was part of the 461 squadron—the squadron that was notoriously engaged in 49 operational sorties. When Colin returned home, he continued to serve his country, but this time it was the community. He became involved in various executive boards around agriculture and show societies to promote our regions across Australia and beyond. To list a few, he was a foundational member and past president of the Barossa Valley vintage festival and a council member of the Royal Agricultural and Horticultural Society, including serving as its chairman in 1975. He also chaired the Adelaide Wine Show committee in 1974 and served as a council member for the Roseworthy Agricultural College. Through his extensive knowledge of the wine industry, he served and led these organisations successfully for many decades. I want to thank Colin for his military service. I want to thank Colin for his service to the wine industry and broader business community of South Australia. And, of course, I want to thank Colin for his invaluable contribution to the community of the Barossa Valley. Vale, Colin Gramp AM. COVID-19: Mental Health 86 16:12 Ms CLAYDON 248181 Newcastle I want to draw the parliament's attention to the looming mental health crisis facing Australians in the wake of COVID-19. Experts have warned of deep and lasting mental health consequences of the pandemic for millions of Australians. Indeed, Lifeline is already experiencing a 25 per cent hike in calls compared to last year, and Australians are reporting feeling far more anxious and uncertain about the future. Distressingly, one study found that more than three-quarters of Australians reported a worsening in their mental health during the first period of the COVID-19 crisis. The issue was driven home for me recently when I received a letter from my constituent Ms Emma Warren. Ms Warren wrote to share her experience of mental illness during the pandemic and urged me to call on the government to raise the number of subsidised psychology sessions available for Australians under Medicare. In her powerful letter, Ms Warren wrote, 'As you are no doubt aware, Lifeline, beyondblue, Kids Helpline and all mental health support services are reporting a dramatic increase in people seeking assistance during this pandemic. I myself had weekly Skype sessions with my counsellor in July, as I was suicidal, and the isolation enforced by the pandemic absolutely played a role in my downward spiral. Yesterday, I reached the limit, 10, of subsidised appointments per calendar year with my counsellor, and it's only August. There is enhanced primary care'—which she already accesses as a chronically ill person—'but this is not available to everyone. I'm asking, indeed begging, for your help to call on the Morrison government to implement a special raising of the 10-session cap in the mental health care plan in response to the unprecedented mental health challenges this pandemic has brought.' I'd like to thank Ms Warren for reaching out and commend her for her courage in sharing her story and advocating for others in the same situation. Ms Warren is not alone in having exhausted her allocated care sessions. Indeed, recent reports suggested that one in four Australians on a mental health plan have already reached their cap. Today, I plead with the Prime Minister and the Minister for Health to increase the number of subsidised care sessions for all Australians. I applaud the government's decision to double the cap for patients in Victoria, but mental health impacts, in the tragic times we are living through, aren't restricted to just people in lockdown. Every Australian who's affected by this crisis should be able to access the mental health support they need. It shouldn't be a matter of what you can afford or where you live. Fletcher, Mr Tony 87 16:14 Mr PEARCE 282306 Braddon Last week, Tasmania lost a true gentleman of the Tasmanian parliament. Former MLC Tony Fletcher served in Tasmania's upper house for 24 years, between 1981 to 2005. More comfortable being referred to as 'Fletch' than 'the honourable', his electorate of Murchison covered his adopted heartland of Circular Head, the West Coast, King Island and the Greater Wynyard area. It was there he captained and coached the mighty Smithton Magpies to nine premierships in 13 years. He taught high school and became one of Tasmania's leading insurance agents. This was the region where he and the love of his life, Margaret, decided to settle. It is where they raised their children and watched their grandchildren become young adults. Tony's memorable political career almost didn't happen. When he contested the seat of Russell in 1981, he won the seat by just 51 votes, but such was his impact over the years that he was re-elected unopposed in 1987 and 1993 and, following redistribution, he won the seat of Murchison comfortably in 1999. Tony was a gifted orator and truly a dominant force in Tasmanian parliamentary history. After just five years in the upper house and sitting as an Independent member, Tony was appointed by Premier Robin Gray as the leader for the government in the upper house. In 1996, he was again appointed by Premier Tony Rundle to the leader's role for his proven capacity to take members of the Legislative Council with him and deliver the government's agenda. It was universally acknowledged that Tony had no peer as a parliamentary contributor. He was a man of great wisdom and he brought to all debates a level of thought and consideration that is rarely seen in parliament. On a personal note, every day when I walk around the electorate, I feel that I walk in Tony's footsteps, and I am honoured and I respect and treasure the moment. Tony remains one of the finest grassroots politicians that Tasmania has ever known. He fought for his people, he always had their back, and he never forgot a name, a face or an issue. He made promises and he kept them. He was one of the most caring and most generous men you could ever meet. Tasmania has lost a fine man who will be remembered fondly by all. People right across the North-West, the West Coast and King Island are surely the poorer for it, but, more importantly, richer for having known Tony Fletcher. Gilmore Electorate: Nuclear Energy 87 16:18 Mrs PHILLIPS 147140 Gilmore It's sad indeed that I have to rise in this place once more to strongly and vehemently oppose nuclear energy in any form on the pristine and beautiful South Coast. It is simple: the Liberal-National governments, at both a federal and a state level in New South Wales, are obsessed with nuclear. They have been trying for years, decades even, to get this project off the ground. The New South Wales government, right now, is trying to overturn the ban on uranium mining in our beautiful state. The Deputy Premier himself is a long-term supporter of nuclear power. He has made that no secret. But according to news reports, his cabinet has put him in charge of researching the issue and reporting back. That's outrageous. What is there to report on? As far as I am concerned, that debate is settled. But it isn't just the New South Wales government that is obsessed with nuclear. Those opposite have also been pursuing this for years. I sat on the inquiry into nuclear energy by the Standing Committee on the Environment and Energy. I listened to the evidence that was given and it was clear: there is no basis for nuclear power in Australia. All the evidence points to the same conclusion. So why do we keep going down this path? Why do Liberal and National governments continue to bring this up and push for it when it is nothing more than a distraction? Jervis Bay has been floated for too long as a great destination for a nuclear power plant. I want to make it crystal clear to everyone here. Our community on the New South Wales South Coast will never accept nuclear energy at Jervis Bay or anywhere else on our coast. I will never accept nuclear energy at Jervis Bay or anywhere else. What we need is an actual plan for renewable energy—a plan for the jobs of the future, not a plan to put our community and our environment at risk for a technology we know there is no basis for. Our beautiful coastline and our health are too precious to risk on this thought bubble of the Liberals and Nationals. This year we have been through enough. We've seen the power of nature. We have seen what happens when natural disasters strike. Just imagine if we also had a nuclear power plant to contend with. That risk is unacceptable to me and it should be unacceptable to every single member of this place. It should be unacceptable to the New South Wales government. The Morrison and Berejiklian governments need to rule this out immediately and stop talking about nuclear. We will never allow it to happen. COVID-19: Parliamentary Procedure 88 16:21 Mr RAMSEY HWS Grey We are certainly living in challenging times. The COVID virus is not only challenging Australia economically and in a health sense but also challenging this parliament. I say to the government and to the opposition, 'Well done,' for making the necessary adjustments to the parliamentary program that enable us at this stage to sit and get on with our jobs. While government ministers and the cabinet actually make the day-to-day decisions about running Australia, parliament does need to convene to ratify and to finance those decisions. It needs to meet for members of parliament, particularly the opposition, to test and examine those decisions. It is an important role we play. We are here, as we should be. These agreed arrangements over the past few months have led to parliamentary committees, both Senate and House of Representatives, meeting electronically. In these sitting weeks for the first time ever we've seen members contribute online to the parliamentary debate. We are wearing masks, observing hygiene and practising social distancing. It is social distancing that I want to come to. To facilitate social distancing, the government and the opposition have agreed to 35 pairs at the moment. That's almost unprecedented. Earlier on we did 40 pairs. The government has 23 members not here this week. They're back in their electorates. There all kinds of reasons why they could not come. The opposition is the same. Some have family reasons and some just need to be in their electorates, particularly in Victoria, and serving their members. It was pretty disappointing yesterday to see the opposition revert to quorum tactics. They knew full well that the government had fewer members here to make a quorum. In fact, they called for a quorum while this chamber was sitting. At the time we were in 90-second statements and there were quite a number of members here. That was a cheap shot. We're here to do our job for the good of the nation. While I understand the frustrations of the opposition—I sat in opposition for six years and I know the kinds of things oppositions do to express those frustrations—I for one think that when there is an agreement between the opposition and the government on the number of the people who should be in this place for the safety of the staff and the safety of our electorates when we return—so we don't spread the virus around Australia—the constant calling of a quorum is a cheap shot. They should reconsider before they attempt to play that game again. Showcase Awards for Excellence in Schools, COVID-19: Education 88 16:24 Dr CHALMERS 37998 Rankin I want to pay tribute today to all of the schools, particularly schools in my electorate, that have been recognised by the Showcase Awards for Excellence in Schools. Those are the main awards in my home state of Queensland that recognise the schools, the teachers, the principals and the staff who go above and beyond to deliver really amazing outcomes for local kids. It has been a bit of a tradition that schools in my electorate generally do really well in the showcase awards. In the seven years I've been the member for Rankin, and particularly this year, it has been a pretty steady stream of award winners, and I want to acknowledge that today. This year we've got four schools who have been recognised across six different categories; they've either won or received commendations across those categories. I want to pay tribute to Berrinba East school for their Building Children's Oral Language Through Connections—Kindergarten to Prep Transition program. I want to acknowledge Kingston State College's Growth STEMs From Here program; Mabel Park State School's Our Deliberate Focus program; and Browns Plains State High School, which really did an extraordinary job with its supporting diverse learning needs program as well as a commendation in the Every Child Needs a Champion award category. Browns Plains State High School principal, Blair Hanna, received a commendation in the Griffith University award for excellence in school leadership. I want to salute every one of those schools for their awards and their commendations and their mentions. It really is another remarkable effort by our local principals, teachers, staff and students in our great local schools. While I'm at it I also want to acknowledge all the schools of the nation, including my schools in Rankin, for the extraordinary efforts so many people have put in, in a really difficult, really interrupted year. I can't even imagine what it's like, particularly for year 12 students and their teachers and staff, at our local schools, but really right across the board. I've seen this firsthand, I've experienced this. I've got a young fellow in prep; my daughter is in early learning as well. Some of the things that our teachers and educators and staff have done on behalf of our students—and in my case for my little people—is something that I'm sure the whole parliament can acknowledge and applaud. I thank all of those people for that. It has been a difficult year. Our teachers and staff and principals and students have come through remarkably well so far. So, in addition to the award winners at the Showcase Awards for Excellence in Schools, the Queensland government's main award for state schools, I also acknowledge all the teachers, all the staff, all the principals and all the students for doing what they can to back each other in a difficult year. Higgins Electorate: Environment 89 16:27 Dr ALLEN 282986 Higgins Higgins is proudly conscious of its local environment and its residents act locally and think globally. Whether it is the gorgeous Gardiners Creek reserve in Glen Iris or the simply stunning Victoria Gardens in Prahran, Higgins is home to some truly beautiful places. Local community groups in my electorate of Higgins were very excited to take part in the hugely successful Communities Environment Program. The applications we received were innovative, and in some cases will be transformative in protecting and enhancing our natural environment. One such project I was excited to champion was the installation of a litter trap at Gardiners Creek, where my family often ride their bikes. The litter trap will primarily prevent litter and other large pollutants present in stormwater, such as sediment, from entering the creek. This, in turn, will prevent litter and plastics polluting our oceans. This project has received community support from the Friends of Gardiners Creek Valley, an active community group in my electorate seeking to improve the environmental condition of Gardiners Creek and its surrounds—home to thousands of cyclists and walkers. As a passionate environmentalist, I'm keen to promote sustainability to our younger generations; therefore, I'm very pleased that Lloyd Street primary school is creating an Indigenous garden in acknowledgement of the traditional owners. The project will involve the creation of a raised garden bed and planting of Indigenous species. This is a wonderful local school, and thanks to principal Nerida Smith for designing this innovative concept that will provide a tranquil place for students to learn. Solway Primary School will plant new trees and shrubbery on their school grounds and involve students in the process to ensure they appreciate the importance of revegetation and environmental sustainability. Thank you to principal Lyn Rodda. I know how passionate you are about this project. Finally, I want to congratulate the City of Stonnington for developing their first biodiversity monitoring project, ClimateWatch, along the iconic Yarra River. ClimateWatch is a nationwide citizen science project run by Earthwatch and developed in partnership with the Bureau of Meteorology and the University of Melbourne. This project aims to foster stewardship of the local environment, support community connection to nature, enhance local biodiversity and build community awareness of the important role of nature in the city. The project will also help council to better understand the impacts of its biodiversity projects. These are just a few of the wonderful local initiatives devised by community groups in Higgins. Congratulations to the Yarra Riverkeeper Association, Oakleigh Anglican Church, mecwacare, St Joseph's Outreach Services and the Carnegie Church of Christ, who were also successful under the latest grant round. I look forward to seeing how you've invested your grant, and thank you for promoting a cleaner and greener local environment. Sometimes in inner cities it can be very difficult to access parks and enjoy the beauty that our environment can provide. Thank you to my community for supporting these initiatives. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 In accordance with standing order 193, the time for members' constituency statements has concluded. COMMITTEES 89 COMMITTEES Intelligence and Security Joint Committee 89 Report 89 16:30 Ms TEMPLEMAN 181810 Macquarie Deputy Speaker, what a pleasure to see you in the chair. I don't think I'll forget the disbelief I felt back on 5 June 2019 when John Lyons at the ABC started tweeting that an AFP raid was underway at the ABC. This was my husband's old workplace. I know many ABC journalists. I think my bewilderment was probably tenfold within the walls of ABC's Ultimo headquarters as the raid was happening, and John Lyons brought it to life for us. He told us about the coffees that were being brought in for the AFP officers. He gave us some insight into the conversations that were being had over what I think was a nine-hour raid, where they went through and determined what they were going to take and what they weren't. He described the special AFP sticky tape, the evidence-sealing tape, as they began sealing bags with USBs. I think that was a shock for everyone like me who's been a journalist, because that is not common practice in Australia. We do not have a history of having our offices raided. Since those extraordinary raids on News Corp journalist Annika Smethurst's home—not her workplace, her home—and that ABC headquarters, the Morrison government has maintained that the law was fine, the law doesn't need to change, there's nothing to see here, there is not a problem. But clearly there was a problem, and we all know now that he was wrong to maintain that the law was fine. That there is a problem with the law, and this Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security report has unanimously rejected the view that things are fine. There is something to see here, and there is something that needs to be addressed. As a journalist originally, my initial response to the release of these findings by the committee was one of relief, because the pressures on journalists are bad enough without an additional fear that you'll be locked up for reporting something. I don't think people appreciate this, but, as a journalist, you are busting a gut to make sure that not only do you have the story before one of your competitors or your colleagues but that you can turn it into something that's able to be broadcast or published really fast. And not only do you have to do all that, you have to get it right, or as right as you possibly can, in the time that you've got. So I can't imagine what it feels like now, in this really fast-faced media environment compared to the one I worked in 30 years ago, to see the senior people that you respect facing raids on their offices and their homes. That is not doing anything to bring a sense of confidence to journalists, that by doing the right thing they will be okay. So the bipartisan recommendations in this report are really welcome. I think, if they were implemented, they would go a long way to be a really significant improvement for the legal protections that journalists have. A key change is the way federal warrants that relate to professional journalists and media organisations are issued and contested. So while now this report is saying that we can't have journalists know about the warrant before it's issued, what we can have is a public advocate who can appear before a senior judge—and we're talking about a judge, as is recommended in the report, of the Supreme Court or the Federal Court. So while the agencies, the media organisations, won't get advanced notice, there will be someone who can actually challenge the warrant and the legality of it—a public interest advocate who can speak on behalf of journalists and media organisations. So that's a really good step forward. The Committee has also recommended a review of how national security legislation is applied as far as the classification of government documents goes. There is a concern that high-level classifications are being put on documents which really don't deserve that status. It's highly likely that even if just these processes had been in place when the warrants for the three journalists were sought we might have seen a different outcome. A Labor has said, though, we don't believe that the 16 recommendations go far enough to protect press freedom. A government member: No! Ms TEMPLEMAN 181810 Freedom of the press is central to a functioning democracy— A government member: I agree with that! Ms TEMPLEMAN 181810 It's absolutely essential, and it's great to hear those opposite agree. Freedom of the press is under threat from multiple fronts. The market is so fragmented now that there have been huge consequences for traditional media and a profound loss of jobs in every broadcast and print medium. The journalists and their sources need to be protected so that stories that someone wants kept secret are able to be told. Because news is often what someone doesn't want reported, and to use legal force to prevent that publication should not be possible. It's a journalist's job to find out those stories and to build trust with their sources so that they can share information that they believe is in the public interest. I want to thank Dan Oakes, Sam Clark and Annika Smethurst for being fearless in doing that. As the union representing journalists, the MEAA, of which I'm a member, says, 'There remains a raft of so-called national security laws that can be used to criminalise journalism and punish whistleblowers for telling the truth.' No-one is saying journalists should be above the law, but even if the recommended changes are adopted, there is still a situation where journalists are considered guilty before the law and are required to prove that they haven't breached any laws—a different standard than for anybody else. The concern about press freedom isn't the exclusive domain of journalists and media organisations. The third annual MEAA press freedom survey showed that 89 per cent of the 2½ thousand respondents said that the health of press freedom in Australia was poor or very poor, and that there had been a change for the worse to the tune of 18 percentage points. Looking at the trends over the past decade, 98 per cent of people said that it had got worse, compared to 90 per cent in 2019. This shows that this is something we should all care about. It shouldn't just be journalists or ex-journalists who care about this. It's relevant to everybody. The chief executive of the MEAA, Paul Murphy, describes the sentiment as the sort you'd expect to see 'in a despotic police state, not a country that prides itself on being a liberal democracy that chides the failings in others.' While this is a good first step, there is much more that can be done to make sure journalists are free to do their job, free to hold governments to account and free to uncover things that are being hidden by bureaucracies and private organisations as well as government organisations. I commend this report, but it is just a first step. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 I thank the honourable member and I call the member for Goldstein. 16:38 Mr TIM WILSON IMW Goldstein 'Gold-styne', Deputy Speaker! The Goldstein electorate is named after a very famous suffragette by the name of Vida Goldstein. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 I know. Mr TIM WILSON IMW Every time we mention her name, we honour her memory. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 265979 Indeed. She was a contemporary of my great-grandmother. Mr TIM WILSON IMW A contemporary of your great-grandmother? That's very good. That's why it's so important to get it right. In fact I understand that a Labor member contacted a historian to make the point that the member for Goldstein kept mispronouncing it and was making a dill of himself, only to be lectured by the historian that in fact it is 'Gold-styne', not 'Gold-steen'. But that's not what we're here to talk about, now that we've made that important correction. We're here to talk about the report of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security on press freedom. As you know, Deputy Speaker, I was part of that inquiry, since I am privileged to be a member of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. Of course this inquiry came about as a consequence of criticism—justified, I think—of investigations into I think technically former journalist—or certainly on the road to being former journalist or at least sabbaticalled former journalist—Annika Smethurst, where there were investigations into her private home as part of uncovering the source of leaking of documents on the basis of national security. This inquiry was justified and very relevant for a number of reasons. Firstly, because there was obviously a moment of community concern. I'm not going to try and pretend. Most of the concern came from the free press itself, but there was also community concern about making sure that the free press is not stifled. Being somebody who believes very strongly in not just free speech but also freedom of the press, I share those concerns. I don't care who sits on this side of the parliament, we must speak truth to power. Of course, I'd much prefer it be us, but, even then, I believe there must be truth speaking to power. There were difficult questions being asked, including of myself and the member for Mackellar. I know he has an awful lot to hide! That's the basis upon which I get to speak truth to power to him, but there's also, of course, the Prime Minister and everybody else. In the end, there is nothing more that humans should be concerned about than concentrations of power—economic power or political power, because they are the first be abused. It's one of the core reasons why I'm a Liberal. I can never understand why anybody would want to sit on the other side of this chamber and believe in any other value, because every other political system is anchored around concentrations of power to the benefit of a few and at the expense of the many. We are focused on the many. That is why we believe so strongly in a free press. That's why the minister called this inquiry, that's why the committee, led by a Liberal chair, conducted it, and that's why we came up with such important recommendations. The second reason I believe in this inquiry is that it does not matter where you are. Even if there are no events, there are important issues that should be revisited from time to time, on both sides of the ledger. What we confronted in this inquiry weren't just issues about freedom of the press, although that is very important and we need to make sure the laws are tinkered in the digital age and are appropriate and contextual to our times; we also looked at the apparatus and the provisions around national security laws and the classification of documents, and whether that was relevant for the 21st century. The report made a series of recommendations looking at reviews, consistent with what has previously been done. Other recommendations were proposed about making sure we have correct classifications of documents so that, if there is information that goes through the appropriate steps or through whistleblowers, legitimately, to appropriate authorities, that information can't be suppressed when it might simply be embarrassing to the government. It needs to have a standard met, at a level that we all would reasonably accept, that it can't be released unless it's on the basis that it breaches national security. That's a good thing. I really support that. I always have a concern that people in positions of power and authority will classify documents or— A division having been called in the House of Representatives— Sitting suspended from 16:42 to 17:03 The DEPUTY SPEAKER E09 The question is that the document be noted. I call the member for Goldstein. Mr TIM WILSON IMW Thank you, Deputy Speaker, but do we really need to go through this again? I went through this with the other deputy speaker, about how it's pronounced 'Gold-styne', named after a suffragette. Every time we mention the name of the electorate, we honour her, so I respectfully counsel the deputy speaker that that's how we pronounce the name of the electorate Goldstein correctly. In any case, that's the second time I've now had to do that in this speech, so hopefully we don't have a third deputy speaker! The principal reason I support this report is it constructively goes through all the different issues that we find with the tension between national security and freedom of the press. I outlined before the division how strongly I support both principles, and they are important. There are some people who believe in almost unlimited or unfettered restrictions or limited restrictions on the press to be able do their job. Idealistically, that suits me. In practice, when you work through the issues around national security and the risk to lives, particularly with sensitive information being released, that's not a viable option unless you're prepared to discard those lives for freedom. I always sit on the freedom versus security ledger, but I also recognise the need for national security not only for the interests of government to be able to deliberate and do its work but also because we don't want officers in the field who may be doing particular types of work to be exposed to harm. That's what we've sought to introduce in this report. We can go through it and the different recommendations, line by line, but what's clear to me is that putting in an effective mechanism to make sure that the classification of documents is properly scrutinised and done in accordance with the spirit of law as well as the practice of what we should expect as a Five Eyes partner is critical. I think that making sure we revisit a lot of those previous reviews, which made recommendations that haven't necessarily been fully enacted by successive governments, is also critically important. One of the things that arose specifically out of the Smethurst case was whether registrars could issue warrants. As a member of the inquiry, this was one of my bugbears, and it was a simple thing to fix, to build a sense of public confidence. That in itself is mostly what we are talking about. I think that our national security agencies do an outstanding job. I think they do it deliberatively and cautiously. In terms of their roles, there is a constant review of the functions and powers, as well as an auditing of the activities, of both the IGIS and the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor. Of course, the IGIS effectively has the power of a standing royal commission. I think they take those roles very seriously and I think they do an excellent job. I'll leave it to the members of this chamber to decide whether they think the free press always do their job with the same degree of responsibility. I have mixed views at times, but that is the price of freedom. That is why I am a great believer in free speech in particular. So, getting that balance right is important. I think that having proper courts and superior court judges issuing warrants is a foundational test for making sure that there is public confidence. When they're issued by a registrar to journalists it erodes public confidence that there are proper considerations in place, that there are proper restraints and that there are proper consideration of the public interest in its many forms, including security and of course freedom, in this discussion. There is also the involvement of a public interest advocate, looking at the justification for a warrant but also making weighty decisions about what the public interest is in making sure that the public gets the information they need to hold us—meaning all of us—and the agencies and arms of government, as well as, of course, politicians, to account. That's where I feel we got the balance overwhelmingly right. The member for Berowra made some additional comments—and I've no doubt that he'll give a very erudite outline of the basis of his comments. I associated myself with them. They're not dissenting from the report. They're not arguing against the report. They're talking about a general trend around what warrants ultimately are and particularly around the fact that they are an obligation and a responsibility of the executive versus the courts and that we should reflect that and acknowledge that as part of the discussion around these issues. Of course, the Parliamentary Joint Committee of Intelligence and Security do quite a substantial and weighty amount of work, not just in the areas of freedom of speech, freedom of the press and national security; we have inquiries looking at any number of other areas of legislation, like the legislative clearing house, as well as the more recently announced inquiry related to tertiary institutions and the role of foreign interference, which, I think, at this time, is critical for building another type of confidence. The PJCIS works very well, and I want to acknowledge all of the members, even those from the opposition that I sometimes have strategic disagreements with! Sometimes I have strategic disagreements with members from my own side as well—it's true—inside and outside the committee. I thank them very much for their constructive work under the chairmanship of the member for Canning, who does an excellent job stewarding the committee and steering us all in the right direction. The truth is that it is a committee where there is so much work that needs to be done, particularly on the detail. I want to thank everybody who had input into this inquiry—your voices were heard and listened to—and also to the secretariat, who bring all of those voices together into a digestible form to enable us committee members to successfully prosecute our job. I commend the report to the Federation Chamber. 17:08 Mr LEESER 109556 Berowra by leave—I sought leave to make a statement on behalf of the member for Canning, who chairs this committee so well, as my friend the member for Goldstein just said. I presented the report on behalf of the committee and spoke about the report in general, and I wanted to use a small amount of my time today to note the additional comments that the member for Goldstein, myself and Senator Abetz made in the context of this report. This report was an unusual activity for the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. Most of our activities as a committee involve the examination of bills, often giving those bills quite a technical assessment, and making recommendations as to the parts of those bills that could be amended. This was an inquiry that was more traditional of other committees of which I've been involved on, and was more traditional of other committees in this parliament, which look at issues of broad public policy consideration. And so, instead of considering the minutia of particular bills, we were actually trying to chart a way forward for public policy. Like the member for Goldstein and Senator Abetz, I don't dissent from any of the recommendations that have been made by the committee—in fact, I join with all members—but the three of us wanted to make a particular point in this inquiry of observing a trend about the issuing of warrants. In the particular circumstances that gave rise to the inquiry, warrants were issued to search the premises of Ms Annika Smethurst and the ABC by an issuing officer who was the registrar of the local court at Queanbeyan. The registrar of the local court at Queanbeyan has wide powers to issue warrants for everything from searches through to arrests—they are a very experienced officer. But, given that agencies were seeking to effectively search out the premises and the home of media organisations and given the important role that the media plays in our democracy, informing the Australian public of the activities of their government and critiquing those activities, it was thought in these instances, instances that involve warrants issued relating to journalists or media organisations, that those warrants should be issued by superior court judges, either Federal Court judges or judges of the Supreme Courts of the states, or the Attorney-General, in relation to some warrants that relate to ASIO powers. For myself, I thought that this was a very important thing to do because it addressed the public concern about such a low-level official in our nation issuing a search warrant for an important democratic protector, which the press provide. But one of the things that we have been seeing on the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security generally is a trend to the judicialisation of warrants, and I think that this is a worrying trend. The issuing of warrants, as the member for Goldstein pointed out, is an executive and not a judicial action, and in increasing the issuing of warrants to the judiciary rather than executive officers effectively what we're doing is changing the balance. We are losing the knowledge, the expertise, the balance that we've developed in those officers who are regularly used to issuing warrants. This, in many instances, may be a good thing, but we should be cautious in doing so because custom, tradition, codes of practice and knowledge of the balance may well be lost over time. In our additional comments we make the point that, because this issue of who should issue warrants in which circumstance constantly comes up in different reports before our committee, the government should develop a principled approach to the appropriate authority for warrant issuing generally. And that is, I think, the key recommendation, because in committee hearing after committee hearing the issue of warrants arises and I don't think there's adequate justification for who should issue warrants in which particular circumstances. The other point that the additional comments make is to note that the public interest advocate regime—which it's proposed to extend in this report from the journalist information warrant area to all areas that deal with warrants sought against media organisations or against journalists—as the report suggests, should apply whether it's the Attorney or whether it is a Supreme Court judge or a superior court judge, a Federal Court judge, issuing warrants. In relation to the Attorney, I think, as with the journalist information warrant, it provides a very helpful mechanism. But I wonder in relation to superior court judges, given that they are among the smartest and most experienced legal officers in the land and the most able to weigh up these competing concerns, whether the public interest advocate role in those circumstances is necessary. Nonetheless, those comments aside, we completely concur on the recommendations of the report, and let me take this opportunity again to acknowledge the good work of the member for Canning, who is an outstanding chair of this committee, and all members of the committee for the good work that they do. Debate adjourned. Electoral Matters Committee 93 Report 93 17:14 Mr DICK 53517 Oxley As a member of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, I rise to speak this afternoon on the advisory report on the Electoral Legislation Amendment (Miscellaneous Measures) Bill 2020. This is an important piece of work that the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters has undertaken. I believe this is one of the most important joint committees in the parliament, as this is the committee that oversees our democracy, the Electoral Commission and how we conduct elections in this country. We've seen over the years an erosion of some of our democratic institutions. The work of the committee is really about ensuring that those institutions are respected, making practical and enhanced decisions to improve the democratic processes to make sure not only every voice is heard but every vote is counted, and having as many people participating in our democracy as possible. I state from the outset that Labor members of the committee support the passage of the bill, but we've provided amendments to make sure that there is certainty for election participants and, more importantly, to provide greater political transparency when it comes to donations, and I'll unpack that a little bit in my speech today. The Commonwealth Electoral Act cannot be undervalued. It's vital that the act is constantly under review to ensure that it's fulfilling its vital role in regulating our nation's democracy. Labor's firm view is that all changes to the electoral law should be made only in a consultative and bipartisan manner and should never be rushed through or politicised. The bill that the JSCEM inquiry advisory report looked at seeks to amend two sections—and I will go through each of those: sections 302CA and 314B of the Commonwealth Electoral Act—in order to clarify the interaction between federal, state and territory electoral funding and disclosure regimes after the High Court in the Spence case found section 302CA to be invalid. The amendments seek to ensure that state and territory laws cannot restrict the ability of donors to donate for federal purposes and of parties to spend those donations for federal purposes. Simply, Australians deserve to see who has given the money to which political party. They deserve to see that level of transparency. The bill also makes a series of technical amendments that stem from recommendations of the JSCEM inquiry into the 2016 election. They are based on recommendations of the Australian Electoral Commission. I give special thanks to the former Chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, the now defence minister, Senator Linda Reynolds. She showed that bipartisanship is truly the key to making sure that we get democracy right in this country. I'll deal with section 302CA, which allows donations from any class of donor—even if at a state level they are not a permitted donor—as long as the donations are expressly given and used for federal purposes. So you couldn't raise money federally and then siphon it into a state campaign or use it for a purpose for which that funding was not allocated. The amendment to section 314B would mean that donations to a federally registered party that are above a state's threshold for disclosure—for example, $1,000 in my home state of Queensland—but below the federal threshold, which is currently $14,300, if you can believe it, would not need to be disclosed to the state electoral commission if they were expressly given and used for a federal purpose. So once again it's making sure the money is used for the purpose that it was donated for. Many submissions in the JSCEM inquiry expressed concerns about these amendments and argued for comprehensive donation reform at the federal level, which I will also touch upon in my report today. The report goes on to state that Labor is proud to have continually fought for donation reforms. At the 2016 election, under the leadership of Bill Shorten, Labor committed to introducing a ban on foreign donations and to linking public funding to campaign expenditure, preventing candidates and parties from profiting from the electoral system. I'm delighted to say that, from opposition, Labor lead that debate and we saw those reforms put in place—well overdue but important, as I said in my opening remarks, for the health of our democracy in this country. We'll always defend the right to have accountability and transparency in our electoral system. In 2019 we introduced two bills committed to strengthening our electoral system and protecting democracy. These measures included lowering the disclosure threshold for political donations to $1,000 and making sure that disclosure of a donation is made within seven days of the donation. I want to particularly thank my colleague and friend Senator Don Farrell, Labor's shadow minister, who really has been like a dog with a bone with this issue in ensuring that we have some of the highest standards when it comes to electoral threshold donations but also electoral transparency. I know that Senator Farrell will continue to lead this fight. I pay particular thanks to him and his staff not only for all the work they have done in preparing Labor's dissenting report that I'm speaking on today but also for the ongoing negotiations that they've been conducting in the Senate. We introduced those two bills to further deliver on Labor's longstanding commitments. The first of those bills was the Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Transparency Measures—Lowering the Disclosure Threshold) Bill 2019—a critical bill, lowering the current amount from $14,300 to $1,000. Don't forget that it was Labor, under former Prime Minister Bob Hawke, who introduced the first donation disclosure scheme. Prior to that, there were no disclosures and you could do whatever you wanted. It was a bit like the Wild West. Labor brought in these reforms, and has a proud of record. We saw those rules change under the coalition, right up to 2006, to hide who was giving them money—including raising that threshold to $10,000, linked to the CPI; hence why we're over the $14,000 limit. The other bill, the Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Transparency Measures—Real Time Disclosure) Bill would require people to disclose political donations within seven days. Under the current system, annual returns are not published until the first working day in February—meaning that it could be up to 19 months before voters know who has made a donation. That is not healthy for democracy. That is not an open and transparent system. Yet those opposite continue to stand by those rules. I do not and members of the Labor Party do not, and neither do the Australian public. One example we saw of this loophole being exploited was the $1.75 million donation that Malcolm Turnbull made. He didn't say at the election, 'I'm making that donation;' he hid it from the Australian public. If any MP wants to give money to their own campaign and make a donation, I say, 'Good on you; that's fine, but just be up-front with voters about it.' Why hide it? Why hide it until 19 months after the fact? I'm sure that if you ask any Australian, they will say, 'Yes, political donations should be in real-time, there should be transparency and there should be limits put in place.' With today's report we've had to clarify a number of important relationships between federal, state and territory governments. There have been a number of concerns about this. That's why Labor members recommended an amendment to delay the bill's commencement date until the Queensland state election is held on 31 October 2020—something I strongly support. This will enable parties and candidates in Queensland as well as the QEC to operate under the existing rules for their upcoming election. We also recommended an amendment that would require parties to maintain a dedicated federal campaign account—so getting away from the fact that you could donate and not see what that the money was genuinely being used for. To further strengthen the electoral system, we've also recommended that the current donation threshold be reduced, as I've said, to $1,000, and that there be a system of real-time disclosure introduced. We believe that it is important to have an open and transparent process when it comes to making donations in this country. The perception of the political class in this nation, as seen through the eyes of the public, is, I would say, at an all-time low. We're seeing a government avoiding scrutiny. We're seeing a Prime Minister ducking and weaving. We're seeing the government over and over again making big announcements and not following through. We've got to get this right. We've got to make sure that our donation laws are in line with best practice in the world. With the coalition dragging its feet, it's not good enough. That's why I'm really pleased that today's report has made some technical amendments and has also strengthened the legislation to ensure that we do have an open and transparent process when it comes to political donations in this country. Finally, we must ensure that the Electoral Commission, our independent regulator, is properly funded to carry out their role. We've seen cuts across the board to the AEC. I want to make sure that, when we have elections, that the people who conduct those elections do it in a fair and transparent way and that they have the resources to ensure that we have the best elections in the world. Debate adjourned. GRIEVANCE DEBATE 95 GRIEVANCE DEBATE Morrison Government 95 17:25 Ms RISHWORTH HWA Kingston Something that has been said a number of times during this pandemic is that the virus doesn't discriminate. The intention of that statement is fair enough: anyone can catch COVID-19 and feel the full force of its dreadful health effects. That is why we have to take care and follow the rules to protect ourselves and those around us. It's also fair to say that no Australian has been spared from hardship during this crisis, but there are two corners of our society that have been hit exceptionally hard, and they are older and younger Australians. While older Australians have tragically borne the brunt of the health impacts of COVID, young Australians have disproportionately felt the social and economic pain that restrictions and recession have brought. They are suffering from high unemployment, interruptions to education and training, social isolation, depletion of their retirement savings and mental health impacts. Last week the Prime Minister said to young Australians: I'm counting on you. You're counting on me. And so let's make a deal. Well, Prime Minister, young people have certainly held up their end of the bargain. They have made sacrifices. Many work casual or part-time hours and have been hardest hit by job losses and cuts. Disruption to education and training have also dented the aspirations and career plans of many. Many young people have missed out on once-in-a-lifetime milestones and the rites of passage of their most formative years, things like graduations and gap years, formals and significant birthdays. Young people rely on seeing their friends frequently for support even in the best of times to get through challenges as they grow into adulthood. This year that has been made so much harder with extreme social isolation due to lockdowns, some schools being closed, campus life being extinguished, social gatherings restricted and/or prohibited. For all these reasons, and more, young Australians have taken a big hit to their wellbeing and their potential future. So what is the Morrison government doing to hold up its side of this deal with young people? I'm sad to report it's doing very little. It's a terrible deal. All of the sacrifice is going only one way. Young Australians have been disproportionately cut out of job and income support. The government deliberately left casuals out of JobKeeper. And young people have missed bill payments at a rate two to three times higher than the general population. More than half of all young renters are concerned about their ability to pay rent. But instead of taking responsibility and supporting young people, the government stepped back and left young people to fend for themselves. Young people have been left with no choice but to raid their own retirement savings, forced to make a terrible choice between a comfortable retirement in the future or keeping their head above water now. Seventy per cent of young Australians are now concerned about their financial wellbeing, and some 600,000 superannuation accounts are now completely drained. The government brags about this as a policy success, but really it is putting poverty into the future for many current young Australians. The government has also made radical changes to university, which will hike up the costs of many courses, so we shouldn't be surprised by the government not taking the issues of young Australians seriously. It was only back in May, when asked about the pre-existing problem of high youth unemployment, that the Prime Minister said: The premise of the facts of your question are simply not right … Young people need so much more from this government than the arrogant dismissal of the facts and the flippant replies, because it's not just the immediate impacts of this crisis that need to be dealt with. COVID-19 has exposed the many deep fault lines and inequities that have been developing for years in this nation. A key component of the fair go in this country has been a compact between generations that children could grow up to be better off and enjoy a better quality of life than those that came before them. Increasingly though we're seeing living standards and economic growth—it does take work. It takes government intervention, it has done since Federation. But for the past seven years this Liberal government have just shrugged their shoulders and left this generation of young people to face stagnating wages, increasingly insecure work, plummeting home ownership, mounting personal debt and an environment in decline. The relative wealth and wellbeing of young Australians is lower now than at any other time in the past two decades. Generational progress can no longer be taken for granted, because this government is failing to do its job. But this future is not inevitable. The government can shift the dial on these problems, but it takes courage and commitment. This is why over the last few months I've been doing what the government and Minister Colbeck have been failing to do, and that is speaking directly with young people. I have been attending and holding youth forums with my Labor colleagues across this country to hear directly from young people on what they think needs to be done. The government is in denial, but Labor has been listening. This is just some of what young people are saying. Anita spoke to me about losing hours and not being eligible for JobKeeper, as well as the need to support young carers. Daniel was anxious about the declining quality of life due to the degradation of our environment. Tiffany said it was important that we continue to normalise talking about mental health and emotions. Sammy was worried about the difficulty in transitioning from study to work. Others were concerned about housing affordability. Lauren saw this crisis as an opportunity to invest and improve in responsiveness, job pathways and the role of technology in education. Vanessa thought the government could do a lot better in communicating with young people, rather than shaming and blaming them. Liam was concerned about bullying, particularly during vocational training. Celine expressed alarm about the government's superannuation policies and what they were doing to current young people's retirement. Carina wanted more work to be done on solving high youth unemployment. Jesse and Ellen wanted more compassion in Canberra. Zach, Mackenzie, Lillian, Robyn and Declan all thought the government should consult and engage more with young people. It's clear from this feedback that young Australians have a lot on their mind. Last week the Prime Minister said the government always has and always will engage and consult with young people. If that is true, the minister for youth would be coordinating a holistic response to this crisis to ensure that young people don't get ignored and left behind. Trying to address these interrelated, complex challenges facing young people with isolated bandaid solutions and media releases with no follow-up will fail. The fact is there hasn't been a national youth strategy developed in over a decade, and that is why Labor is calling on the Morrison government to work with young people and urgently design a comprehensive COVID-19 youth recovery strategy. We need a strategy that considers how the myriad problems facing young people interplay and produces real solutions and policies to successfully address them. We need all the siloed parts of government, all the different agencies and departments, working together to deliver better outcomes for young Australians. The strategy must also include an ability for young people to have oversight and input into their own futures. It must be co-designed with young Australians and ensure that young Australians have targets for which the government can be held accountable. When I say 'co-designed', it's not just holding a few focus groups and saying, 'Job done!' It must also include accountability measures and targets. Young Australians certainly did not enter this crisis on firm ground, and yet they've still made huge sacrifices to protect our community, taking a disproportionate share of the economic toll, suffering social disruption, missing important rites of passage in their most formative years and dealing with disruptions to their education and training. They have kept their side of the deal, and it's now up to the government to keep theirs. When it comes to things like education and training, we don't need a government that will hike up university fees, cut apprenticeships and traineeships and let the market rip when it comes to low-quality vocational education. We don't need a government that puts in internships that deliver no outcomes to young people, where they work for an extra $50 a week and get put into a job that does not match their aspirations. We can do better at this as a country. We can do better for our younger Australians. They deserve it. They deserve a real plan for secure jobs, accessible education, affordable housing, good mental wellbeing and a healthy environment. I urge the government to take Labor's ideas seriously. We want to work with young people. We want to work with the government. We want a better future for young Australians. Small Business: Workplace Relations 97 17:35 Ms HAMMOND 80072 Curtin Today I want to talk about our need to remove barriers to employment, particularly those which impact upon small and family businesses. Over the course of our lives, many of us have experienced all manner of employment—casual, part-time or full-time. I've been a checkout chick, which is what we were called in the 1980s, a babysitter, a waitress, a receptionist, a lawyer, a university lawyer, a university administrator and a senior manager. I have been casual, part-time and full-time. There are most definitely great bosses and wonderful mentors and inspiring co-workers and colleagues. There are also poor managers, difficult colleagues and difficult staff members for bosses to deal with. There are great workplaces—places where you really want to get up in the morning and go to. There are also bad workplaces—places where you dread going to and where you only go to out of pure, utter financial necessity. We all learn a lot from the good and the bad experiences. Perhaps the most significant of these is that, when employment relationships go sour, it is more common than not for there to be fault on the part of both parties, with both parties feeling a sense of having been wronged by the other party. In many cases, the fault is not malicious. It's not necessarily intended; rather, it's a by-product of people having to deal with others who are different to them in very basic ways—different personalities, different styles, different skills, different expectations, different goals and different ambitions. Of course, it is in the best interests of both employees and employers to try to make an employment relationship work. Employers need competent, committed and reliable employees that are capable of doing what is required of them to make the business successful, and this means that employees should always be treated fairly and respectfully. Their work should be valued and they should be appropriately recognised and compensated. Because continued employment depends on the viability of an employer, employees need to be positive contributors to the success of a business and do what they are employed to do, competently and reliably. But even when both an employer and an employee know what is at stake, and both can realise and recognise the importance of building a long-term, positive employment relationship, it sometimes just doesn't work out, and the employment relationship needs to be ended. It is at these times that an effective, efficient, reliable and balanced process for ending the employment relationship must exist so that both parties can walk away as unscathed as possible. At the present stage, our system for ending employment relationships, particularly for those relationships which have gone sour, is one which is laden with potential hazards for employers. Navigating the complicated terrain of unfair dismissal laws, adverse action claims and claims of discrimination can be extremely treacherous, particularly for small and medium-sized businesses without human resource departments or easy access to professional advice. Let's not forget that over 90 per cent of businesses in Australia are small or medium-sized businesses. There are over three million of them employing over seven million people. All of the processes which currently exist to challenge the ending of an employment relationship can be initiated on minor, technical or weak grounds. Even if baseless, they can be so time-consuming and emotionally draining that employers are often tempted to cut their losses and pay the ex-employee additional and unearned money simply to have them go away. Some would argue that, provided the system works for those employees who have genuine cases—and there are a lot of them—the fact that these processes can and are used for spurious claims should simply be the cost of business. But this approach is not right. The cost to business is actually a cost to all of us, because it can act as a handbrake on employment, particularly for small- and medium-size businesses, and particularly with respect to permanent or ongoing employment. This, in turn, leads to a handbrake on business growth and overall economic growth. We need laws to ensure that employees are treated fairly and justly by their employers. We need to make sure that employees have access to efficient and accessible processes which can be used by them when employers do not do the right thing. But we also need to make sure that our laws ensure that employers are not held hostage to weak and baseless claims from ex-employees, remembering that over 90 per cent of the bosses of those employers are small- and medium-size businesses. There have been calls to change these laws in the past and, in relation to unfair dismissal laws, the suggested changes include options such as redefining 'small business' to mean fewer than 50 employees or reducing the cap on compensation able to be awarded to a minimum of three months pay, with a discretion for the Fair Work Commission to award a further three months pay in exceptional circumstances. Unfortunately, discussions on this issue have often become unstuck by people retreating to polemical and partisan corners and not even gauging in meaningful discussion. There is absolutely no question that this is a difficult balancing act, but at this point in time, when we need to stimulate our economy and encourage our businesses to employ people, we need to ensure that unnecessary barriers to employment are lifted. I repeat: this is particularly so for our small- and medium-size employers, who, despite being called 'small', are actually the largest employers in our country. The five working groups which were established by the Prime Minister and the Attorney-General, comprising business leaders, union representatives and others to examine our IR laws and attempt to collectively undertake the delicate balancing of interests, is extremely positive. We should all embrace the opportunity to move away from polemical battlegrounds to sensible and balanced discussions and deliberations. I want to end with a commendation for the work being done by the Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman in this space. This body is undertaking extremely useful research and inquiries and is regularly producing well-thought-out and sensible reports and recommendations. It is also a body which is providing invaluable advice and assistance to small businesses and family enterprises. Throughout the time of COVID-19, there have been significant increases in requests for advice. The reports and recommendations produced by the ombudsman are well worthy of consideration by everybody in our chambers and the five working groups which have been established, because they could certainly help take us further in this space to removing barriers to employment. Economy 98 17:43 Mr GORMAN 74519 Perth I rise tonight to speak about what a strong economy looks like and where the government is choosing to take us instead. This is the year that we set up the economy for the future. While we tackle the immediate economic challenges, the parliament should also look at opportunities for national investment. We owe it to future generations to think not just about our interests today but about the way we grow the Australian economy well into the future. A strong economy gives people hope, it gives people a place to call home, it gives us an education system that ensures everyone reaches their full potential, and it gives people a future. The purpose of Labor when it comes to the economy is to start with the basics: a home, an education, a job and a fairer deal for the next generation. Labor is the party of the future, the standard-of-living party. The Liberal Party just wants to let the free market rip. The Greens party believes that you must always choose the environment over people if you are to be truly pure. And One Nation, Palmer and the radical right are parties that divide, and we've seen that division clearly in terms of Mr Palmer's political intervention in Western Australia, with his attempts to tear down the WA border. The Australian economy right now is deeply troubled. The challenges of 2020 will dominate the work in this place over the next decade. We are facing confirmation tomorrow that we are in our first recession in 30 years. More than one million Australians are unemployed. For the first time ever we have reached one million Australians unemployed. The government's own figures tell us that some 400,000 more workers will lose their jobs before Christmas. At the same time this government has no plan for jobs. We hear far too much criticism and far too much promising, but we don't actually see a clearly articulated plan to bring back jobs, to create new jobs or to give long-term certainty for the jobs that are in our economy. We just see plans to cut super, increase university fees and wind back JobKeeper. A strong economy means that we have a healthy superannuation system. Superannuation is a strength of the Australian economy. The Leader of the Opposition said: At a time of global uncertainty and disruption, having a strong domestic savings pool is a clear measure of national resilience. It is the ballast our financial system and economy needs. It provides the capital to invest in needed infrastructure and nation building. I couldn't agree more. Fifteen million Australians are members of our superannuation system. Some 80 per cent of Australians aged 25 to 54 hold a superannuation account. Collectively that system manages $2.8 trillion in assets. That's more than 140 per cent of Australia's national gross domestic product. Let's hope that that gets a lot bigger. The current average balance in retirement for an Australian man is $270,000. Sadly, for women it is just $157,000. This is a gap that we must address. As long as that gap exists we know that we have not achieved true gender equality in this country. One way we can help men and women is to stick with the 12 per cent superannuation guarantee increase. That's something that has been talked about in this place for a decade. People have made decisions about the future of their lives based on that guarantee. The Prime Minister, both as Prime Minister and as Treasurer, said that he is fully committed to that guarantee. If we stick with that 12 per cent increase, the median balance at retirement will be $300,000 for women and more than $600,000 for men. It is good for both, but I still find it very hard to accept those huge gaps between the gendered outcomes in superannuation. Even the lowest-paid Australians will be 15 to 20 per cent better off if we stick with the 12 per cent guarantee. We know that, if we don't, things will get worse, particularly for women. At the moment, 40 per cent of older single women retire in poverty. That is something that isn't necessary and isn't acceptable in Australia in 2020. We definitely shouldn't be setting up a system to fail in the future. Let's look at the sorts of jobs that pay for that superannuation—the sorts of jobs that give people that opportunity to give their kids a fairer deal, that pass on a fairer deal to the next generation. A huge amount of jobs created in Australia recently have been in the care economy. When you start to scratch the surface of the care economy, you see that it is a place where the jobs are not as secure as they should be. We've seen that in aged care, with people having to work at two or three facilities because they can't get the hours or the security of employment that they need and deserve. The other side of that is that we could create even more jobs if this government had a jobs plan in the space of home care. Tonight there are 103,000 Australians waiting for home-care packages. They are waiting up to three years. Some of them never get the package; they only wait for it. So we need a plan for aged care in the middle of this crisis. As I said, the government don't have a plan for jobs. Sadly, they do not have a plan for aged care. But it's okay. Labor is going to come to the rescue. The Labor Party does have a plan when it comes to aged care. There are some really simple things that the government could steal from us today—firstly, that there be minimum staffing levels in residential aged care. Anyone who has interacted with the system knows that is an essential thing for fixing the system long term. Secondly, reduce the homecare package waiting list, so people can stay in their home for longer. I think we would all like that. Most Australians would like to stay in their home as long as possible. Thirdly, ensure transparency and accountability of funding, so we know where it is going and we know if that funding is not working. How about some independent measurement and public reporting, as recommended by the government's own royal commission? This is a radical idea, but maybe we could make sure that every aged-care facility in Australia has adequate personnel protective equipment. I can't believe that, six months into this pandemic, we are still talking about providing the basics for our aged-care sector. There could also be better training for staff; a surge workforce strategy; and additional resources so that the aged-care royal commission can do its job fully and properly. At the other end of the economy, at the other end of life, is child care. Research released by the Mackell Institute just last week showed that there has been a 7.1 per cent decline in the number of women in jobs since March 2020. I commend the work of Ryan Batchelor and Sam Crosby in continuing to keep this on the agenda and continuing research into this space. Their recent report, The Impact of COVID-19 on Women and Work in Victoria, found that emergency economic policies initially helped women stay afloat. However, the report notes: … a mix of poor policy design (the early access to superannuation program), and ill-considered decisions (cessation of free childcare and ending JobKeeper in early childhood centres; proposed HECS increases) have not been supportive of many women across our community. A national survey from The Parenthood found that a third of parents, 32 per cent, surveyed would need to reduce or remove their children altogether as we return to the normal full-fee-paying days of pre-COVID levels of child-care fees. There is a huge economic opportunity in this space. Again, more jobs could be created and hence more opportunity for people to go back to work. What we saw from the report of the Grattan Institute was that, if we put an extra $5 billion a year into the early childhood education and care sector, the payoff would be an $11 billion increase in GDP and, for the average Australian working mum, $150,000 more earning over their lifetime. There is a lot for us to work with when it comes to delivering a stronger economy. There are so many things that this government has refused to take any steps on. We have so much more strength in Australia. We have so much to work with—location, location, location. We are here in the Indo-Pacific. We are in the best place you could possibly want to be for a naturally resource-rich, sun-rich, wind-rich place like us. We have strong unions and strong businesses, and they can work together to achieve outcomes for working Australians. We have the space to do practically anything and, despite this government's knowledge tax and their attack on the university sector more generally, in Australia we do have one of the most skilled workforces. We have a great resource sector, a strong tourism sector, a great infrastructure sector and a great education sector. What that means for 25 million Australians is that we owe it to them to make sure they can have a home, a job and a fairer deal for the next generation. Parliamentary Representation: Northern Territory 100 17:53 Mr JOYCE E5D New England Might I say what a pleasant night this is to give my first grievance debate speech in my time in politics, 15 years. So you are present for a moment in history. Today, with some of my colleagues on the other side, we have been successful in making sure that we maintain two seats in the Northern Territory. It was quite clear that National Party senators—being Senators Canavan, Bridget McKenzie, Perin Davey, Sam McMahon and Susan McDonald—were not going to be seen as part of a process of removing a regional seat from Australia. Then it was about what would happen when it came to the House of Representatives, where I said quite clearly that I would not be part of that either and that I would be voting to make sure that we maintain those seats, even though they are Labor Party seats. That should be irrelevant in representing regional— An honourable member interjecting— Mr JOYCE E5D Yes, 'A Daniel come to judgement.' I think that's what he was saying. An honourable member interjecting— Mr JOYCE E5D That's right. It's really important. One of my grievances is that at times you have to actually go with what is logical and not with what your party says or demands. That's why God placed a head on your shoulders. It would be good to see that in other parties from time to time, to give people a sense that their democracy actually resides in your better judgement, in an informed conscience and your better judgement that is to be guided by your party and not ruled by your party. And all of a sudden the clapping disappears. An honourable member interjecting— Mr JOYCE E5D You gave up your job, so I have to give it to you. Good on you, mate! You're one of my mum's favourites, God rest her soul. An honourable member interjecting— Mr JOYCE E5D You always thought that was the great opportunity, the great Labor hope, and that was my mum. Anyway, what we should also have before us, what we should be dealing with is getting a better regional franchise. My grievance is that at the National Party federal conference we had a unanimous resolution to support regional senators, that the regional party believes in regional representation. The democratic weight of our nation should always be represented by the lower house—there are no problems there. Your House of Representatives seats will overwhelmingly be in the nation's capitals, and that's fair enough. But we have this ridiculous situation in Australia where 4½ per cent of our elected members represent about 85 per cent of our land mass. How do you think Indigenous Australians see that? How do you think they deal with that issue? We've got seats like Durack—1.629 million square kilometres for a nation that is only 7.6 million square kilometres. An honourable member interjecting— Mr JOYCE E5D If we had regional senators you could have six regions per state. This is based on the Washington system. They only have two senators for New York, and they are very important senators. Why do we need 11 out of the 12 senators in Western Australia residing in Perth? Why? If we had six regions and two senators per region, based on the same process as what they would have had in the Washington system of government, then you'd actually give the people of the Kimberley and Indigenous people in the gulf and Indigenous people in the Northern Territory and the western districts of Queensland and New South Wales a chance—a very good chance; in some cases I would say both chances—of being senators here. They wouldn't be a voice to parliament, they would be a voice in parliament. It's a sad day. I introduced this bill; it didn't even get debating time. In the Order of Business the Labor Party and, on my own side, the Liberal Party said, 'We're not even going to debate this.' That is a shame. That is also another time when it should have resided in the well-informed beliefs of the people in that committee to say: 'I don't know if I'm going to vote for this, but we're going to have the debate. Let's have the debate and let's get this thing out. Let's have a discussion. Maybe some good will come of it.' I will give you the names of some people disappointed with that: Richie Ahmet; people up in the gulf; people in the cape; Aboriginal people from my electorate—they call themselves Aboriginal in my electorate; the people back home. Yet again it's all rhetoric. When you actually can do something, when there's a possibility to do something real, no, that's too much; back away. Back away to Hollywood. Back away to the photos. Back away to the benevolent statements and the wondrous desires, but not in the realpolitik of actually delivering a real outcome. To continue on with that, it's why we back Lingiari to remain as a seat. It's so that we won't just have one seat called Darwin. That is why I think we need to deliver that, we need to show that we're willing to break from our party's solidarity and support the Labor Party on something—not because it's going to get us a seat, but because it's the right thing to do. At the same time, someone in the bills committee should have the capacity to stand up and say: 'I believe this needs to be debated. I believe this issue needs to be discussed.' Otherwise, to be quite frank—I say to Labor, 'What you ask of us, we always turn around and say: "Where's the quid pro quo? Where's the time that we see the stand from you?"' Who are the beneficiaries of this? People in remote regional areas, where the poorest Australians come from—they have the least opportunity of going to university, as I was just speaking about in the other place—and where life expectancy is shorter. That is why I wrote the book, Weatherboard and Iron. People would ask, 'Who would live there?' and I'd say: 'See the smoke coming out of that chimney. That means people are living there. That is their house. That is their life.' The reason we have to get better representation for those people is that they've got no other avenue back. More and more seats like Durack, O'Connor, Grey, Maranoa, Kennedy, Parkes, Lingiari are getting bigger and bigger. The smaller ones are becoming wealthier and wealthier because the political weight resides with them. Not only do they have the lower house members; they have the vast majority of the senators. Usually, 11 out of the 12 senators live in the capital city. This means that the desire for investment in a motorway, or, God bless you, the desire for an investment in a new park or foreshore redevelopment or whatever—you've got so much political weight to do it. But the fundamentals of what is required for a basic health service in an area where they don't have a doctor—there is no doctor. If you get sick, good luck. That is what you'll get: good luck. You might get a nurse, maybe, but, in a lot of these areas, there is no medical practitioner. I'll put some numbers to that. In Double Bay, there's one doctor for every 200 patients. Do you know what it is in New England, which I would say is a fairly affluent sort of seat, as far as regional seats go? One to 4,000. In other areas, like the Mallee, it's one to 6,000. It's probably the same for the outer suburbs. But we just stand back and let this happen. No-one ever has the debate. Maybe if you had regional senators, they'd say, 'Let's have a debate about where Medicare provider numbers go.' Do we just allocate them to anybody who wants one? My daughter is doing medicine at the moment, so I've got some skin in this game. My brother is a doctor—that's on the record—and my cousin is the director of ICU at PA in Brisbane. But do we just give Medicare provider numbers to anybody that wants one, even if they all want to stack one on top of the other in Double Bay, or is there a contractual obligation here—that, after the nation has invested so much in a person, there should be an expectation that that person should invest something back into their nation? It might be that you have to go to Blacktown, or to Penrith, or to Moree, or to Longreach, because those people are also Australians, and they also need the largesse of an understanding government that has the capacity to push services out to them, beyond the rhetoric. So, we supported two seats for the Northern Territory, because that's the right thing to do. The debating time for regional senators should also have been supported, because that was also the right thing to do, but it didn't happen. I say to the people who went to that federal conference: I apologise to you. I'm sorry, I tried my best; I just didn't get anywhere. But I implore the Labor Party: if you want to change the direction and cut into a debate that everybody is listening to then start talking about issues such as regional senators, and you'll get yourself on an even keel. Regional Australia, Chifley Electorate: Infrastructure 102 18:03 Mr HUSIC 91219 Chifley After the contribution we've just heard, I'd make this point: a lot of decisions in this country get made within a very small radius in Sydney and Melbourne, and there's a lot that was said then that I would agree with, in terms of the regions, particularly as a representative of the outer suburbs. We'll probably have our differences about how we get it done, but the main thing is that it's got to get done, because there are imbalances in the way that decisions get made that impact real people in the regions, both in your region and in ours. I'll just leave it at that. I take great pleasure in being able to report back to the chamber on one of those areas. I send surveys out to my community. I read the surveys. I ring people up, who then tell me they never expected me to read what they had written on the survey—good, bad and indifferent. I think it's good to improve the way we do our job. One of the surveys I'm flicking through here is on new growth areas in the outer suburbs. Governments love to say that all these new homes are being built, but they never like to pay for it, and by that I mean they don't put the infrastructure in as people are moving in, so you don't have the roads, you don't have the schools, you don't have the hospitals, and you don't have all the other things that people expect will be there when they move into these big estates. In this survey that I distributed within the electorate, a number of people, for example, in Marsden Park, Richmond Road and Elara Boulevard, have real issues with regard to traffic: 'Too much traffic on Richmond Road, near Glendenning'; 'Richmond Road in Marsden Park has really bad traffic'; 'The roundabout at Aldi and Bunnings'—which is in the Colebee-Marsden Park area—'took 35 minutes to get out of that bottleneck'; 'Traffic is the main issue at the moment'; 'Better road infrastructure.' All those people are continually raising this issue. In fact, Marilyn wrote this to me: 'I moved from Ryde to get away from the traffic nightmares only to find that Richmond Road is a bottleneck,' and that's now part of western Sydney. That space is part of a broader push, where nearly 200,000 people are going to move in. It's become Sydney's Bermuda Triangle, because people move in and they disappear—off the radar of federal and state governments when it comes to providing infrastructure support. I'm sick of seeing all the glitzy ads that suggest that all the infrastructure has been brought forward, when you see, in the area of the member for Werriwa and my area, in our parts of Sydney, people moving in and getting stuck in the local area. This isn't even on a motorway; it's just a local road. Richmond Road was widened a few years ago and it's already clogged. For the life of me, I can't understand how planners got it so wrong. Worse—on top of that—even if all the money were allocated today to fix Richmond Road, it would take three years to unclog the road, and thousands of people are moving in. Developers who built the estates have all those people moving in and did not think people would need an entry point and an exit point at the estates. Instead, they built one entry point and thousands of people are frustrated through the course of the morning and into the evening by trying to get access to those developments. The state government in New South Wales needs to get its act together. There's money sitting there. The planning has been done and it needs to be released. People in Marsden Park, in the electorate I represent of Chifley, are putting up with intolerable amounts of time, as they are in Colebee as well. They're just trying to access services, the local shops to get the groceries, medical support, or anything that they want, and it takes an unbelievably long time. It's unacceptable for those people. Better planning should have been done and I will keep speaking up on that. On a separate matter, what rattles in the ear is when I hear the coalition talk about the need to be bipartisan because they used to be in the eighties and nineties. What rot. On all of the major things we did as a Labor Party to make life easier for people, this is just false. On the big reforms, they either opposed them outright, like Medicare and superannuation, or, if they know that the public support the things that Labor did in government, they have a slow process of undermining, weakening and rendering useless the reforms in the first place. They come in with a chokehold. They slither in, they coil around, they choke the reform and they make it useless. For example, if the coalition didn't like Medicare, which they never did, they would freeze doctor payments, force people onto private health insurance and cut funding to public hospitals. If they didn't like the NDIS, they wouldn't attack it full-on but would underspend it by billions. If they didn't like the NBN, which they never did, but couldn't take it out outright, they would say they'd deliver better broadband but would use copper to deliver it—and it's a terrible service and a lot of people can't stand it. They're doing the same thing on superannuation right now. That's what this attack is. They can't get rid of it outright, so a bunch of them are basically undermining faith in the superannuation system. And their chief advocate in this endeavour is Senator Bragg, who gets upset when people target him—he's had a little bit of a whinge today because Paul Keating basically said, 'Ignore Senator Bragg,' and he got all miffed on his Instagram account about it. But here's the thing: here is a man, in Senator Bragg, in a very powerful position within a governing coalition, who is doing his darnedest, having represented superannuation himself, who's gone into parliament thinking not all people should get a super fund or should have the support and the ability to live a comfortable retirement. He goes around saying all these falsehoods like: 'Super doesn't work.' 'It doesn't get many off the pension.' 'It costs the budget more than it saves.' 'It damages home ownership for low-income people.' They will never fix any of those issues themselves, but he goes around saying that stuff. This man has the ability to shape the outcome for a lot of men and women in this country on low and middle incomes, and he complains a bit if someone has the temerity to stand up to him. The thing that I can't get is this: in the modern Liberal Party it looks like you need two things for success: (1) to become an MP you need a Liberal Party membership and (2) you need a trust fund. So many of them have trust funds. This is what's happening: the trust fund class are looking down their nose at super. And before those opposite say, 'You've got a problem with wealth,' I don't have a problem with wealth; I want people to do well. But my questions is: why don't they want other Australians to do well? Because the thing is with superannuation, if you look at the level of savings an Australian has when they retire—for most men it's about $270,000 when they retire and for most women it's $160,000; that's a gap that's got to be fixed—compared to some in the US, for instance—other major developed economies—would be completely different. This is a level of wealth that has been built up through supporting public markets. It has been built up through supporting infrastructure investment. It has been built up through the economy and helping people in there. And it makes sure that we don't, as a country, take the begging bowl to the rest of the world to try and get money to support investment, and it's all through our superannuation fund we're able to see that happen. We've got these people in the trust fund class of the Liberal Party saying that superannuation is no good. I'd ask this: what do they want to do? They don't like industry super funds that are made up of businesses and workers where they have to, by law, make decisions in the best interests of members. And they are not-for-profit as everything gets ploughed back into the fund, so they don't like that. I bet any money they will not put the $3 trillion that's currently in superannuation funds on the table as a government and set up their own scheme for the nation. They won't do that. So what's the other option that they'll do? I bet you any money it's to turn to the banks. Make sure that retail funds— Ms Stanley 265990 Oh yes, they're good! Mr HUSIC 91219 'Yes, absolutely!' as the member for Werriwa rightly says with a fair dose of sarcasm. The retail funds that perform lower than industry funds are run by the banks. And here's the thing: they attack super through a pandemic, but they let the rats of the financial services sector off the hook by not implementing the banking royal commission recommendations and saying they can't do it now. They want the banks to look after people's retirement. We have seen the most terrible instances where banks have ripped people off and their fortunes have literally disappeared in the cover of night, and this is what the coalition want. This is a joke. People should have the ability to retire in dignity, not worry about supporting themselves and be able to put their feet up after a life of working hard. What we're seeing by the Liberal Party is an utter disgrace. Infrastructure: Marine 103 18:13 Mr GOODENOUGH 74046 Moore My grievance relates to the lack of investment in marine bunkering infrastructure for liquefied natural gas at key ports around Australia for the supply of fuel for use by ships. The barriers preventing the transition of the maritime shipping industry from heavy fuel oil to LNG include a lack of appropriate infrastructure, such as bunkering facilities, and a lack of an appropriate policy framework. Based on projections by Perth based consulting firm BE&R Consulting, which specialises in small-scale LNG and LNG bunkering projects, this potentially equates to a lost opportunity to create a new industry capable of generating revenue of $500 million to $1 billion per annum for the Australian economy. Renewable fuels suitable for the bulk carrier marine industry and associated technology are not expected to be available on a commercial scale for another 15-plus years. There is a growing global movement to replace the use of heavy fuel oil as the primary fuel for maritime shipping with the more environmentally friendly LNG. Australia is one of the largest producers of liquefied natural gas. In 2019 our nation exported 77 million tons of LNG, thus our nation is ideally placed to build an LNG bunkering industry. The global LNG bunkering market is expected to grow from one million tons per annum in 2020 to 15 million tons per annum by 2030. There is potential for Australia's LNG bunkering market to grow from zero to greater than two million tons per annum over the next 10 to 15 years. Currently, Australia is more than 80 per cent reliant on imported transport fuel oils despite extensive domestic natural gas reserves in our nation. Our reliance on imported fuels is concerning and an unsustainable model that undermines Australia's energy security. By adopting LNG as a marine fuel, Australia will provide the maritime industry with an alternative, sustainable and cost-effective fuel source. The use of LNG as a marine fuel provides a step towards Australia achieving energy independence. Currently, minimal fuel bunkering of international shipping occurs in Australia. This is principally due to the high cost of fuel relative to elsewhere in Asia. Bunkering industries are generally located close to major refining capacity and shipping hubs. Our ports in the north-west of Australia are some of the largest in the world in terms of export tonnage, with over 3,000 bulk shipments departing from Port Hedland each year. The majority of demand in Australia is expected to come from the bulk ore carriers, which ship our iron ore and coal to Asia; container ships; and cruise liners. One very large ore carrier would consume in the order of 1,000 tons of LNG per round trip to China. Thus, Port Hedland alone has the potential to build a multimillion ton per annum LNG bunkering industry. LNG is seen as a transition fuel to a low-carbon economy that provides substantial environmental benefits over conventional fuels in terms of improving air quality and human health, which is particularly important in ports and coastal areas. LNG emits zero sulfur oxides, virtually zero particulate matter and significantly less nitrogen oxides. It is estimated that the use of LNG reduces carbon dioxide emissions by around 20 per cent. According to DNVGL, a Norway based ship classification firm, LNG is clean and poses no pollution risk to ocean environments and has no waste disposal or discharge issues. The LNG Marine Fuel Institute was established in 2016 to promote the transition of the maritime industry to the use of LNG as a marine and transport fuel. The objective is to replace the use of heavy fuel oil as the primary fuel for maritime shipping with the more environmentally friendly LNG, which is produced abundantly domestically. By promoting and facilitating the use of LNG as a marine transportation fuel, the federal government can partner with industry to help Australia's economy grow and create jobs while reducing pollution and emissions on a large scale. The transition to LNG will be driven by a number of factors. LNG meets the International Maritime Organization's 2020 emissions guidelines, limiting sulfur emissions to 0.5 per cent from 1 January 2020. LNG is cheaper than using marine fuel oil. LNG represents the cleanest economical fuel option that is currently available. LNG is more environmentally friendly than diesel or heavy fuel oil, with less carbon dioxide and sulfur and nitrogen oxides. It also provides an environmental risk reduction in terms of accidental fuel spillage. If a ship runs aground, any LNG leaks will evaporate, whereas an oil spill will create an environmental disaster. The implementation of emission control areas around major coastlines around the world with emission restrictions more stringent than those specified in IMO 2020 is continuing to grow as part of a global movement phasing out the burning of heavy fuel oils and diesel by the maritime shipping industry at sea and in ports. It should be a priority for the Commonwealth to implement emission control areas covering Australia's pristine coastal waters and estuaries, as has been done already in the USA, Canada, China, the North Sea and the Baltic. Industry adoption will significantly increase overall emissions reductions in the short term, prior to the introduction of future technologies. LNG is unlikely to be displaced by renewable fuels such as hydrogen in the next 15-plus years due to cost and limited available technology. Development of an LNG bunkering industry also creates other benefits for Australia, including employment for local residents in regional towns, Indigenous participation, and opportunities for design, construction and maintenance of LNG storage facilities and bunkering vessels in Australia. We have the opportunity to create a series of Australia's first green ports, which aim to minimise import vessel emissions such as heavy particle emissions, carbon dioxide, sulphur and nitrogen oxides, noise, dust, waste and water pollution, providing both environmental and social benefits. Using LNG as a fuel is projected to achieve a 20 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide and a 90 per cent reduction in sulphur and nitrogen oxides and particulates, eliminating clouds of black soot emitted from ships whilst in port. Australia can emerge as a leader within the South-East Asian and Indo-Pacific region in green shipping and port infrastructure. Multiple Asian countries, with the support of their governments, are currently building their LNG bunkering capability to service the expected demand from vessels trading in Asia. This will include vessels carrying Australia's bulk ore. These countries, such as Singapore, Malaysia, China and Japan, are likely to be using LNG sourced from Australia. The opportunity exists for vessels to be refuelled using Australian LNG at Australian owned and operated facilities based at Australian ports, retaining the economic benefits and full value chain of LNG for Australia. For Australia to grasp this opportunity to build a new industry using our domestic natural resources, federal government support is required to fund the development of bunkering infrastructure at key ports around Australia, as demonstrated successfully in Europe and Singapore. This could include incentives to encourage investors to build the required infrastructure, provision of sites at ports for infrastructure such as LNG storage and loading, and providing incentives for ships and charterers to refuel in Australia. In concluding my contribution to this grievance debate, I call upon the minister for energy to take measures to actively promote the development of an Australian LNG bunkering industry through investment and appropriate infrastructure for maritime refuelling at Australian ports and developing an appropriate policy framework. Reducing Australia's reliance on imported fuels is a strategic benefit, and LNG offers an economically viable solution to power the shipping industry. To achieve this, it is also necessary to allocate adequate funding in research and development of future fuels technology. We have the opportunity to encourage institutional investment in the necessary facilities and infrastructure to support this innovative and new, environmentally friendly industry for the long-term economic development of our nation. The DEPUTY SPEAKER 72184 There being no further grievances, the debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting. Federation Chamber adjourned at 18:24 QUESTIONS IN WRITING 106 QUESTIONS IN WRITING