address to parliament - PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS - Government Commitments

The member for Pearce just indicated that the government is getting things done. I would ask the member for Pearce and every other member opposite to go and ask their constituents whether they are better off now than they were prior to May last year. The resounding answer will be no. The resounding response will be a big fat negative, because people are not better off now than they were when we, the Liberals and Nationals, were in government. We achieved a lot.

We see in the motion of the member for Lalor 'cheaper child care'. That's all well and good, but it's got to be available—not just affordable but available—and in regional areas it is not available. The opportunities to get child care are just not there. The member for Lalor talked about reform to the safeguard mechanism, yet you only have to look at the Australian article from last Thursday entitled 'Power pain: long winter of high costs.' The front page report says:

Households and businesses face extended power price pain into next year after the energy market operator revealed the cost of generating electricity rose—

wait for it—

31 per cent in the three months to June.

Labor members: ask your constituents if they are any better off, if their power prices are coming down. The answer will be no, because they're not—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Dr Freelander ): Order! Props are not allowed.

Mr McCORMACK: Because the answer is no. I wasn't using the newspaper as a prop, Mr Deputy Speaker Freelander; I was just using it to gesticulate the fact that people are frustrated. They are very frustrated at the power price pain that they are enduring.

The members opposite talk about aged care. I know the member for Pearce genuinely—and I join her to thank those workers in the aged-care sector because people in their twilight years deserve the very best of care. What we saw from the royal commission—a royal commission that, I might add, we put in place—indicated that much more needed to be done. But let me tell you that taking away from an aged-care centre in Temora $3.68 million that was promised, pledged and committed under the coalition government for the Whiddon group to provide another wing for that valuable aged-care centre—stripping that money away—was not 'protecting' the aged-care sector. Making it impossible for regional centres to get people—it is so tough at the moment. Allawah Lodge at Coolamon has had to close an entire high-dependency unit, an entire wing of its very well run local government aged-care centre, because it just can't find the workers. I've spoken with the aged-care centres of Cowra and I've spoken with the aged-care centre organisers and owners at Junee and elsewhere in my electorate, and they are doing it tough. When you see that Labor want to put in 24-hour nursing, that's all well and good in utopia but it doesn't work in regional Australia, because you just can't find the nurses. I appreciate the aged-care minister has put a caveat in there that aged-care centres can apply for an extension to not have to do that, but eventually it will be there and those aged-care centres will close. What will happen to the people who've lived in their communities all their lives? They'll have to go hundreds of kilometres away to find a bed; hundreds of kilometres away from their loved ones; hundreds of kilometres from the communities in which they have lived, in many cases, for most of their lives. This simply isn't good enough.

It's simply not good enough for Labor members to come in here and read from their talking points, bagging the previous government and praising themselves. Stop patting yourselves on the back. Get out there and talk to your constituents and talk to your small-business people.

I note that in this there's the Small Business Energy Incentive. Ask your small-business operators how they feel about the fact that Labor has taken away the instant asset write-off to the point of an unlimited guarantee to purchase goods and utes and goodness knows what else for tradie operators et cetera. Ask them how they feel about that and you will find a big negative.

You will find when you talk to people that grocery prices are going up, fuel costs are going up and power is going up, and what's Labor doing? They're coming in here and praising themselves and patting themselves on the back. I say it's not good enough, and so does Australia.