STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS - Budget
May 24, 2018
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The first five years of a child's development are the most crucial, so if we want to invest in our children's future, we need to invest more in child care, not less. Part of that investment is also boosting pay for early childhood educators. Early childhood educators do a phenomenal job under very difficult circumstances. With two kids in early childhood education, I'm in awe of their educators. They have to have a minimum of a cert III qualif...
Read MoreI'm proud to rise on this matter of public importance to discuss the government's failure to invest in infrastructure. It's a privilege to follow the member for Bradfield, a warm-up act to four successive National Party ministers. It must be very galling to be taking orders from the likes of the member for New England. The truth is that this is a smoke-and-mirrors budget. This government, as the member for Grayndler has ably outlined, uses...
Read MoreI rise to talk about the Treasury Laws Amendment (Personal Income Tax Plan) Bill 2018. I do so with eagerness because this bill allows us to talk about the centrepiece of the government's hopeless and already discredited budget and the philosophical underpinnings of that budget. The philosophical underpinnings of this budget are twofold. First, it's a reaffirmation of the discredited 1980s economic theory of trickle-down economics. Secondly, i...
Read MoreI rise proudly to oppose this motion, because it is all crocodile tears from the government, who don't care a single iota for a single coalminer in this country. I have had the privilege of representing two seats in this parliament, the first named after a Lambton coalminer who went on to lead the Australian Labor Party, and the second named after Lieutenant Shortland, who discovered coal in Australia, in Newcastle. So I'm proud to represent a...
Read MoreIt has been a brilliant season for the Newcastle Jets football team; they've gone from wooden spooner to grand finalist. Unfortunately, the grand final did not go to them last Saturday night. It was a great show. We had 29,000 people at the stadium. We had big crowds watching the game from Speers Point Park and in town. Unfortunately, the spectacle of the game was ruined by the incredible incompetence of Football Federation Australia. The vide...
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