Page 880 - Week 06 - Tuesday, 25 July 1989
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These decisions of the Government amount to a major step towards achieving the Government's objectives and its commitment to social justice.
I conclude, Mr Speaker, by stressing the need for community participation. Their involvement is critical to finding the right solutions to meet their needs. I would look forward to a positive contribution to that review from Mr Stefaniak, in the form of a submission to the housing policy review. I am sure it would be valued. Since he is so interested in Federal policies that certainly have the major impact on this matter, he may even come down with a list of the Liberal Party's Federal policies that it would claim would alleviate the position; we have not seen those yet. It may be that they will not be presented to the review, while we would all be looking for the alternatives.
MR JENSEN (4.52): Mr Speaker, I know time is running away, so I will attempt to be as brief as possible.
Mr Wood: I gave you a couple of minutes.
MR JENSEN: Thanks, Bill. Such dramatic rises in interest rates for home buyers are unprecedented in this country. In fact, I recall some years ago that we were complaining about 13.5 per cent being very high. Now we are up over 17 per cent, with threats of 18 per cent.
There is a particular strain on single-income families, which has been enormous and which shows no sign of abating in the future. It is hard for those in decision making positions in our society and political life and in financial institutions to appreciate just how desperate the financial situation has become for many families in our outer suburbs - families that not only can no longer afford to eat meat but regard the provision of the roof over their heads as their number one priority.
But the costs, financial and emotional, are becoming frightening. I think all of us here have had people with those sorts of problems coming to us at some stage during our period in this Assembly. For many families, the only way out of this situation is to seek a second income. Many full-time home makers and mothers have no choice but to seek employment, which they are reluctant to undertake because of their commitment to stable family life and their problems of obtaining reliable child-care. It would be appropriate, Mr Speaker, for this house to give some priority to the increasing provisions of full- and part-time child-care facilities for these situations and actively encouraging the public and private sectors to provide more part-time, casual and job-sharing work.
However, it is not just the home market, Mr Speaker, that is affected by this massive increase in interest rates afflicted on our community by the Federal Labor Government, bereft of any real compassion for the effects of its discredited economic policies. The world's greatest
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