Page 1957 - Week 06 - Thursday, 8 June 2006
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MR MULCAHY: $900 million. That is an extraordinary windfall of gains for this territory that could have been used to avoid so much of the pain that is being inflicted on the people of Canberra. The Labor Party always attempt to categorise the opposition as heartless or cold or economic rationalists. In fact, this budget has indicated to the people of Canberra that this government could not care two hoots about the ordinary people.
Time and time again we hear these pat speeches from Mr Gentleman about Mary of Wanniassa or Tom of Belconnen and the terrible plight of the working people, as he calls them. Well, the entire working population of Canberra has been hammered under this budget. There are people in this town who are not earning the salaries that members of the government are earning. They will be the ones to suffer and they will have enormous difficulty making ends meet.
As I said earlier today, this budget will affect so many of their basic pleasures in life. Their discretionary dollar will be gobbled up by this series of charges. Not even the Chief Minister understands how the new indexation system works. I raised it with him yesterday. Today he said, “Well, it is up over three per cent and it was only two. Your calculator is wrong. How can that be a 45 per cent increase?” Maybe Mr Barr, who is a little bit more skilled on matters of economics, might be able to sit him down and explain to him that the percentage increase from CPI to WPI is, in fact, in the order of 45 per cent.
That will have a compounding and very deleterious effect on the financial position of many people in Canberra, especially retirees, people on fixed incomes and the so-called working people that in the past Mr Gentleman has built so many cases on and pretended to suggest are the ones that Labor care about. They are the people who are calling my office. They are the people who are distressed at the figures in the Canberra Times. The Canberra Times only had the rate increases. They have not gone through and done all the rest of the calculations. They are horrific and are causing people to be distressed.
Most people do not live with vast amounts of surplus cash available to spend at the whim of a government that now realises it has made a great mess of things. Most people tend to live to their income levels, and I believe that a government that imposes a raft of charges that require a city of salary and wage earners to suddenly and dramatically change the relativities within their income and expenditure patterns will be dealt with severely in two years time.
There is a remarkable lack of sympathy for this budget from the community. It is universal. I have never been to a business breakfast meeting like the one I went to yesterday where I heard people jeering the Chief Minister. It is without precedent to see that reaction in such a forum in this city. It spoke of the anger that exists amongst those who attended about the way in which this Chief Minister has arrogantly gone about it with this budget.
There is no remorse. There is no attempt to demonstrate sympathy for people. It is just a case of, “Well, you know, we have made mistakes.” The government is trying to blame Trevor Kaine or—I do not know—Kate Carnell or somebody in the past before most of the people sitting here were in the Assembly. They are saying it is all somebody else’s fault. It is always somebody else’s fault. From what I hear, it does not matter if it is
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