Mrs ELLIOT (Richmond—Assistant Minister for Social Services and Assistant Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence) (15:27): I'm really pleased to be speaking on this matter public importance on trust. I don't think the irony is lost on anyone that it's coming from the opposition leader. This is outrageous. Ask any of his colleagues, or, better still, let's revisit Nemesis. There we had the former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull describing him as a thug. We look at Nemesis, and what do we see? A litany of incompetence, infighting, cuts and chaos. We can see it all on your faces today. There wasn't much support for him at all, and the cuts and chaos continued. We saw that incompetence over—what?—three leaders and nine years. There he was, the opposition leader, always lurking about and plotting lots of cuts and chaos in all his ministerial roles. Of course, Nemesis shows us they were totally consumed with themselves, whilst also there were a whole series of harsh cuts and failed policies. All we get now from the Leader of the Opposition is negativity—whinging and negativity, constantly. There are no positive policies. We never hear any of them, just non-stop whinging. They haven't got a plan to relieve the cost-of-living burden on Australian families. They've got nothing to offer the country except negativity and division. What we do know is that the Leader of the Opposition wants Australians to work longer and get paid less. That's what we know about him. The fact is the Leader of the Opposition is out of touch and cannot be trusted. In contrast, our government, the Albanese Labor government, is focused on delivering for the Australian people. Our No. 1 priority is addressing cost-of-living pressures. We know people are doing it tough; we understand that. This government is proudly delivering a tax cut to all Australian taxpayers, and a bigger tax cut for Middle Australia to help with the cost of living. This builds on our targeted relief that's already in place. That includes electricity bill relief. It includes making medicines cheaper—this has made a huge difference—and making it easier and cheaper to see a doctor. It includes cheaper child care and expanding paid parental leave. We're building more social and affordable homes and increasing rent assistance. We've also delivered fee-free TAFE, which has made a huge difference for training opportunities for people right across the country. As I've said, the Leader of the Opposition has made it clear that he doesn't believe in tax cuts for Middle Australia. We know that. They've had so many different positions and policies right across the board. The fact is these tax cuts are good for Middle Australia. They're good for helping with cost-of-living pressures, good for labour supply and good for the economy. Our tax cuts mean that 11.5 million taxpayers will receive a bigger tax cut. That's the reality. Nurses, teachers and police are some of the most likely to benefit, with more than 95 per cent of these taxpayers getting a bigger tax cut. Let's look at this in the context of how strongly Labor supports Australian workers and improving working conditions right across the board, whether it's job security, working conditions or tax cuts. It's only Labor that supports all of these initiatives. As I said before, the opposition leader wants Australians to work longer and get paid less. He even applies that to our brave and hardworking police officers. Let's have a look at that in terms of Labor's right-to-disconnect laws. They're so vitally important for workers across the country and especially important for our police and emergency services personnel. I'm a former frontline police officer and I know how important it is for police to have incredibly good working conditions, especially the right to disconnect. They need to have that work-life family balance. But the opposition leader is opposed to the right to disconnect—of course he is; he's so negative. Unbelievable! A lot of police have contacted me saying they are absolutely appalled that the opposition leader has taken this stance. Our police do an incredible job, and Labor back them; we do. We know they've got to have protected working conditions, but the opposition leader is so out of touch he wants to get rid of all these laws that protect their working conditions. In fact, it was only a couple of days ago that the Police Federation of Australia came out and condemned the opposition leader for this. I'll quote what they said in relation to the opposition leader's actions, which is that they are 'disrespectful and wrong'. Even they're onto him. Everybody's onto him. We're all onto him. He can't be trusted. I stand with the Police Federation of Australia. I stand with the police across the country. I stand with workers across the country—with Middle Australia, who are doing it tough. They're onto you and they're onto the opposition leader. They know that he cannot be trusted. That's just one of the many examples we see when it comes to the policies the opposition. In fact, we finally have seen an election policy from them: they want to take away more of workers' rights; that's all they want to do. I would like to focus on the record of the opposition leader when he was health minister. I remember it. I was here, and we saw this. Every day we heard from our local constituents about what he was doing, and particularly about how he was destroying the health system in this country. Let's have a look at what he did in trying to dismantle Medicare. An opposition member interjecting— Mrs ELLIOT: That's right; you remember him dismantling Medicare by forcing all Australians to pay a $7 co-payment, the GP tax. That was appalling, especially for our senior Australians, the people who built this nation. This is what he wanted to impose and tried so hard to do it. He said at the time: … we believe very strongly in having a price signal. There's no sense me pretending to Australians that when you walk through the door of your GP that everything can be for free. How out of touch can you get? Australians remember that. They know; don't worry. He also wanted to jack up the prices of essential medicines by $5 a script, making them unaffordable. What have we done, Madam Deputy Speaker Claydon? We have made medicines cheaper. We know that people need to be able to access them. He also wanted to charge Australians who needed to access public hospital emergency departments. How catastrophic would that be? He said at the time: The government will also remove the restrictions on state and territory governments that prevent hospital emergency departments charging a modest fee for presentations. Absurd! He froze the indexation of the Medicare rebate, undermining the viability of our great GP practices and increasing out-of-pocket costs. What have we done since we've been in government? We've tripled the Medicare rebate to make accessing bulk-billing easier—so important—because we understand that Australians need to have that cost-of-living relief. We also saw the opposition leader, when he was health minister, rip more than $50 billion out of our public hospitals. Of course, we inherited this absolute mess, which our government is fixing with a massive investment in Medicare. The damage that was done was so wide ranging, impacting people and their health and wellbeing over the nine years they were in government. In fact, the opposition leader was so bad as health minister that he was named the worst health minister in 35 years in a pile of GPs and specialists. That is the reality, and that was just one of the many, many bad, bad policies that we saw from this government with all of their failures. Let's not forget when he was the Minister for Home Affairs as well. The opposition leader as minister then wrecked Australia's system of immigration and border security. We saw this in the Richardson Review. You have all seen it and read the details. He left our borders wide open, our communities less safe and our economy weaker. This has all been detailed very, very clearly in the Richardson report. We had that nine years of chaos. We had the three leaders. We are all seeing it played out in Nemesis, every detail of it, all the infighting. It is because those opposite were so focused on themselves and their infighting, and there was always the opposition leader there lurking about, undermining all the time. Their focus was completely on themselves. We on this side are focused on the Australian people and delivering for them right across the board, particularly delivering the really important cost-of-living relief. But those opposite will keep on with their infighting. We are all waiting for Nemesis part 2. It will be good to hear about the Dutton years in opposition. It will be Nemesis part 2. Mr McCormack: The Dutton years when he's Prime Minister! Mrs ELLIOT: I don't think so. I don't think that is going to happen. Nemesis part 2 will be about the opposition leader and the infighting that keeps continuing. Clearly it does. You can see them sitting there today, completely devoid of any interest and enthusiasm when he speaks. It was pretty bad. No wonder. We know from Nemesis that they didn't trust him then. We can see it now on their faces that they don't trust him. It is not just all those opposite who don't trust him; everybody outside has worked it out because they know his long history of cuts and chaos. They know when Malcolm Turnbull, the former Prime Minister, described him as a 'thug', that he was pretty spot-on. They knew that was the case. They have worked him out. They know that he is harsh, with all those health cuts over such a long period of time, and they know the opposition leader is so out of touch with their concerns. He has no credibility because of his history. All he does is come out with all of this division and negativity and whinging. He has a long history of making cuts and causing chaos all over the place. Australian people are completely onto him; we know you mob are too. Everyone knows that the opposition leader is totally out of touch and they know the opposition leader cannot be trusted.