Kerry Nettle
Instead of investing in our common future the federal Coalition government spends money on waging an illegal war, on regressive tax cuts, buying swinging votes and divisive public policy — and all this while presiding over the most dramatic decline in our essential public services.
This budget has been hailed as a budget for families, but it is not a family budget because it fails families in the long term.
There is a handout to family tax benefit recipients that many families won't see and there are lump sum payments for new mothers that fall well short of a national paid maternity leave scheme.
But there is no action to support the over-stressed public services that all of us, families in particular, rely on.
There is no real investment in public health, nothing for public schools, nothing for universities, and nothing new for sustaining our environment.
This government has shifted the spending on services from the public sphere — in which all Australians contribute to the cost and share the benefits — to the private sphere — where those with private financial resources buy essential services based on their capacity to pay rather than their need. It is the poor and vulnerable who are the biggest losers.
The Greens would scrap the appallingly unfair SES system that funds non-government schools, and in doing so redirect the $1.5 billion earmarked for the wealthiest private schools over the next four years into a priority public schools funding program.
The Greens would freeze the funding of private schools at 2003-04 levels in order to direct those savings into urgently needed catch-up funds for the public sector.
The Greens advocate abolishing the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) and forgiving all HECS debt, returning Australia to a system of free public tertiary education.
Instead of strengthening Medicare, the government has moved Australia closer to a situation where the health care you obtain depends on what you can afford to pay. Instead the Greens want:
* Abolition of the $2.4 billion per annum Private Health Insurance Rebate and redirection of funds to: public hospitals; increasing the bulk-billing rebate for GP services; mental health services; preventative health care; and Indigenous health care.
* Additional funding to include medically necessary dentistry covered under Medicare.
The government's maternity payment is no substitute for a proper paid parental leave scheme. The ALP have lowered the bar on national paid maternity leave by proposing a welfare payment, not a national paid maternity leave scheme.
The Greens have developed a scheme to deliver replacement income to 75% of women for 18 weeks, with a further 34 weeks of unpaid leave, a right to return to work part-time and to share the leave period with a partner.
Under the Howard government, taxation policy has become less progressive. The Greens support progressive taxation, and as part of this we call for the abolition of the GST. The company tax rate should be returned to 33%.
The Australian Council of Social Services has identified tax loopholes worth $8.2 billion a year that benefit only the very well-off. These loopholes must be closed and the savings redirected to public services.
We are surrounded by evidence of the damage we are doing to the Earth. The Pentagon report on climate change, released earlier this year, should have dispelled any doubts about the threats we face if we fail to reverse global warming.
The Greens propose a carbon levy, as many European countries have. The proceeds would finance energy conservation, renewable energy and measures to protect low income earners from higher electricity prices.
We also propose a $35 billion, 10-year investment plan to build a sustainable future. By using the government bond market to offer "Green Bonds" to green Australia's essential infrastructure we can help transform the nation, bringing social, environmental and economic benefits.
In this budget, the government continues its abysmal record on assisting the world's poorest people. Improving the living conditions and life opportunities for the poorest people on the planet is one of the best investments we can make to secure a safer world.
We need to withdraw our troops from Iraq and instead put resources into reconstruction and humanitarian aid managed by the Iraqi people and their future government.
The Howard government is depriving East Timor of billions of dollars in royalties from the exploitation of oil and gas reserves in the Timor Sea. Australia refuses to allow independent arbitration of the sea boundary dispute that sits at the heart of this robbery.
Our global responsibility includes providing asylum to refugees. The Greens continue to call for an end to mandatory detention with savings redirected to help asylum seekers live in the community while their claims are assessed.
[This article is based on Greens Senator Kerry Nettle's budget reply speech outlining the Greens' alternative.]
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, May 19, 2004.
Visit the