Labor maintains attack on ‘unfair’ Hockey budget
BILL Shorten has accused Joe Hockey of trying to “divide” the country, saying the Treasurer does not know what “fair” means.
The Opposition Leader called a speech by Mr Hockey defending the budget a “remarkable interjection” that showed the government was out of touch with the most vulnerable.
“The Abbott government is a small minority determined to divide Australia and Labor will not retreat,” Mr Shorten said at the Australian Council of Social Service conference in Brisbane, at which delegates also condemned the budget as “divisive and unfair”.
“Last night we saw the remarkable interjection by Treasurer Hockey.
“He is complaining that people are calling his budget unfair. I’ll tell you what unfair means, Joe Hockey, it means cutting support for the people who can least afford it.”
Mr Shorten said the budget was “a disgrace to fairness”.
“Labor and I reject the cynicism that divides Australia into the so-called lifters — successful businessmen, Coalition ministers, conservative media commentators — and the leaners — the disabled, the disabled pensioners, the people going to the doctor, the fixed-income pensioners and families with children between six and 16 receiving modest payments.”
Mr Shorten drew on budget measures such as the $7 GP co-payment and cuts to the pension as “unfair” policies that would harm the most vulnerable.
“Whichever way you crunch these budget numbers, the inescapable, unavoidable, ugly conclusion is that the people who do the heavy lifting in this budget are those least in the position to do so,” he said.
“(The government) has increased taxes, it has knighted people, but … Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey cannot answer the question of whether they housed the homeless.
They cannot answer the question: “have they protected the vulnerable?”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/policy/labor-maintains-attack-on-unfair-hockey-budg...
