An ideological crusade against people on low incomes and …

Andrew Wilkie’s address to today’s anti-Budget rally in Hobart

No government has any right, no right at all, to wage an ideological crusade against people on low incomes and other disadvantaged members of the community.

But that’s what the Federal Government is doing right now with its budget that attacks the young, students, the unemployed, the sick and disabled, the aged, single parents and grandparents raising children. All will be directly affected by this budget and some dramatically.

That’s why I voted against the Budget when the Appropriation Bills came before the Parliament last Monday evening although, regrettably, my vote came to little because the only other Member of the House of Representatives to join me was Clive Palmer.

Now that these Bills have passed the House of Representatives I hope that my Labor and Greens parliamentary colleagues in the Senate will vote against the Appropriation Bills and force the Government back to the drawing board to prepare a fair budget.

This is vitally important. Appropriation Bills No. 1 and No. 2 contain, among other things, the weakening of the indexation of government pensions, the cut to the ABC and SBS, and even the axing of funding for legal aid services including the Women’s Legal Service in Tasmania.

Please be assured there would not be a constitutional crisis if supply is blocked in this way.

For a start some public servants and all pension recipients would keep being paid because their payments are covered by what’s called Standing Appropriations.

And in any case the Government has time to remedy the Budget. But if it did want more time then it could put in place an interim budget not unlike those that were implemented in 1984, 1987 and 1996.

The bottom line here is that many Australians are worried, and even downright scared, about the consequences of the Budget for them and the Government really should redo the Budget and bring it back to the Parliament with a better and fairer set of proposals.

No wonder we all feel betrayed, not just by all the pre-election promises, but also by the very notion that we have a budget emergency in the first place. And that this so-called emergency should be justification for targeting the most vulnerable and disadvantaged members of the community is dreadful and, frankly, unforgiveable.

From the feedback I’ve received I feel confident that my vote against the Appropriation Bills, for what it’s worth, represents the will of a clear majority of Denison constituents and indeed the broader community.

In closing can I just say that budgets are a chance for governments to show the community what they think is important. And this Liberal Party government has sent a clear signal to the Australian people that it is more interested in a budget surplus than their future.

If the Government refuses to re-write the Budget then I think supply should be blocked and then we can go back to the polls where the people can decide this budget, and indeed this government’s fate.

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