Thanks very much for that very warm Tassie welcome. In fact everywhere I go these days I seem to be being upstaged by Tasmania. A few months ago it was Ricky Ponting, last week it was Princess Mary.
I half expected to come here to today to find out I had been replaced as the keynote speaker by Peter Hudson.
Proud Queenslanders, who can be here among the proud Tasmanians. Our two great states have helped make this very great Australian nation. If you look at just what we have contributed together. You gave us apples, we give you pineapples. You gave us Ricky Ponting, we have given you (inaudible)
You have given us Princess Mary but we have given you King Wally Lewis. I know it is a different form of football.
But it is great indeed to be back here in Tasmania and to be back here also with Tasmania's brand new Premier David Bartlett.
I take this opportunity to congratulate a new Labor Premier in Australia as well, the Premier of NSW Nathan Rees, and Deputy Premier Carmel Tebbutt. I look forward very much to working with Nathan on the big challenges that we face in Australia's future and we will be doing that soon with Council of Australian Government's.
To Jodie Campbell, Member for Bass, Julie Collins, Member for Franklin, Sid Sidebottom, Member for Braddon, good to have you have back in Parliament Sid. Dick Adams, Member for Lyons, we also have Senator Nick Sherry, Senator Katrina Bilk - who I think has just survived her first fortnight in the Senate - good on you, I thank you very much Katrina. Senator Carol Brown, Senator Kerry O'Brien, Senator Helen Polley, John Dowling the State Secretary, and men and women of the Tasmanian branch of the great Australian Labor Party.
I begin by acknowledging the First Australians on whose land we meet and whose culture we celebrate as among the oldest continuing cultures in human history.
I also acknowledge this great branch of the Australian Labor Party. I acknowledge the rank and file members of the Australian Labor Party. I acknowledge the rank and file members of Braddon who delivered Braddon back to the Australian Labor Party.
To rank and file members of Bass who delivered Bass back to the Australian Labor Party and to rank and file members who have also returned to Labor, Denison and Lyons and Franklin.I also want to acknowledge the work of this great state branch as I also acknowledge the work of the men and women of the Australian trade union movement - the Your Rights At Work campaign.
Tasmania delivered Federal Labor's highest vote of any State in the nation - at 56.2 per cent of the vote, it helped deliver one outcome, and that is to consign the Howard Liberal Government to history.
We, the Labor Party won the national election because we stood for something radically different than the Liberal Party:
They are the party of Work Choices. We are the party to abolish Workchoices.
They are the party which gave us AWAs. We are the party which abolishes AWAs.
They are the party who send our combat troops to Iraq, we are the party in Government who returned our troops from Iraq.
They are the party who refused to ratify Kyoto, we are the party, in our first hour in Government, ratified the Kyoto Protocol
They are the party who denied and who continue to deny the reality of climate change. We are the party who accepts the reality of climate change and agree that we are responsible for acting on climate change.
And remarkably delegates, they are the Party today which still says, when you look at the state of Australia's great inland river system, the Murray Darling System, the Liberal Party says today that climate change has nothing to do with it.
They are in a state of denial now, they have been in a state of denial in the past and they have indicated that they will be in a state of denial in the future on climate change.
Also if you look about the other great differences between what they did in their 12 long years in office and what we have committed to do in our first nine months in office.
They are the party which ripped $1 billion out of the nation's public hospitals. In nine months in office, we have put $1.2 billion back into the public hospitals of Australia.
They are the party who withdrew, literally hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars from the nation's universities. In our first budget we delivered back an additional half billion dollars to the nation's universities. And so the list goes on.
Whether it is in health, whether it is in education, whether it is across the entire spectrum, what we saw from that Government after 12 long years in office was this: despite the benefit of the resources boom, despite there being 12 years through which so many of those years delivered enormous increase in the revenue of the commonwealth, their response was, not to invest in the nation's infrastructure, not to invest in the nation's education, not to invest in the nation's health and hospital system, and instead to allow that money to be wasted.
I have news for you delegates, in our nine months in office, we have turned a corner decisively, we will be investors in the nation's future.
I'm delighted today to be here this weekend with Premier David Bartlett - leading this Government here in Tasmania.
The Premier understands that absolute central importance of education for this state's future and for this nation's future.
He understands that the best investment we can make is in our people, the next generation of Tasmanians, the next generation of Australians.
He understands that the jobs of the future will be different from the jobs of the past.
And he understands that the economy of the 21st century is an economy built on the education, skills and training of the workforce.
That is why he is the first Premier in fifty years in this State to retain the education portfolio - because he wants education to be at the heart of the Tasmanian Government's strategy for the future and I congratulate him on that.
This goes to the heart of the Labor message. The Labor message is that, wherever you are, whatever side of the tracks that you are born on, whether you are rich or poor, whatever part of this country that you come from, that our mission as Labor is to reach out a hand and say, ‘here is a future for you'. Here is a future for you, carved through first class schools, first class preschools, first class TAFE's, first class training institutions, first class universities.
That is the Labor mission from the past, that is the Labor mission for the future - and I welcome Tasmania's participation in it.
Tasmania has also been embracing the economy of the 21st Century, embracing the opportunities of the digital economy, renewable energy, (inaudible) and value adding to your additional industries.
And very soon Tasmania will reach a population passed the half million mark.
I know that the Bartlett government will be a partner in building an innovative 21st Century commonly for Tasmanians. And I look forward as Prime Minister of Australia, of working closely together with the Premier of Tasmania and this Tasmanian Government to forge the future together and we will do that with energy, with vigour and with determination.
It is now a just nine months since the Government, the Australian Labor Government took office.
Since coming to office, we have been prosecuting our long-term program to build a stronger Australia, a fairer Australia, a more secure Australia, to help working families, pensioners and carers facing financial pressures, and to prepare Australia for the challenges of the 21st century.
But our reform agenda has just begun - as we build this more secure Australia, this stronger Australia and, fairer Australia and an Australia capable of meeting the challenges of the new century, we are also committed to new ways of engaging the community in different ways as well.
And that is why we as party and we as a movement, must constantly explore and (inaudible) new ways of engaging with the community at the grassroots. Always keeping in touch, always responding to what the people are saying, that is the message of Labor, that is mission of Labor.
The first priority of government, for the National Government is to protect our nation's security. The security challenges that face Australia are increasingly complex.
The balance of global strategic and economic power is shifting to the Asia-Pacific region. Terrorism continues to pose a threat, and new challenges such as energy security continue to emerge.
The Government is responding to this complex emerging environment by preparing Australia to meet these new national security challenges.
We will strengthen our defence forces for the future, and we will enhance our relations with our friends and allies across the region.
We will also tackle non challenges like terrorism, natural disasters, water scarcity, food scarcity, and energy security.
The Government is delivering on our commitment to build this more secure Australia.
The starting point will be a new national security policy outlined in the near future in a new National Security Statement for the nation. It will be the first time Australia has had a National Security Statement.
We are bringing new rigour to our defence planning through the preparation of a new Defence White Paper. The White Paper will detail the emerging strategic terrain we face and how our policy and defence procurements for the future will respond to that great complex terrain.
And to give our Armed Forces the resources they need to do the job, the Government has committed to provide three per cent real growth in defence spending, not for the next year ahead, not for the next three years ahead, for the next ten years ahead, so that our defence forces can claim certainty for the future, because that is our first responsibility as Government.
We also intend to promote security cooperation in our region. And to do this, we are promoting as a Government a regional dialogue about the future of an Asia-Pacific Community.
We believe we have a simple choice - we either try to shape the region, shape the future of our region or allow our region simply to be shaped by events.
So we will continue prosecute an active foreign defence and security policy agenda for the future.
The years of disengaging from the international community for Australia are now over. Australia is back in business. The United Nations, the frame work convention on climate change, dealing with the challenges of global poverty. Dealing with the challenges in our own immediate region in the south-west pacific. Australia is back in business under this Government.
We are again engaging with the world again - including through our nomination to the UN Security Council, our commitment to the Millennium Development Goals for the world's poorest people, the establishment of the International Commission for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament, which is now headed by the former foreign minister Gareth Evans.
And by using Australia's potential for creative middle power diplomacy, we will build and keep building a more secure Australia, and to play our part to do our bit, to deliver a more secure region and a more secure world.
The Government came to office at a time when Australia is facing some of the most challenging global economic conditions in almost a century. We face serious global economic challenges. If you looked at the unfolding of the global financial crisis these last 12 months, it is watched across most economies in the world. Negative growth rates have been generated in Japan, Germany, France and Italy.
Zero growth in the United Kingdom and so the list goes on.
In Australia that economic challenge is compounded by the economic circumstances we inherited and bear these facts in mind. When this government was elected in November last year, we inherited the highest inflation this country has had in sixteen years. We inherited ten interest rate rises in a row. We inherited the second highest interest rates for Australian working families of any developed country in the world.
That was John Howard's and Peter Costello's legacy for Australian working families. When you therefore look at those challenges, those in the global economy and compounded by our local economic circumstances, the Government's course of action has been clear.
One, responsible economic management, anchored in a $22 billion budget surplus. A buffer for the future. Responsible economic management.
Two, a clear economic reform agenda to boost our long term economic productivity growth. And that is through the agency of an education revolution in our schools, in our preschools, in our training places and in our universities. And three, for this nation, under this Government and under this Prime Ministership, to begin the single largest commonwealth government driven nation building program the country has seen, $76 billion.
In the past the attitude of the nation's government under the Liberals and Nationals was this: not our problem, blame somebody else.
If there was a problem with infrastructure don't come up with solutions, just come up with an excuse, that was their attitude. Our attitude is different. If we the national government are the recipient of this great influx of revenue resources from around the world, off the back of the resources boom, you can either do two things with it.
You can waste it on consumption, which is what the Liberals did, or you can invest it in the future, which is what we intend to do. That's the difference. And we are proud of the difference. We are a party and Government of nation building.
When we look at the challenges of broadband, we look at the challenges of our roads, the challenges of our ports, the challenges of our railway system, our attitude is, it is not who do we blame, our attitude is, how do we fix it.
That is the difference. And so our first nine months in office, we have dedicated $76 billion to this great task of nation building, and we intend to get on with the task.$20 billion, Building Australia Fund, $11 billion education investment fund, $10 billion Health and Hospitals Fund, $26 billion through the Auslink roads program and other programs as well. This is just the start.
The people of Australia are looking at their national government and not simply for a litany of excuses, they want instead a program of action. And I say to you delegrates, we in our first nine months have embarked on that course of action.
We intend to build the nation. We are nation builders by instinct, we are nation builders by instinct, by our history and we will be nation builders for the future.
Those opposite, the Liberals enjoy particularly talking the economy down. I would draw the Liberal's attention to one core fact, in the various data which has been produced on the economy in the last period of time, what the Australian business community is saying about their view of the future.
Last week we learned that Australian businesses are planning to lift capital expenditure to $100 billion for 2008-09.
That is the highest investment level ever, after a very strong 11 per cent increase in the financial year that just ended.
It demonstrates strong confidence in our economy's future.
And there's good reason for that confidence.
We are in the fastest growing region in the world - and despite the global slowdown, we are still seeing solid growth in our region.
The latest IMF forecasts predicts 8.4 per cent growth for Asia's developing economies for both 2008 and 2009.
Demand for Australia's commodities remains strong, and prices for our commodities are at generational highs.
The 50-year highs in the terms of trade are resulting in extra income flowing into the economy and fuelling strong investment and export revenue.
Indeed, the balance of payments this week recorded the greatest quarterly improvement in the current account deficit since records began in 1959.
Despite therefore, difficult global conditions, Australian businesses are determined to get on with it. Many are still thriving, and many firms are held back more by a shortage of skilled labour than a shortage of business activity ahead.
The Australian Government is committed to steering Australia through these tough global economic times to ensure our economy emerges stronger in the long term.
Our strategy of responsible economic management, depends in part on our ability to deliver a strong budget surplus, a buffer for the future, a $22 billion buffer for the future.
At this last week's in Canberra, when our Senators, including our Tasmanian Senators got to, got up close and personal with those opposite, we saw what the Liberals were really like. We saw what the Liberals were like.
What did the Liberals do in their first major legislative act in the Senate? The Liberals decided that their number one priority was to make sure that Luxury cars would remain affordable. In other words, their number one priority in their legislative action in the Senate was to block an increase in the Luxury Car Tax.
That is their number one priority. So much in touch are they with the needs of working families, pensioners and carers, that their number one priority in the Senate, it's the composition of the new Senate has been to act on the Luxury Car Tax in this way.
Let's go to the money involved: $555 million, half a billion dollars. So what the Liberals are saying is that they will put porches ahead of public transport. They will put Rolls Royces ahead of urban rail. Half a billion dollars to make sure that your Porsche or your Maserati or your Lamborghini, remain affordable.
You know something, I don't think that's what working families are looking for.
Working families want some help, and if half a billion dollars is available through what has been a modest tax increase in this category of vehicles, I say as the head of the Labor Government, we want to dedicate that money to the urban transport needs of working families coming into work.
But what we see from the Liberals, this pattern of behaviour, spreads across their other actions in the Senate as well.
Take the Medicare Levy Surcharge. We have a simple measure announced in the Budget, was to make sure that working families are no longer penalised by the surcharge. Back in 1996, they introduced the surcharge for those earning $50,000, which they defined back then as high income earners.
And guess what, as of 2007 when they lost office, they still defined those earning $50,000 a year as high income earners, because they hadn't changed the surcharge.
Our budget measure was this: it is time to change that to provide people with a decent break.
And so that is our measure before the Senate at the moment, to make sure that those who have to pay that surcharge at present in that $50,000 to $100,000 bracket no longer have to pay that into the future.
And for a working family with a couple of incomes, $60,000 from one $60,000 from another, you are looking at a potential saving of more than $1000 a year. So in the very week that for the first time in seven years, the Reserve Bank delivers an interest rate cut, the equivalent of which is $600 a year for a person on an average mortgage, the Liberals turn around and say, well here is a $1200 tax bill back on top of that for you.
That's what the Liberals are saying, that is what they are doing, and more importantly, they are committed to do it in the future. I say this to the Liberals as they contemplate their future actions in the Senate: It is time for the Liberal Party of Australia just to get real with the challenges which working families are facing.
They want a help up, they don't want another tax thrown on top of their heads like this one that I have just been talking about. But it is part and parcel of a pattern of behaviour. Whether it is FuelWatch, whether it is Grocery Choice, whether it is what we are doing with the changes to the Medicare Levy Surcharge.
Whether it is what we were proposing also in other areas of tax. In one areas after another. They are not siding with consumers, they are not siding with working families. The same Liberal Party of Workchoices, the same Liberal Party who constantly is siding with the big end of town as opposed to helping those who need a hand up.
This Liberal Party earns the Nation's condemnation and you have just seen the first edition of it in the debate we had just now in the Senate on the Luxury Car Tax.
Labor's plans are different. We say to take this revenue, the $6 billion which the Liberals now hold to ransom and say, let's invest that instead in the nation's future. Let us invest it in the urban transport needs of our major cities. Let's invest it in the infrastructure needs of this great state of Tasmania.
Let us make sure that we have a decent telecommunications system, in this great state of Tasmania, lets invest to make sure that happens.
Delegates I spoke before about an education revolution, in our first budget we allocated $19.3 billion to the Education Revolution over the next four years.
We are delivering a national curriculum for all students in English, and maths, the sciences and history - and already we have established the National Curriculum Board.
We have guaranteed funding to both Government and non-Government schools alike - this year, Tasmanian schools will receive funding of $201 million from the Commonwealth.
We have begun to deliver on our $1.2 billion Digital Education Revolution - Round One of the computers in school program saw funding for 1,047 new computers in 23 schools across Tasmania. That's practical action.
While the Liberals in parliament complain about computers in schools, I have one question back to them, and that is, which of you as liberal members of parliament want to put your hand up and hand the money back from the schools in your area.
I am yet to hear one say yes. You know why? The P&C's and the P&F's across this country are saying, any practical help to make sure that our kids have the opportunities of the 21st Century education in the classroom is help that is welcome and that they receive positively.
We have begun allocation funding for our $2.5 trades training centre programs in schools. We are funding 630,000 training places over five years through our $1.9 billion investment in the Productivity Places Program.
I welcome the agreement we have reached with the Tasmanian Government just last week to work together in delivering Productivity Places in Tasmania.
That partnership will deliver training places across many Tasmanian industries including the key skills shortage areas in community services and health, in manufacturing, in construction and electrical trades.
We started this year with 458 new training places in identified skill shortage areas, and we are matching that training closely to industry needs so that businesses have a solution to skill shortages.
Already, 1,030 Tasmanians have commenced training in the Productivity Places Program in occupations such as Community Services Support Work, Security Operations and Asset Maintenance - and 300 of these job seekers have completed training. That's practical action. That's practical action for Tasmania, practical action in our first nine months in office.
And I look forward to continuing to work with the Tasmanian Government on strengthening the skills, education and training of the Tasmanian workforce.
This is the practical start, the skeleton, the bones, the flesh the blood of the education revolution, which I am committed to and which your premier is committed to.
And as we seek to build the nation, building together and in this state, 21st century highways, 21st century broadband, 21st century water infrastructure and 21st century hospitals and schools.
In the long term, this is necessary to underpin productivity competitiveness, exports and growth.
I said before delegates that we are committed to a program of nation building. And we see the states as being partners with us in that progress.
But nation building, building for the future, building a stronger economy, building a more secure Australia is an incomplete vision unless we are equally committed to building a fairer Australia, to give every working person a decent go.
And that is why fairness is etched deep into the Labor soul. From our very beginnings, from the earliest days of the 1890's, when this movement of ours was founded and we began operating as a national political party in 1901. If there is one core organising principle of Labor, it is this: to give every person a fair go.
And that is why when the Liberals said that their attitude to a fair go was to impose Workchoices and AWAs. They lost touch totally with the Australian community.
Because in that one act they dropped the fair go and they shredded it, they shredded it. Because at the end of the day, they are not the party of the fair go. They never have been and they never will be. It is not in their DNA. It is in ours and we should be proud of it.
That's why we are building a fair and flexible industrial relations system for the future.
That's why we're delivering tax relief for working families. That's why, in this most recent Budget, we have provided $7.5 billion in additional payments to pensioners and carers and that is why we have young kids going to preschool, increase the childcare tax rebate from 30 per cent to 50 per cent. And that is why if you are educating your kids at school, for the first time in the nation's history, there will now be an education tax refund to help you get a tax rebate for what you invest in your kids' education.
We have also in the (inaudible) fairness, decided to shine a light on the great national obscenity that is homelessness. How is it that this nation of ours in the 21st Century that the (inaudible) can say to us that we have 100,000 Australian out there who cant call the place home.
How could we allow that to happen. I say it is wrong. I say we have got to do something about it. And that is why we have launched the first Green Paper for this Government, in the first month that we were in office, a national paper on homelessness. It will deliver its findings by years' end. And this Government is determined to act.
To act also in partnership with our programs on housing affordability: First Home Saver Accounts, the National Rental Affordability Scheme, the Housing Affordability Fund.
In the past, the Liberals thought so much of housing and housing affordability, they did not even have a Minister for Housing. They did not have a department responsible for housing. They had no housing policies.
In nine months, we have hit the ground running. But we looking forward to the delivery of this White Paper on homelessness, because I believe a mark of a nation's decency, a mark of a people's decency, a mark of our society's decency is looking at a need as acute and as deep as that and saying, ‘we must act'. And act we will.
We have also, as a party and as a Government chosen to shine a light on the great challenge of our age as well which is closing the gap. Closing the gap between Indigenous and non Indigenous Australians.
I do not believe that for us as a party and the Government of the people can stand idly by while the life expectancy gap between indigenous and non indigenous and Australians grows wider as opposed to growing narrower.
How is it that young Aboriginal children under the age of five have three times the mortality rate of non indigenous kids. It is just wrong, we have got to do something about it. Closing the gap is one of the hardest commitments this Government has made. We have outlined a timetable for so doing. We are harnessing the resources of Government for so do. We will do so in partnership with the businesses and community organisations across the nation.
But I say to you as delegates of the Australian Labor Conference here in Tasmania, the mark of this Government and this movement must be to deal with this great and enduring challenge to our nation's decency. And we are determined to act.
Delegates, it has been good to be among you today. It has been good to be among you here in Tasmania. Part of our challenge for Government is not just building a secure Australia, building a stronger Australia, not just to build a fairer Australia, not just to prepare for the great challenges of the future including climate change, it is also to explore together a new way of governing, a new way of engaging in the community. A new way of remaining in touch.
It has been good to see here in Tasmania the new Tasmanian Government beginning to fold out, community cabinets across the Island.
As a national Government we have done this since the beginning of the year. We have had community cabinets now in the Western Suburbs of Sydney, the Southern Suburbs of Perth, we have had them in the centre of Mackay, in North Queensland, we have had them in an Indigenous Community in Yirrkala, in East Arnhem Land.
We have also held them in other parts of the country as well. And what I can say to you today and confirm is that before years' end, we will be bringing the entire cabinet here, to Tasmania as well.
For the first time in ten years, the Australian cabinet is coming to town and it is coming here to Launceston. And next year, the entire cabinet is coming back to town, we are going to the south of the island.
And the year after that we are going to the north west. It is part of the community engaging the cabinet. It is part of the community engaging the Government. There is no better discipline for the soul, for some of the mandarins that work in the commonwealth public service to sit down across a table, with representatives of local community organisations and find out just what it is like.
It is part of a new way of governing. And we intend to do that, and to keep doing it.
Delegates, as Governments we can never afford to lose touch with the community.
None of us in Government can ever taker the community for granted. None of us in Government can ever lose touch with the community. None of us in Government can ever become detached from what the people are saying because the people are very tough task masters and it is right that they are tough task masters. Because in Government they give us their trust to deliver for them. To deliver for them, in what is needed now and to deliver for them, leadership for the great challenges of the future. And that is our challenge.
Friends, It has been an honour to among you today because you are the heart and soul of our movement. Each and every one of you. Today I have met so many of you as I came into the building. I met the missos, I met many missos, more missos than I could poke a stick at. I met members of other unions as well.
And I thank you again for you work with Your Rights at Work. Each and every one of you. I met also, those of you who work in local councils. I met also, a woman who works on council up in Georgetown, who said something really interesting to me. She said that why she was in the business of local government was to respond to what, to use her term, the local people, those who see themselves of little people, need.
I think there is something in that for us. Always to bear in mind what it is like when you are doing it really, really tough.
I also met today representatives of (inaudible), out there doing the hard work of recruiting. Keep at it, each and every one of you.
We constantly must rejuvenate our movement, we must constantly rejuvenate by bringing you people in. The values of which we stand are ancient and continuing and they are good values because we stand for the fair go.
But we must always be rejuvenated by people who come afresh to join our ranks and that is where your task comes in.
I also met today, the (inaudible) where are they? Hands up. I have never met these folk in my life before, other than to know that they became life members recently. And I heard the story of how Young Labor was formed in Hobart in 1948, 68 years ago.
You know, when I hear stories like that from the local council of Georgetown, from the formation of Young Labor in 1948, to the work on our campuses today, to the work that we see through our great trade unions, it makes me proud to be the leader of this great movement of ours.
Our values are great. Our people are great. Our mission is good. Our determination is strong. Let's go forward to the future, together.