Senator PATTERSON (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs and Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Foreign Affairs) (3:10 PM) —I thought Senator Evans was above this, but he will sink to the lowest tactics the Labor Party can use. This is a typical tactic of gilding the lily and of changing the story to put fear into older people. Pensioners were well informed that the bonus amounts depended on their levels of income and savings. Over and over again coalition members went out and said there would be `up to' $1,000 for a single person. I cannot say it often enough—up to $1,000. It may be that the Prime Minister said once or twice, and you found the clipping, that it was $1,000, but over and over we all said it would be up to $1,000. Senator Newman indicated that she wrote a letter to all pensioners before the election indicating that it would be based on their level of savings and that it would be up to $1,000. There were articles in the Age Pension News, sent to all pensioners, indicating that it would be up to $1,000. The claim form for the bonus sent to all pensioners earlier this year indicated what would happen.

Senator Evans went on about the fact that they used out-of-date information from Centrelink. Pensioners and part-pensioners were told over and over again to tell Centrelink when their income changed because this would affect their pension. Some of them did not keep that information as up to date as they could have and Centrelink was operating on the most recent information they had been provided with by pensioners.

Let me just remind people of Labor's record. Before the 1993 election the Labor Party went around promising to take every pensioner out of the tax system after the election. What did they do? Three days after the election Dr Blewett went to the public and said, `Oh, we made a mistake. We didn't mean to put that in our policy. We made a terrible mistake.' They lied to the public. They lied to pensioners through the whole of the 1993 election, telling them they would be taken out of the tax system. Three days after the election they said, `Oh, we made a mistake.' For them to come into this chamber and to say what they have been saying today is absolutely outrageous.

What did they do to pensioners in 1992? They treated unrealised capital gains as income for the purpose of assessing the pension. If I was a pensioner who owned a few shares and my shares went up, my pension went down even though I had not sold my shares. That was outrageous. We had pensioners coming to public meetings of the Senate in their hundreds in Melbourne, Sydney and all around Australia and saying, `It was outrageous.' Their incomes were going up and down every time there was a change in their share portfolio. That is what the Labor Party did. Before the 1998 election, what was Labor going to do? It was going to put a capital gains tax on everything you had purchased before 1983. Who was that going to affect? It was mainly going to affect older people and pensioners.

What of older people with private health insurance? They were struggling. I had people coming to me and saying that they were struggling to pay their private health insurance. As the numbers went down in private health insurance, as the people with private health insurance aged and as the costs increased for private health insurance, so the premiums went up. Older people were struggling to pay their private health insurance. Did Ms Macklin care? No, she hates the concept of private health insurance. She would get rid of it tomorrow if she could. In fact, she is going to means test it. Any self-funded retiree who thinks they are going to get a rebate under the Labor Party ought to think again, because she will means test them and they will not get their rebate.

Senator Payne —They will change their minds on that, too.

Senator PATTERSON —They will change their minds on that too, Senator Payne. There was no rebate, premiums went up and older people were the ones who were struggling. What of extension of the health benefit card to older people? No, the Labor Party did not do that. When wholesale sales tax went up in 1993, when the Labor Party opposed the goods and services tax in the 1993 election, did it tell older people that it was going to put the wholesale sales tax up? No. There was wholesale sales tax on the sorts of things that older people use: pet food, cordials, cleaning materials.

Senator McLucas —Cordials are used by older people?

Senator PATTERSON —It was imposed on drinks. These are the sorts of things that older people purchase. If you would like to know, older people purchase a considerable amount of confectionery. The wholesale sales tax went up on all of that, on their pet food and on many other goods. There was no compensation. You can sit and laugh on the other side; you were not here. I might excuse you. You must remember what the Labor Party did, and you are part of that policy.