Mr HARDGRAVE (1:03 PM) —It is a twist of fate, but it seems I keep following the member for Lilley in debates in recent times. I follow him only in the sense that I rise to speak immediately after him and I have had the opportunity to reflect upon just how sad so much of his contribution has been since he has come back from his almost self-imposed exile in the paddock for the 2½ years he was not in this place. He did not have the chance to contribute to the debate on youth allowance in the last parliament, but he is trying to play catch-up this morning.

I think it is very sad that those who pretend to be the alternative government in this place rise constantly and offer sad reflections on the motives of the government, offer a sad and dire future for the people of Australia, while on this side we are working on the big positive to give people incentive and security—the safety net, if you like, if they have to fall back on it. At the end of the day, we are giving them a hand-up and the direction that they need to follow in order to get somewhere themselves, based on their own skills and of course their own motivation.

I thought back on the years of the previous government, which the member for Lilley had a short stay in, and I thought about how the previous government in fact encouraged young Australians to leave school, because the unemployment benefits were higher than the Austudy benefits that were paid to the underprivileged. The underprivileged families, the families with low incomes in this country, were getting a smaller hand up in the form of a handout under Labor than they are under this government and, moreover, they were getting a smaller hand up as a handout under Labor than those who opted to go on the unemployment lists.

I think it is extraordinary that we have a Leader of the Opposition who pretends that one day he may be known as the education Prime Minister but who was happy to earn a wage from the people of Australia as a member of several cabinets through the Hawke and Keating years which presided over a system which encouraged people to leave education. One of the things this government had to do when it came to power was to try to reorganise the incentive for young people to learn and to put in the effort and to apply a mutual obligation standard on the benefits they receive from government. As a result of the youth allowance, which was introduced on 1 July last year, something like 95 per cent of recipients of government benefits either received the same or more money on going onto the common youth allowance. More money went to those particularly from battler families, families who found it difficult to afford the costs of keeping children in years 11 and 12 at high school. Battler families now get additional money under youth allowance than they were getting under Labor's allowances of Austudy for the same purpose.

I find it extraordinary to have the member for Lilley coming in here promoting the big scare, as usual, coming in here to deny some of the basic truths about the government's tax reform agenda, which includes compensation measures that are going to rework the way so many of the systems which people rely upon in the form of a safety net. One of the systems that is going to be enhanced and improved, something that people have been crying out for for years while they have been caught in a poverty trap, is this government's broadening of the base of income that people are able to receive before benefits start to decline completely.

In other words, people will be encouraged to earn a little money and not run the risk of losing a benefit. The benefits themselves will increase as the government recognises that there will be a one-off increase in the cost of living of about 1.9 per cent as a result of bringing in a 10 per cent GST after all of the various taxes that the Labor Party seem to love—like wholesale sales tax of 12, 22 and 32 per cent and more—are taken off.

These sorts of compensations were never evident after the 1993 federal election when the Labor government of the time campaigned heavily against the Hewson opposition's proposals with regard to taxation reform. And what did they do? They rewarded the people of Australia who narrowly returned them at that time with an increase in wholesale sales tax; in fact, not just one, but two increases in wholesale sales tax. Between 1993 and 1996 wholesale sales taxes went up from 10 to 12 per cent, 20 to 22 per cent, 30 to 32 per cent, and where were the compensation measures for the battlers which the member for Lilley now decries? He is back in this place ever so narrowly, replacing a very effective former member, Mrs Elizabeth Grace. The member for Lilley now decries this government's compensation measures which are targeting the battlers of Australia like the Labor governments of Hawke and Keating never did. I find all of this talk unbelievable.

I also want to talk about the member for Lilley's fantasy about the crisis in Centrelink. The only crisis that is evident to people in Australia today is the crisis of leadership of those opposite, which is very obvious to everybody. I would invite the member for Lilley to use his apparent extensive power in caucus to call on his Labor senators to pass the government's taxation measures, so that, once implemented, along with all of the other various improvements we have made to the mess that Labor left us, we will find the battlers of Australia especially doing very well as a result of this government's agenda.

I turn now to matters relating to this bill. The member for Lilley again tried to suggest that there was some apparent revisionist brilliance in taking some of the disallowable instruments and popping them back into the social security acts. The five tenets of the youth allowance package last year included a number of disallowable instruments. At the end of the day the reason there were these disallowable instruments—something that allowed a bit more hands-on in terms of its implementation—was to ensure that no student suffered as a result of any disruptions to payment halfway through the academic year.

The government was not making some carte blanche policy decision in the middle of an academic year without realising that there may have been some disruption to payments. The government kept closer control on those matters and now, quite rightly, we are doing what we always intended to do, which is to displace those particular disallowable instruments with these particular pieces of legislation contained in this bill today. This is a sensible continuation of what the government had always intended to do.

What happened? From 1 July last year students were eligible for the first time to receive the same amount of government benefit as those who were unemployed and receiving Newstart. The government made sure that all young people, whether they were studying or looking for work, were treated equally when receiving government benefits. The government introduced a policy which recognised the fact that, whether you were studying full-time or looking for work, your living expenses are exactly the same.

In fact, the common youth allowance was introduced as a direct result of concerns expressed to the government by the young people of Australia; people who voted for us in droves in 1996 and repeated the exercise in 1998. Their families were also concerned about the way their young people would be treated. The general community understood that there needed to be a change and that the income support arrangements that existed prior to 1 July last year were inefficient and treated young people very differently, despite the fact that they were in similar situations.

Another new benefit that came in as a result of those changes which are being enhanced again today was that young people were able to move between looking for a job, training and full-time and part-time study without having to go through all the paperwork involved in actually changing the government payment. It was a recognisable streamlining of the process of ensuring that there was some consistent income support for those who were definitely in the business of trying to get themselves into full-time work through whatever stream—training, study or simply doing the hard slog of trying to find a job.

I firmly believe that in practice the government's proposals, which have been in place since 1 July last year, have in fact encouraged young people to improve their job prospects by staying on in education and training longer. It has provided the right incentives to ensure that young people are not better off on the dole than they were by trying to improve their general knowledge, training and study.

The parental means test has been the subject of some disappointment to some. As I said, 95 per cent of those who receive the common youth allowance were in fact either receiving the same benefit prior to its introduction, or receiving greater than what they were receiving under Labor. That left five per cent who dropped out, but those five per cent tended to be from families who had an income stream which, because of a means test, excluded their students from access.

Ninety-five per cent of recipients being better off is an obvious equation and we should feel as though the government has got the policy right. For the other five per cent, there has been a realisation that their families have had to provide some of the income that their charges may need and most people believe that is fair enough. The introduction of that parental means test has encouraged families who can afford to to continue to support their children until they are financially independent. The measures contained in the bills today define and refine that even further.

I maintain a great deal of concern about what those opposite might do if they were ever to find themselves back in power. They talked this morning about lower wages. The only party in this place that has delivered lower wages in recent times has been the Australian Labor Party. Through the course of the Hawke and Keating years the real take-home pay of people declined. I know because of my own circumstances. I felt it myself. It is one of the reasons why I became involved in this political business that we are all involved in. It was because it seemed to me that my lot in life was declining before my very eyes after the Hawke government came to power. It was obvious as costs rose and my wages never kept up that there was a problem and a problem that needed to be addressed.

What is happening under this government is that a whole new stream of incentives are being introduced. People are realising that, with the government's tax reform package in place, we are going to find greater amounts of money in people's pockets than is currently the case, and people will genuinely be better off.

I am left to ponder why those opposite are now trying to campaign against junior wage rates in the way they are, given that as a consequence of their policy there will be more people on youth allowance. I think it is an important point to bring into this debate. The government has committed itself to ensuring that there are as many employment opportunities for young people as is possible, and junior rates of pay certainly do help achieve this objective. In fact, they are necessary to preserve the vulnerable youth labour market—a labour market that is on the edge on a constant basis.

Junior rates of pay assist young people to gain a foothold in the labour market. Talking to an employer in my electorate the other day, he made the comment that 15-year-olds are terrific workers and 15-year-olds know when they have a birthday they receive a pay rise, as a 16-year-old realises there is a pay rise when they turn 17 and a 17-year-old receives a pay rise when they turn 18—and on it goes. There is an incentive involved in actually staying on the job and working hard and preserving your position because you are going to get a wage rise on your birthday.

I also tested the concept across some young people. The Moreton Youth Advisory Group met in my office last week, and I asked these 16- and 17-year-old students from high schools what they thought about junior rates of pay. I hope all those opposite realise that those young people are absolutely terrified of the course the Australian Labor Party have taken in the Senate. They are absolutely terrified that they are going to lose their jobs, because they realise that if they are competing in a skills sense with someone 10 years older than they are they are going to fail.

If the Labor Party are going to change the system so that the wages of junior workers are going to be the same as the more experienced, senior workers, then there is going to be a great deal of focus on that particular skill and experience base that those young people offer in return for remuneration. They know that their chances of holding onto their jobs are going to become bleak indeed if junior wages disappear. They understand quite clearly in the businesses they work for—McDonald's, KFC, Woolies or wherever—that they are learning on the job and they do advance themselves in skills as well as in wages. They are quite happy with the system as it stands.

In fact, it is about 22 years ago I bought my first car, a Holden Gemini of a dreadful colour. I worked at McDonald's at Mount Gravatt and I was paid a junior wage rate which went up when I turned from 16 to 17. It seemed to work fine then and I believe most young people today believe it works fine now. So hands off junior wages, I say to those opposite, just as it should be hands off changes to the government's tax reform agenda and government proposals as far as common youth allowances are concerned. If those opposite had a clear and concise understanding of exactly what was going on in the real world, they would not be promoting the sorts of changes they have been promoting.

I find it greatly disturbing they are turning their back on some of the facts. The Australian Retailers Association survey identified that 46.4 per cent of respondents—these are people who employ juniors—said the main reason they employed them was junior wage rates. I think that says something else, given that 50.6 per cent of respondents said they were more likely to employ adults in the future over young people if junior wage rates were to decline. Those sorts of matters are very important to air in this debate because, at the end of the day, if we are going to tip more young people out of jobs as a result of Labor's proposals, we are going to find more and more of them having to access the common youth allowance and the cost to government and the cost to taxpayers of this country is going to increase.

We are going to find those queues at Centrelink that the member for Lilley promoted in his contribution getting longer. We are going to find the challenge to government will be to continue to use new technology and to decentralise access to Centrelink, which I believe is a proposal that is going to work extremely well. Instead of people having to go to Centrelink to access the common youth allowance or any other government benefit, we are going to take Centrelink to the people. We will start to see those kiosks in major regional shopping centres and, in rural and regional Australia, in other established institutions—council offices or whatever.

At the end of the day, the government is thinking and acting in the very best interests of the people of Australia. We are prepared to disclose before an election what our intentions are for after that election. Moreover, we are prepared to meet the commitments made before an election in the form of legislation introduced into this place.

The disturbing thing is that, without any positive attributes to offer, those opposite are simply into the big negative, the big scare, the big delay and the big protraction of development of this nation. In years to come, when people read the history that is being written as those actions opposite evolve each day in this place, they are going to reflect upon a very negative, obstructionist Australian Labor Party. They will read about a Labor Party that turned its back on the real world and forgot that the world was demanding greater individualism, greater freedom, greater opportunities for those who wanted to work and rewards for their efforts and less government intervention in people's lives and less paperwork.

These are all the things that this government has already delivered, and will continue to deliver, with its programs. Those opposite have nothing positive to contribute, only the big negative, and they should be condemned for it. I believe they will continue to be at the ballot box until they start to bring themselves into the real world and support some of the government's programs. I commend this bill to the house.