The number of underutilised Australian workers (unemployed or underemployed wanting more hours) rose from 1.35 million in June 2022 to 1.68 million in June 2026.
The Albanese government has permitted high migration levels when there is an insufficient amount of work for the 1.68 million underutilised Australians.
Minister Gallagher defended the government’s economic record, pointing to over a million jobs created, low unemployment and record-high participation rates.
She noted that the government has reduced net overseas migration by about 45% from its post-COVID peak and added that industries and businesses have raised concerns about our immigration policy.
She went on to say that wages are rising, women are working more hours due to childcare support, and the government continues to support economic opportunities for workers.
I pointed out that high underutilisation suppresses wage growth and that the Wage Price Index shows real wages have fallen by 1.5% since the Labor government took power.
Further, the government’s immigration policy of creating a labour glut that lowers real wages is undermining workers’ pay.
Minister Gallagher responded saying that the government consistently supports higher wages (including minimum wage increases and pay rises in female dominated industries like aged care and childcare), whereas opposition parties frequently vote against these measures.
Over 70% of new jobs are in the taxpayer-funded care economy (health, NDIS, aged care, education) rather than the private sector. This is nothing but a “Ponzi job scheme.” I asked if the Labor government would admit immigration is a disaster for taxpayers and workers.
Minister Gallagher strongly defended care economy jobs (such as in hospitals, aged care, disability, and childcare), noting they are difficult, emotional and vital services that an aging population and working families rely on, rather than jobs to be trivialised.
I was not “trivialising” these valued jobs – this was just another Question Time of Labor dodging the hard questions.
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: My question is to the Minister representing the Treasurer, Senator Gallagher. The Australian Bureau of Statistics produce a measure called the ‘underutilisation rate of Australian workers’, which is people without a job or those who have a job yet need more hours than are available. In June 2022, at the start of the Albanese government, there were 1.35 million Australians underutilised in the workforce. In June 2026, this had increased to 1.68 million Australians. This is a significant increase on both an actual and percentage basis. Minister, why has the Albanese government brought in so many new arrivals when there is already insufficient work for 1.68 million Australians and rising?
Senator GALLAGHER (Minister for Finance, Minister for the Public Service, Minister for Women, Minister for Government Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate): This government is all about increasing employment opportunities for Australians, and I think the last figure I saw was over a million jobs which had been created under this government. Unemployment has remained very low, and participation rates are at record highs. That is our record on employment across the economy. Your question I think links to migration and some of the debates that you’ve been having around this in One Nation. You would know, Senator Roberts, that we have reduced net overseas migration by about 45 per cent compared to the post-COVID peak. We did see a pull forward after the COVID years, essentially after the borders reopened, and net overseas migration has been tracking down since then.
We are a country that relies on migration to support the economy and have historically, and indeed in recent months, in response to some of the policies that you’ve been outlining, we are seeing more and more businesses and industry raising concerns about those policies and the impact they would have on our economy. We have unemployment sitting in the low fours. We’ve got jobs created under our government the most that we’ve seen in government over a sustained period of time. We’ve got participation rates at record highs. We’ve got wages up. Women are working more and working more hours because of some of the work we’ve done to support wages in the feminised sector and to ensure that the childcare system works for them. On all of those metrics, Senator Roberts, I think you can see where we stand, which is about making sure that there are choices and opportunities for Australian workers in this country, and we’ll continue that approach.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, first supplementary.
Senator ROBERTS: Underutilisation predicts wage movement. The more workers desperate for extra hours to keep their head above water, the less employers need to pay to secure that labour. The wage price index, an ABS measure, shows Australian workers have gone backwards 1.5 per cent since this government came to power backwards. The data is in. Your policy of mass immigration is creating a glut of labour, pulling down real wages. Minister, why is your government undermining Australian workers’ wages?
Senator GALLAGHER: I think there is only one party in this chamber that supports increasing wages for working people. You can see that in every test that’s brought to this chamber. In every single test that’s brought to this chamber where you get a vote on it, more often than not, you all vote together over there to oppose working Australians getting good and reasonable wage increases. That is what we’ve done in government. We have supported increases to the minimum wage, increases to highly feminised low-wage industries like aged care and child care. When we have had those debates on this floor, those who sit on that side of the chamber have tended to oppose them. I think Australians know that it’s this government that will always argue for better wages, better conditions and better protections, including through superannuation for Australians.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, second supplementary.
Senator ROBERTS: Treasurer Chalmers stated last week six out of seven jobs created since 2022 were in the private sector. This statement is deceptive. Over 70 per cent of the jobs created are in the taxpayer funded economy—health, NDIS, aged care and education. Minister, 1.68 million underutilised workers, 1.5 per cent fall in real wages and now a Ponzi job scheme—will you admit your immigration invasion is a disaster for taxpayers, workers and their families?
Senator GALLAGHER: I want to distance myself from the content and the language used in that question, for a start order. In relation to jobs in the non-market economy, Senator Roberts, if you need any kind of care in a hospital, aged care, disability or child care, those are legitimate jobs. They are hard jobs. The people who work in those jobs put their body on the line. They are physical jobs. They are emotional jobs. They are difficult jobs. I have worked in that sector. I don’t know whether you have, but I don’t think you would be trivialising them if you had worked in those sectors. They are legitimate jobs, and more and more our community relies on them. We have an ageing population, and we have parents with children who have a disability, who expect their child to be cared for and provided support in the way that any other parent would. We have working parents who need child care. These are legitimate, good jobs, and they should be valued. (Time expired)
This Estimates session is with representatives of the Commonwealth Environmental Water Office regarding the management of environmental water in the Murray-Darling Basin.
I asked is there a specific target for “lotic flow” to improve river health. Dr Banks clarified that they do not operate on a rigid velocity target; instead, they work with available South Australian entitlements and return flows to design hydrographs that achieve outcomes like native fish movement and Lower Lakes connectivity.
Referring to historical CSIRO and South Australian environment reports, I pointed out that the Murray-Darling Basin naturally experienced extreme boom-and-bust cycles and was not historically perennial. Dr Banks acknowledged this natural variability while emphasising that they must operate within a heavily modified and regulated system designed for irrigation and town water supplies.
I referenced a 2023 report that states that environmental water extended flowing water habitat by 46 days into autumn. I argue that this makes the river unnaturally wetter than its pre-settlement state. They explained that these flows aim to improve native fish movement and health as systems transition out of summer, taking upstream and downstream benefits into account. Specific details will be provided on notice.
In my opinion, maintaining high, constant river levels or “toppings” saturates hard clay banks and causes severe erosion, tree root collapse, and siltation. Why was water-level variability reduced by 10% in 2022–23. Officials responded to this saying that reducing variability was primarily aimed at “slowing the rate of flow recession.” Mr Johnson stated that scientific analysis on the Goulburn River indicates environmental water has provided a net benefit to riverbank health rather than causing erosion.
I pointed out that the Murray-Darling Basin Plan requires a minimum of 2,000 gigalitres (GL) per annum on a three-year rolling average, claiming that actual flows over the barrages reached 5,200 GL in 2024 and 4,400 GL in 2025. I asked why water velocity and volume sent out to sea are vastly exceeding targets? Is environmental water being wasted at the expense of farmers?
The Department maintains that barrage flows are minimum requirements necessary to maintain critical connections between the Lower Lakes and the Coorong, manage salinity, and allow fish passage from the sea. While exact total barrage figures for those specific years were taken on notice, they did say that Commonwealth environmental water contributed roughly 700–900 GL to South Australia barrage flows during the 2024–25 period.
Transcript
CHAIR: Senator Roberts, you had one more block. I would very politely encourage brevity.
Senator ROBERTS: I’m trying to. David Farley was here just four days after being elected to represent Farrer in the recent by-election. But this line of questioning—it’s very, very important to him—is on water. These are our questions, but I’m prepping for David to get here. This line of questioning goes to the effectiveness of environmental water as against alternative uses, like growing food and fibre to feed and clothe the world. I want to compare your performance over time and raise important issues to form part of the next Murray-Darling Basin Plan. Two publications I’m referring to are the Lower Murray 2022-23 summary report: Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder science program (flow monitoring, evaluation and research), commonly called the Flow-MER program, dated July 2024, and the Lower Murray 2019-24 summary report on the same program, dated July 2025—the most recent version. On the Lower Murray, I’ll start with the concept of flowing water habitat called ‘lotic flow’. This is the concept that improving the velocity of water—something above 0.3 metres per second—improves river health, producing environmental benefits around fish spawning, oxygenation, nutrient levels and connectivity. What is your target for lotic flow, expressed as a target velocity on how many days of the year?
Dr Banks: We don’t have a specific target. We basically work on the volume of water that is available within the Lower Murray—our South Australian entitlements—and the water that we have available that comes from return flows. What we do is we’ll design a hydrograph, working with our state partner agencies to achieve a whole range of different outcomes for the environment. That includes native fish—trying to increase flow through a period of time, which then will get the fish to move—as well as other targets down in that area, like the level of the Lower Lakes and trying to ensure connectivity between the Lower Lakes and the Coorong, which is a really important part of the health of that system more broadly.
Senator ROBERTS: So your targets are volume?
Dr Banks: Not so much. We have a volume of water available to us which comes through the allocation frameworks that are set up by the states. Then, based on the volume of water that we have available in our accounts, we will then design hydrographs, working with South Australian government officials to achieve the outcomes that we’re aiming for. As I say, that might be a pulse flow, which not only provides that flow habitat that native fish rely on but also increases the likelihood that native fish will start to move through the system and improves productivity within the system, which also helps them build condition.
Senator ROBERTS: What’s the heads of power you’re using for this volume metric? Is it specified in the Murray-Darling Basin Plan or regulations?
Dr Banks: Basically, my role as the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder is to manage the Commonwealth’s environmental water holdings to protect and restore the environmental assets of the MurrayDarling Basin. Like irrigators, we have allocations that are made available to us through the state allocation frameworks, and that varies from year to year. We go through a planning process each year where we will produce a water plan for the year, and then we’ll adaptively manage our water through the water year, which will depend on conditions and what’s happening both in the upper catchments and in the lower Murray and the Lower Lakes.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. Is this explanation that I’m about to read of the ecosystem along the MurrayDarling basin before Western settlement accurate? It came from the CSIRO, and Environment South Australia has a similar page. ‘The Murray-Darling system, especially its lowland and lower sections, was naturally highly variable and often behaved like a semi-arid or dryland river system before European settlement and regulation. It was not reliably perennial like many European or North American rivers. Ecosystems and species evolved with extreme boom-bust cycles driven by climate, not constant flow.’ Is that accurate?
Dr Banks: I think it is a reflection of the boom-and-bust cycle within the Murray-Darling Basin more broadly, where we’re reliant on rainfall to generate flows in the northern basin, for example. But I think we’ve also got to recognise that we’re working in a highly modified system, a highly regulated system which has been modified to support irrigation and town water supplies, and that’s happened over many decades.
Senator ROBERTS: I’ve tabled a paper here: ‘Australian non-perennial rivers: global lessons and research opportunities’. The Murray and Darling rivers were never perennial rivers. I’ve circulated the paper to that effect. The annual flows were highly variable along the Murray, starting with flooding during the spring rains and thaw from September through to November and then falling to low levels depending upon local rains. By autumn, the period when you unnaturally flooded recently, the river would have been very low. These are called pulse flows. Can we agree on that aspect of the science, which informs my next question?
Dr Banks: We certainly try and reinstate those pulse flows. We know that there are some systems—the Goulburn River, for example—where much of the flows has been reversed. The seasonality of flows has been reversed. So you’re getting higher summer flows to meet the demands for irrigation, and then what we do is try and improve those flows during the winter-spring period, which is the more natural timing for environmental water or water to be flowing down that system.
Senator ROBERTS: Could I have the scientific basis for that on notice, please.
Dr Banks: Sure.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you.
Dr Banks: You referred to a number of our Flow-MER research reports. We’ve been supporting that research for well over 10 years now, and it’s very comprehensive. All the reports, including annual synthesis reports, are available on the website for everyone to review.
Senator ROBERTS: I note your 2024 release claimed credit for the following. It said: … from late March to early May 2023, Commonwealth environmental water extended the duration of flowing water habitat by 46 days. This extended the summer flow period well into autumn, when the flow would naturally have slowed dramatically. What’s the logic of extending the flow into autumn when the river would have naturally slowed in the period before Western settlement? Your remit is to restore the habitat, not make it wetter than it was naturally. Why?
Dr Banks: I don’t know the specific watering flow that you’re talking about, but, like I indicated earlier, what we certainly aim to do is, within a highly modified and regulated system, try and use the environmental water that we have available to us to try and reinstate some of those more natural flows. The flow heights that we can achieve go to the timing, the duration and the constraints within the system. It’s all focused on achieving good outcomes for native fish, in particular, but also to maintain those lower lake levels as we move down the system. I might just ask my colleague to add to that.
Mr Johnson: I can’t remember that specific flow event, but it’s probably very similar to a flow that we’ve done just this past autumn. For example, we’ve just provided a pulse flow down the Goulburn River in autumn. That was primarily around targeting outcomes within the Goulburn Valley itself—being able to support native fish movement and generally improve the health of that system as it comes out of the summer period. Those flows then continue down into the lower Murray and then can provide that benefit further downstream. It is not necessarily always the case that we’re delivering water purely for a downstream outcome. It can be that we’re targeting that upstream valley and then having that flow continue down to provide benefits further downstream.
Senator ROBERTS: This question is on notice, please. How much of your environmental water was used to create that 46 days of unnatural man-made flow in March to May 2023, and, in any year since then, where there’s been an attempt undertaken to extend the period of high flow.
Dr Banks: Yes, we’ll take that on notice.
Senator ROBERTS: The next aspect of the success criteria you’re using is river-level variability. You claim to have reduced water-level variability by 10 per cent in 2022-23. Your 2023-24 report doesn’t provide data for the 2023-24 report. This is a significant area of debate. It’s One Nation’s position that maintaining the river at a commonly called ‘topping’ at the top of the riverbank has led to saturation of the hard clay shell that protects the bank from erosion, and this causes erosion. You’re actually causing erosion. We’ve been listening to the farmers down there. I’ve visited the areas myself. Letting the flow drop to allow the riverbank to dry and harden is an essential, natural process to protect the bank in times of flood. Why are you pursuing a constant river flow target when the Murray-Darling was never constant, and, in so doing, you’re contributing to bank erosion? I’ve got photos here showing tree roots and trees collapsing. You’ve probably heard of it.
Dr Banks: I think a really key feature of the use of Commonwealth environmental water is that we can introduce variability. We’re not looking to meet constant flow heights for long periods of time. We’ll generate a flow to a particular height for a period of time, and then we’ll have a nice gentle recession on the back of that. So—
Senator ROBERTS: Why did you reduce variability by 10 per cent in 2022-23?
Dr Banks: Again, I don’t know exactly what piece of information you’re referring to, but what I can tell you is that there’ll be certain instances where, for example, for river operations in some of our rivers, the river will go up and down to meet irrigation orders within the system. What we do there is we do try and smooth out those flows, and, the reason for that is you can send a false cue to native fish. The river starts to rise, the fish might start moving and then it suddenly drops again. What we do is smooth out those flows to try and minimise the interruption of those sort of behaviours of the native fish—
Senator ROBERTS: The banks are being destroyed and the river is being silted.
Dr Banks: In terms of erosion, I’ll get my colleague to go through the Goulburn because we’ve got really good scientific evidence that shows that the water we deliver in that system is not contributing to erosion. It’s actually that change in the seasonality of water, where there are low flows during summer—and constant flows—that is causing that erosion.
Mr Johnson: Specifically on the matter you raised, Senator, Commonwealth environmental water reduced water level variability by 10 per cent, but that was mostly aimed at reducing the rate of flow recession. The idea of that is, again, not to have the water levels drop away too quickly, because it’s that rapid decline in flow rates that often relates to the bank remaining wet and subsequently slumping. If you can slow those rates of recession, that means you’re going to reduce the rate of erosion, or bank slumping. As Dr Banks said, we have seen that in the Goulburn River as well. We’ve got a whole series of very detailed scientific analysis on the riverbanks, which shows that Commonwealth environmental water has actually been a net benefit to riverbank health.
Senator ROBERTS: I’m getting to the core of this bracket of questions. In your push for unnatural environmental water outcomes, one statistic stands out: the flow over the barrages and out to sea. The plan calls for a minimum of 2,000 gigalitres per annum on a three-year rolling average, with a minimum of 650 gigalitres in any one year. How much water was sent out to sea in the last three years, please?
Dr Banks: We’ll have to take that on notice. Certainly, maintaining connection between the Lower Lakes and the Coorong is really important. It supports a number of fish to move from the sea into the river to breed. Again, what we’re doing is working within a highly modified system and maintaining those connections. There was a period between 2014 and 2021 where it was only because of Commonwealth environmental water that those connections between the river and the Coorong, or the sea, were maintained. It was like three out of a seven-year period. So a really important part of improving the salinity in those systems, and in the Coorong as well, is ensuring that we retain that connection between the Lower Lakes and the Coorong.
Senator ROBERTS: This is the one target that has actually been set by the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, and you don’t know what it is—or do you not want to say what it is? The figure I have for 2024 is 5,200 gigalitres. That is more than 2½ times the target; it’s 2.6 times the target. For 2025 I have 4,400 gigalitres. Now, remember the target is 2,000 gigalitres on a three-year rolling average. In two years, the flow to sea was almost five years worth of flow. Why have you chosen to increase water velocity beyond natural pre-Western-civilisation levels and beyond planned specs? Why?
Mr Johnson: Maybe I will go back through the numbers. We don’t have them for every year, but I do have them for the 2024-25 water year: Commonwealth environmental water contributed more than 700 gigalitres of flow through the barrages to the Coorong.
Senator ROBERTS: What was the total going out the barrages?
Dr Banks: The total barrage flows for the 2024-25 year were around 900 gigalitres. I can get the exact figure, but it’s around that 900-gigalitre figure. I think the other thing to note, on that, is that they’re minimum requirements. It’s not a focus on what the maximum flow is. That’s the minimum requirement for flows into the Coorong.
Senator ROBERTS: We have the figure here. For 2024, 5,200 gigalitres was measured going over the barrages. For 2025, it was 4,400 gigalitres.
Mr Johnson: That doesn’t—
Dr Banks: We can report on what Commonwealth environmental water went down there. As my colleague—
Senator ROBERTS: What was the total water?
Dr Banks: We’ll take that on notice. What I can say is that, in 2024-25, about 975 gigalitres of Commonwealth environmental water was provided down into the South Australian Murray, and, to 31 March this year, about 741 gigalitres of environmental water has been delivered to South Australia.
Senator ROBERTS: I’d like to know the total water going out of the barrages out to sea.
Mr Sullivan: We’ll take it on notice.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. This is my last question on the Murray-Darling Basin. The Murray-Darling Basin Authority is now buying back more water for the environment despite the huge amount of water you’re already sending out to sea. Has water for the environment turned into water to waste so farmers don’t get it?
Senator Watt: No.
Senator ROBERTS: Can I ask one brief set of questions on the grid?
CHAIR: Which grid?
Senator ROBERTS: The national water grid.
CHAIR: Are you able to put them on notice? We are trying to get on. Is that okay?
The 2026 Chalmers-Albanese budget and the Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Bill 2026 represent a cynical, ideological attack on everyday Australians under the guise of intergenerational equity. Instead of fostering wealth creation, Labor is driving a strategy of division to fund social engineering and buy votes.
We support the modest tax cuts and the $1,000 deduction placeholder. What we don’t support is the harmful capital gains tax and negative gearing measures.
Labor relies on “poison pills” — packaging toxic tax grabs alongside popular measures to deceive the public.
One Nation is committed to fighting for smaller government, protecting essential services and allowing Australians to keep their hard-earned money and secure their financial future.
Transcript
The 2026 Chalmers-Albanese budget was a victory of ideology over decency. The fundamental ideology of this Labor government is one which ignores wealth creation in favour of wealth redistribution and division, otherwise known as buying votes with other people’s money. This is a deliberate strategy of division or, more accurately, a strategy of ‘divide and conquer’. Implicit in this strategy is a simple maxim: ‘It doesn’t matter how much hate you get from those whose votes you don’t need.’ It’s callous policy, cynical, dishonest and in the end self-defeating, as every communist government in history has found out the hard way. When you take people’s stuff, they stop creating new stuff and the nation descends into poverty—time after time after time.
Despite the lesson of history, here we are with the Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Bill 2026, which rakes in $1.38 billion in additional taxation in the first full year, 2027-28. This is a tax grab. This is before the $350 million backdown announced last week. How badly does this government need that money to take the electoral criticism they’ve received over a measure which is 0.2 per cent of budget revenue?
This bill takes from those who have created wealth to buy votes from those who have not yet created wealth—our young. And yet, according to the Productivity Commission and updated JBWere financial modelling, an estimated $3.5 trillion to $5.4 trillion in assets will pass from Baby Boomers to younger generations through to 2050. The speed of the transfer is increasing. Inheritances have more than doubled since 2002. Wealth passing between generations has risen from roughly $120 billion per year to an expected $500 billion per year in 2045. This government is trying to buy votes amongst young people with money they would have received anyway. That’s the fatal flaw in this bill—the lie, the deceit. It’s these trillions of dollars in inheritance that have become the grand prize of this communist Labor government’s theft.
Labor wants to steal more of everyone’s money, including from the young, and lock the young out of building assets for later in life. Lock you out! Labor’s intergenerational equity and intergenerational wealth transfer lies will in fact really create intergenerational poverty—a veritable gold mine of money from taxing everyone for Labor and its bureaucrats to use to bankroll Labor’s social engineering and to buy votes from their target demographics, which, for the record, are ABC journalists, university academics, immigrants from any country as long as it’s not a Christian country and union bosses, although only the militant kind. Not only will our young people receive less in the long run, they will receive less in the short term, owing to changes in the capital gains tax. Previously, any capital gain was discounted 50 per cent and then taxed as part of your normal income. This meant young people just starting out did not pay a lot of tax, especially those trading while at uni or TAFE. Not anymore. Now the full value of the profit will be taxed and at a minimum rate of 30 per cent, not your marginal rate. Even worse, more value trades and assets like trading cards or parts of a bitcoin over $500 are now treated the same for compliance purposes as large stocks portfolios. Do you have a $500 Pokemon card? Congratulations! Here’s the compliance you’ll need to meet, including valuations and notifications for a Pokemon card, you evil capitalist you. Off to the re-education camp you go. There will be none of this ‘trying to get ahead’ under this Labor government. The deceit of this government to pretend this bill is about intergenerational wealth when the real impact will be to make it harder for young people to get ahead—that’s why the budget has been called the worst in living memory. Not only were the key measures toxic, the justification for taking those measures was a lie. It doesn’t add wealth and opportunity for young people. It takes it away. Everyone except rusted-on Labor diehards saw straight through it. Our young have seen through it, and baby boomers are furious. They didn’t work their whole lives to create wealth just so the government could come along and take a massive chunk to fund social engineering.
One Nation’s response to these measures is simple: don’t do it. Let Australians create their own wealth and use that wealth to benefit their children. For many Australians, the bank of mum and dad is in play to help young people get their own home. Assistance from parents has risen from 15 per cent of new mortgages in the 1980s to 40 per cent of new mortgages today. I know when I mention family that a lot of our constituents will be thinking, ‘I don’t have a family, since my parents got divorced and my parents lost their house in the divorce. What do you have to pass on?’ I acknowledge those who are in that position. Your feelings and concerns are real. One Nation understands that, which is why our low-start mortgage will allow your personal superannuation account to provide a large share of your home deposit. This will allow you to get into your own home once you have a job, a work history and proven capacity to repay.
When it comes to the broader policy environment, including taxation and regulation, the response to Senator Hanson’s amazing speech at the GetUp! press club in Canberra last week carries a warning. Our opponents will spin One Nation’s policies and words so far, so tightly that Pauline Hanson could knit a sweater with them. Our policies do take a moment of serious thought to grasp. On one hand, One Nation policy does contain measures which need to be funded through some level of taxation. We will support and defend Medicare, the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, aged pensions and the National Disability Insurance Scheme for those who are actually disabled, along with unemployment benefits for those looking for work and sickness benefits for those who legitimately can’t work, amongst other measures. These are what make Australia a civilised society.
On the other hand, our campaign for smaller government is based on an overarching principle of allowing Australians to keep more of their own money and providing an economic environment that encourages people to get ahead through their own hard work and endeavour. This is not an absolutist argument. It’s one of degree—a balance between a government of decency and a government of waste. The Chalmers-Albanese government has crossed over the line out of decency into waste and hypocrisy and deceit, and, as a result, One Nation ranks are swelling. Labor obviously feel that entrepreneurs are not their demographic. You show that repeatedly. Interestingly, a large number of small-business people coming into One Nation are saying the same thing about the Liberals. ALP arrogance has been on display in the development of these proposals. No open consultation occurred and no white papers. The measures were drawn up behind closed doors and then dumped on the public, vomited onto the public. The committee stage for this bill was a farce engineered to manipulate a favourable report—deceit yet again.
This Labor government has made a mockery of the committee system across legislation, referrals and Senate estimates to the point where a review is needed to find a way to stop this abuse from ever happening again. The government has been forced to remove some of the worst elements of their tax grab. Great—now remove the rest!
The Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Bill 2026 includes a provision to limit negative gearing to new properties only. Negative gearing allows someone on a wage or salary to buy a second property, or more, and claim the net cost of that property against their tax. Any net profit is considered taxable income—it’s taxed. Many Australians have used this method to get ahead. It’s most common in retirement, with couples purchasing their retirement home near retirement and then renting it out to help pay it off until they’re ready to move in. Then they rent out their family home to fund their retirement.
It’s true that this is a concession which tends to be used at higher-income levels. Here are the facts. The top 20 per cent of wage and salary earners own 40 per cent of investment properties and claim 60 per cent of the tax deductions. Before this bill, there was no limit to the number of homes that a person could negatively gear other than the ability of their income to cover the cost.
One Nation believes—our policy has shown this before today and shows this right now—that a large property portfolio is not something that should be set against a salary. It’s a business, and the person should have a corporate structure which is appropriate for that business. One Nation will limit negative gearing to two properties. This is enough for Australians to invest in real estate and lift themselves up without misusing the tax system.
The Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Bill 2026, though, cancels negative gearing on existing homes entirely, and it allows unlimited negative gearing on new builds. So that older couple I mentioned before, buying their retirement home and renting it out to help pay for it—they can’t negatively gear. Yet a high-income earner can buy up a whole new block of flats and negatively gear that. Where’s the justice? How is that fair? How does that advance intergenerational equity? It doesn’t. It drives intergenerational poverty.
There are two other measures in this bill. One Nation will support the $5-a-week tax cut. Although $250 a year is nothing towards offsetting the rising cost of living, it’s money better off in workers’ pockets than in the government’s pockets, where it’d be eaten up before it even gets into play in 2027. As a reminder, One Nation policy will put a lot more into the pockets of everyday Australians. We will index the tax thresholds to ensure nobody is forced into a higher tax bracket because they got a pay rise to make up for inflation. That’s the stealth tax. I’ve tried twice to amend Treasury bills, once under the Liberals and once under Labor. Both times, both parties said they loved the idea—but not now.
One Nation will leave schedule 4 in the bill. That is the no-documentation-required $1,000 for tax deductible expenses. I’m concerned that people who are entitled to more than $1,000 will lazily tick that box to save time, although opposing what is a benefit for the many on the basis of what it could do for the few is the wrong decision.
One Nation is moving an amendment to remove schedule 1, capital gains tax, and schedule 2, negative gearing, from the bill. If that amendment fails, we will oppose this bill.
The Labor Party have taken to using a deceitful trick to make it look like One Nation opposed pay rises for workers, which is false. Instead, this is to add a measure to a bill which they know One Nation will not support. In this case, it’s the capital gains tax and negative gearing changes hurting the young and the old. It’s called a poison pill. It’s not their idea; the parties of globalisation around the world are using it to frame conservative parties as hateful of workers when the reverse is true. Tricks destroy trust and kill truth. Prime Minister Albanese gives so much material himself to the Fire the Liar campaign across the nation. Poison pills allow their fake ‘independent’ websites like They Vote For You to lie and say One Nation voted against tax cuts, for instance, when, in fact, the Albanese government wrapped the tax cuts in legislation that could not be supported—it had to be opposed. Labor refuses to put the measures separately. Had they put the measures separately, we would have supported the tax cut, minuscule though it is. Another Labor lie is its claim this bill is tax reform. It’s not. Instead it increases tax complexity, which leads to increased fees for accountants, lawyers and valuers when preparing tax returns for which the people pay. Taxpayers pay even more when doing their return. This is not reform; it’s a rip-off for which you, the people of Australia, pay—including the young. Anyone interested in honest political discussion should treat the OpenAustralia Foundation and their propaganda arm They Vote for You with utter contempt. Their subscribers apparently do, because their most recent report admits a $50,000 loss. It’s not working—perhaps try impartiality and honesty next time—nor is it having any effect.
The growth of One Nation is proof the public are breaking what has been a lifelong allegiance to the tired old parties—yes, you two—and are instead embracing One Nation policies that will restore wealth and abundance for all Australians. Labor’s dirty tricks and lies will not stop One Nation from voting in the best interests of everyday Australians. We want to make Australia a land of abundance and opportunity again for the old and the young.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/VRYgf3wLZWg/maxresdefault.jpg7201280Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2026-10-13 11:41:052026-10-13 11:55:00Taxes, Traps and Tactics in the 2026 Budget
One Nation supports the bill to extend the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) decision-making window to June 2036, putting it on a stronger operational footing to help cut through bureaucratic red tape.
While we support northern development, we strongly oppose the inclusion of net-zero transition goals and special-treatment identity politics in the NAIF investment mandate.
One Nation advocates for equal rights for all Australians without special racial categories, proposing direct grants to local and Indigenous councils backed by proper Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) accountability.
We believe taxpayer funds should not back net-zero measures; projects like wind, solar, or batteries must stand on their own financial merits without government subsidies.
We champion critical infrastructure to unlock real wealth, including the Great Australian Infrastructure Network (GAIN) transcontinental railway, major water and dam projects and regional transport links.
I moved an amendment to ensure NAIF prioritises productive economic growth, directly finances extraction of coal and natural gas and explicitly blocks funding for net-zero measures, which was defeated by Labor, Greens and Teals.
We need to rebuild our country, cut out the bureaucratic and ideological interference, and leave a legacy of wealth, abundance, and opportunity for all Australians.
Transcript
The north of Australia is Australia’s future. One Nation supports the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Amendment Bill 2026. The Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, commonly known as NAIF, was established as a Commonwealth corporate entity in 2016 with bipartisan support. It was tasked with a $5 billion financing mandate to drive a 10-year mission to provide economic and social growth across northern Australia through the provision of concessional loans and financial support to private and public infrastructure projects. The NAIF has been upgraded, amended and fiddled with in 2018, 2021 and now 2026. Hopefully this bill is third time lucky.
Since 2016, NAIF has handed out over $3 billion of the original $5 billion, with a total of $4.5 billion committed. The government has extended the pool to $7 billion. This bill extends the investment decision-making ability for the NAIF from June 2026 to June 2036. It adds additional requirements for the NAIF to report to the minister if there’s any deviation in compliance with their investment mandate. It implements the joint ministerial oversight model, which will see increased joint responsibilities for NAIF board appointments between the Minister for Northern Australia and the Minister for Finance. It establishes statutory reviews every five years. It requires NAIF to align with existing provisions in the legislation of other Commonwealth investment vehicles. In short, this bill puts NAIF on a stronger footing to carry out their mandate.
It is, though, the mandate that One Nation objects to. The Albanese government changed the mandate in 2026 to include economic development in the north—that’s fair enough—and alleviating social or economic disadvantage in northern communities—fair enough. However, the mandate also included improving First Nations outcomes and achieving Australia’s net zero transition goals.
One Nation’s policy is to improve outcomes for Aboriginal communities through improving all communities right across the Top End. To One Nation, it doesn’t matter if a community is Aboriginal or white or any colour in between. We care about Australians equally. We will advance policy based on equal rights for all—special rights for none. Our policy is to provide grants directly to local government, including Aboriginal councils across northern Australia, so that ANAO, the Australian National Audit Office, can audit where the money goes and what benefit the community derive from that money. Accountability in the Aboriginal industry—now there’s a concept.
As for making NAIF about net zero, that’s not happening under a One Nation government. We will require NAIF to support any project which represents value for money for the taxpayers while meeting a real need. If that’s wind or solar or a big battery then so be it, but the numbers must add up without taxpayer money. We don’t propose to change the investment mandate other than to take the woke back out.
Let me give you some examples of how Australia will restore wealth, prosperity and opportunity for all who are here. These are not One Nation projects. There’s no taking credit here. It’s about building the nation from the Albanese government, state governments and private industry for the good of our whole nation. Funding for these projects is provided through private financiers, with the possibility of a public-private partnership to ensure Australia’s interests are looked after. NAIF is required in the early stage to show the government is serious about investment.
For too long, major projects have been held up through bureaucratic and political indecision, sometimes caused by environmental laws, but mostly just incompetence. This has led to trust issues between investors and the government. This is not a reflection on the Albanese government per se; this problem has been going on under successive Liberal, National and Labor governments for 20 years, which is why the NAIF is essential to providing early-stage funding and guiding these projects through the bureaucratic jungle expeditiously. After all, if the Albanese government is going to flood Australia with new arrivals as it is, we must generate new wealth to share with them, or else everyone goes backwards, which is what is happening right now.
Projects One Nation will be strongly supporting include the great Australian infrastructure network, GAIN, which involves a railroad crossing across northern Australia, linking iron ore projects in Western Australia with Queensland metalliferous coal in the Bowen Basin. Steel mills will be located at each end to provide sovereign capacity in steel and steel by-products, including cement, fertiliser and ammonia, which is the material from which pharmaceuticals are made. This development will use water from Lake Argyle in Western Australia and from a new weir where the Urannah dam was to be located.
The railway will include a multifunction corridor bringing town water, electricity and an internet backbone connection. The internet connection is of utmost importance for national security. While the old offshore copper connection between Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth has been upgraded, it’s not capable of carrying Australia’s internet traffic. I’ll just say that. It’s not capable, as it is, of carrying Australia’s international traffic. It needs duplication. For a signal to get from Brisbane to Perth, it must travel via a jump-off point in Brisbane up to Asia, often as far as China, then back down again to Perth. What could possibly go wrong with that? This proposal has had a long history going back more than 100 years. The current proponents have assembled an impressive team, capitalised their project sponsor vehicle and have already exceeded any development conducted in the past through previous sponsors using all new and unencumbered intellectual property—all new on a proven concept.
Project sponsors have advanced proposals to complete Inland Rail from Parkes in New South Wales to the Port of Gladstone, using what’s been called the forestry route. A second proponent is advocating a route due north from Goondiwindi via Moonie to Dalby and on to the Port of Gladstone, where a major container handling facility is currently out to tender. I look forward to the Crisafulli government fast-tracking this amazing proposal to take Australia’s container handling into the 21st century.
One Nation will also build the Big Rocks Weir, Emu Swamp Dam and the Hughenden irrigation project, and complete the reconstruction of Paradise Dam. There are other projects under development. Once again, these are not One Nation projects. We are promoting them and would be happy to promote any other project that will restore wealth and abundance for all. The NAIF has an important role to play in that process. We need to rebuild our country and leave a legacy for our children and for the descendants of all in Australia right now. We need to restore Australia and make it magnificent again. I move:
At the end of the motion, add “, but the Senate is of the opinion that:
(a) the Investment Mandate for the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility must prioritise productive infrastructure which will grow the Australian economy and provide breadwinner jobs for everyday Australians;
(b) financial assistance should be encouraged under the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Act 2016 for measures which:
(i) directly finance the extraction of coal or natural gas,
(ii) directly finance the construction of pipeline infrastructure, including for the extraction of natural gas, and
(iii) directly finance the mining of natural resources, including coal; and
(c) financial assistance must not be provided for net zero measures”.
When I first saw the title of the Superannuation Legislation Amendment (Tackling the Gender Super Gap) Bill 2025, I assumed it was just more woke rubbish from the Liberals and Nationals and was ready to throw it in the bin. It turns out the title is misleading. The bill itself isn’t woke at all; it’s a sensible measure that allows spouses to transfer superannuation to even out their accounts, helping smaller balances grow faster. It works both ways, which makes good financial sense, especially as women are now earning more university degrees than men and female earnings are bound to outstrip male earnings in some households.
Supporting families is a key plank of One Nation policy and one of the essential building blocks for human progress, alongside freedom, the rule of law, secure property rights, fair taxation, cheap energy, and honest money.
While Labor opposes this bill because they only want to tax, tax, tax and waste money while crushing the middle class, One Nation is proud to support it because it helps families.
Transcript
We support this concept in One Nation because One Nation supports families, but I’ll get on to that more in a little while. When I saw the title of this bill, the Superannuation Legislation Amendment (Tackling the Gender Super Gap) Bill 2025, I thought: ‘This one is going in the bin. It’s more woke rubbish from the Liberals and Nationals.’ But the bill title is false; it’s misleading. Why? Is it because the Liberal Party needs to appease the Liberal moderates? Is it to attract the Greens vote? Is it because the Liberal-Nationals have become woke, continue to be woke? Oh, by the way, Liberal and Labor are exchanging barbs about females and looking after females. There’s only one party with a female leader, and that’s One Nation.
Senator McKim interjecting—
Senator ROBERTS: Oh, that’s right; you’re correct—the Greens.
Senator O’Neill: What about Senator Wong? Women are invisible to you.
The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator O’Neill, you should not be interjecting—on your feet particularly.
Senator ROBERTS: I’m not sure why the Liberals would feel the need to give this bill a woke name when the contents of the bill are nothing of the sort. This bill allows a spouse to transfer some of their super to their spouse’s superannuation account, to even them out. That makes sense. Small super accounts grow more slowly than larger accounts, so lifting up your partner’s account is a sensible exercise in financial management. The bill is well worded. The calculation on how much of a person’s balance can be transferred is clearly expressed and fair.
In an era where women are earning more university degrees than men, 58 per cent to 42 per cent female to male, it’s inevitable that female earnings will outstrip male earnings in some households. This bill works both ways. It builds on our superannuation income-splitting policy of lowering the tax rates for a family with at least one dependent child and one partner not working so he or she can look after the child, splitting the income and reducing the tax to give more after-tax income, to encourage families. We introduced that concept. We also introduced tax bracket indexation to get rid of the stealth tax on income tax.
Families need support. That’s a key plank to One Nation policy. There are eight keys to human progress. They include: (1) freedom, which is being destroyed in this country under the uni party; (2) rule of law, which is being destroyed by making feelings part of law and ignoring the truth and contradicting the truth; (3) constitutional continuation for the stability of governance; (4) secure property rights; (5) strong families—strong families are essential for human progress. Families are one of the building blocks, one of the two key structures. The other is the nation state rather than a globalist approach. No. 6 is fair, efficient taxation to pay for government but to minimise that taxation, to minimise the size of government; (7) is to have cheap, affordable energy; and (8) is to have honest money. All of these things are being destroyed by the Labor and Liberal uni party.
One Nation supports families. We want to apply this to super, and this bill we support. Labor opposes it because Labor loves to gouge tax from taxpayers. Labor wants to maximise tax—tax, tax, tax. How about we shrink government to fit the Constitution to restore human dignity, to restore human progress? And where does Labor’s tax tax, tax money go? It goes to waste, waste, waste and is destroyed while increasing inflation, increasing the cost to families, reducing after-tax disposable income, crippling people, increasing the lower working class at the expense of the middle class, destroying the middle class. And we have teachers, nurses, police who are suffering from an erosion of their income. This is a fair bill. One Nation will support this bill.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/fka5oJV6g5k/maxresdefault.jpg7201280Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2026-10-13 10:23:442026-10-13 10:23:47Spousal Super Transfers: A Win for Families
While I acknowledge Senator Whish-Wilson’s passion and past efforts against environmental waste, and while I agree that we need to control excessive packaging, this bill is simply not the answer.
This Bill will force Australia’s National Packaging Targets to be compulsory, replacing state rules with a heavy, uniform Commonwealth-led framework.
It introduces producer-funded fees and financial penalties based on packaging weight and materials. Ultimately, everything coming in a package will go up in price, driving more inflation and reducing wealth for everyday Australians.
The bill also contains an extremely complicated formula for calculating the level of recycling which will quite simply drive small and medium business crazy, requiring the additional expense of a dedicated consultant.
The revenue funds a circular economy, which is code for everyday Australians never owning anything new while the wealthy simply pay the penalty.
One Nation opposes this bill – which will impose a very high cost on business and consumers for a very small and unproven reward. It’s another prime example of the excessive green tape that strangles our society.
Transcript
I thank Senator Whish-Wilson for his bill, the Extended Producer Responsibility Scheme for Packaging (No Time to Waste) Bill 2026. I acknowledge Senator Whish-Wilson’s passion for reducing environmental waste and his efforts, which resulted in a ban on Australia exporting recycling waste to Third World countries where it was picked over and then in some cases dumped into rivers which took the rubbish out to sea. Australian waste was partially responsible for the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
I do agree there’s a need to control waste from excessive packaging. This bill, though, is not the answer. The purpose of this bill is to provide for the government of the Commonwealth to establish a uniform national Extended Producer Responsibility, an EPR, a scheme for packaging through a legislative instrument. The Extended Producer Responsibility scheme would place a direct and legally binding obligation on producers, importers or distributors of packaging for the end-of-life management of the packaging they place onto the Australian market. This bill would see Australia’s National Packaging Targets made mandatory and legally binding. The bill would cumulatively serve to meet the intent of reducing demand for virgin plastic, preventing plastic waste, supporting the economy, increasing recycling and resource recovery rates, as well as reducing emissions and better protecting the Australian environment. These are represented in the National Packaging Targets, which in this context are as follows. The scheme enforces benchmarks for 100 per cent reusable, recyclable or compostable packaging alongside a 70 per cent plastic recycling rate and 50 per cent recycled content. Currently, this is voluntary. This bill would make it mandatory—compulsory. The law applies a strict nationwide mandate to anyone defined as a ‘responsible person’, which covers commercial manufacturers, importers and distributors of packaging. Businesses can no longer opt out or ignore recycling targets. It replaces fragmented state rules with a single, uniform, Commonwealth-led framework. The core economic driver of the scheme is a producer funded fee structure. Companies pay levies based on the type and total weight of the packaging they introduce into the Australian market. Hard-to-recycle materials, composite plastics and virgin plastics face heavy financial penalties. Levies are heavily discounted—that’s ‘eco-modulated’, to use their term—for businesses using highly recyclable materials or high percentages of local recycled content. Modulated!
Now the part which is typical of the Greens, sadly, taking the kernel of a good idea and taking it so far it becomes intolerable. I’m talking about their bill’s lifecycle data tracking. The scheme requires transparent continuous data reporting into an independent national tracking system. Companies must log exact material weights, chemical composition and supply volumes. I’ll say that again: companies must log exact material weights, chemical composition and supply volumes. This data is used to calculate their exact financial obligations and verify whether they’re meeting the mandatory 2030 recycling targets. The revenue collected from producer levies forms a dedicated stable funding stream explicitly earmarked to build up Australia’s circular economy. Now, the phrase ‘circular economy’ is code for everyday Australians never owning anything new. The wealthy will be able to pay the price penalty for new products; everyday Australians will not.
The elitism of the concept of circular economy sits poorly with One Nation’s approach of advancing the lives of everyday Australians. It does seem typical, sadly, of the inner-city Greens, though, marketing themselves as the party of the disenfranchised while bills like this will serve to weigh down the economy, reduce productivity and reduce opportunity for the very people the Greens pretend to represent. This bill will impose a very high cost on business and consumers for a very small and unproven reward for the environment. Everything that comes in a package will go up in price. More inflation, higher prices, less wealth for everyone. This bill, especially its compulsory nature, onerous reporting conditions and cost, is what One Nation means when we talk about excessive green tape. One Nation opposes green tape strangling our society. One Nation opposes this bill.
In this time of high inflation, every wage rise or tax cut is simply compensating for government-driven inflation rather than getting people ahead. Worse, these increases push taxpayers into higher tax brackets, leaving many workers worse off with very little of their pay rise left to keep.
To fix this, One Nation has a clear policy: we will index tax brackets to inflation. This ensures that getting a wage rise to fight inflation won’t push you into a higher tax bracket, offsetting the previous year’s inflation.
While Liberals joined Labor to defeat our amendment in 2025, pressure from One Nation has since brought the Liberals around, though Labor still refuses — showing they certainly don’t represent workers anymore.
Labor claims this will cost over $30 billion a year. Reality is that the cost depends entirely on inflation. No inflation means no cost at all. Their high estimates simply prove they expect inflation to remain out of control under their watch.
One Nation also propose allowing income splitting for families with a dependent, putting $9,000 a year back into the pockets of single-income families who choose it.
One Nation proudly stands up for Australian families and workers with common-sense tax reform.
Transcript
In this time of high inflation, every wage rise or tax cut, rather than getting people ahead, just compensates for government driving inflation. Worse, these increases move many taxpayers into higher tax brackets, increasing their tax rate and leaving many workers worse off, as many are finding when they see how little of this week’s pay rise they actually get to keep.
One Nation policy will solve this. We’ll index tax brackets to inflation so that getting a wage rise to compensate for inflation does not put you into a higher tax bracket; inflation one year will be offset by tax brackets being lifted the next year. In 2025, the Labor government joined with the Liberals to oppose and defeat our amendment to index tax brackets. Because of the heat One Nation applied to the Liberals, the Liberals now agree with One Nation. Labor still does not, which is telling about who they represent these days—certainly not workers. This move will cost around $22 billion over the forward estimates and may come in at a much higher rate over time. Labor will engage in a scare campaign, of course, over this cost. The reality is that the costing depends on inflation; no inflation means no cost at all. Labor advances a cost above $30 billion a year. This means Labor is really saying they expect inflation under their government to remain out of control. Tax cuts take the pressure off businesses to give larger wage rises, countering the wage-price spiral that harms business, workers and every Australian.
Another major element of our income tax policy is to allow income splitting between families with a dependent, if that suits them. Families with two wage earners will probably keep their existing arrangements. Families with one income who split will have $9,000 a year back in their pocket. The PBO has put the cost to budget revenue at $7 billion a year, depending upon uptake. Money well spent helping families. One Nation represents families and workers. These are just two of many, many tax reform policies we took to— (Time expired)
Treasurer Jim Chalmers claims that six out of seven new jobs are in the private sector, yet private sector job share has fallen from 85.2% to 84%, with most growth occurring in taxpayer-funded non-market sectors (health, NDIS, aged care).
Minister Gallagher defended care economy jobs, criticising One Nation for previously labelling these jobs a “Ponzi scheme.” She maintains that the government supports job growth across all sectors.
Labour market productivity has fallen 5% overall under this Labor government – the Reserve Bank linking this to rising inflation. When questioned over this figure, Minister Gallagher responded by pointing to the government’s 15-point productivity package outlined in the budget, covering investment, innovation, red tape reduction, trade, housing, and technology — while criticising the previous coalition government’s productivity record.
In my final question, I pointed out the government’s poor economic performance, citing increased underutilisation, falling real wages and lower productivity – which Minister Gallagher rejected, highlighting positive metrics including higher employment, increased participation rates, a shrinking gender pay gap, falling headline inflation, and annual real wage growth.
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: My question is to the Minister representing the Treasurer, Senator Gallagher. Yesterday I asked a series of questions on the labour market using ABS data, including this question:
Treasurer Chalmers stated last week six out of seven jobs created since 2022 were in the private sector.
Yet over 70 per cent of the jobs created are in the taxpayer funded economy, not the private sector—health, NDIS, aged care and education. Your answer went to the worthiness of those jobs, which One Nation does not dispute. Your answer did not deal with the Treasurer’s misrepresentation. The Treasurer is wrong and misleading. How can six out of seven jobs that your government has created be in the private sector if the share of jobs in the private sector has fallen from 85.2 per cent of the labour market when you came to power down to 84 per cent today, indicating the reverse is true?
Senator GALLAGHER (Minister for Finance, Minister for the Public Service, Minister for Women, Minister for Government Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate): I thank Senator Roberts for the question. My answer to your question yesterday was in response to you calling non-market jobs a Ponzi scheme. That’s how you referred to those jobs. You said aged care, disability care and health workers are effectively masquerading as a Ponzi scheme. That was in your question, so that’s why I responded the way I did.
Since we came to government, the number of jobs has increased by about 1.3 million jobs to the economy since May 2022. I support completely the Treasurer’s comments around the jobs that are being created in the private sector, and we have seen jobs in the public sector and in the non-market sector as well because there is enormous growth in the care economy, as there should be—people who are working hard to support people’s ageing parents, our youngest citizens people who are sick and unwell. That is going to be a growing part of our economy as well. The point I was trying to make yesterday is: don’t punch down on those workers. Don’t demean those workers by saying they are essentially operating in a Ponzi scheme.
Senator Hanson interjecting—
Senator GALLAGHER: Well, Senator Hanson, they weren’t my words; they were your party’s words. The point we were making is that this party will always create jobs. We will always ensure that those jobs are well paid and that those jobs are secure whether they’re in the private sector, the public sector, the market sector or the non-market sector because at the end of the day a job allows you to live a dignified life. That’s what people on this side of the chamber care about. (Time expired)
Senator ROBERTS: Labour market productivity fell 0.2 per cent in the June quarter, taking the total fall under your government to five per cent. It’s supposed to go up, not down. The Reserve Bank has flagged this problem as likely to cause an increase in inflation. Productivity does not mean working harder. It means working smarter, more efficiently and more easily. Minister, what specifically is your government doing to reverse the fall in labour market productivity?
Senator GALLAGHER: In the budget—and we discussed this at estimates, I think, in the committee that you attended, Senator Roberts—there is a very extensive productivity package, whether it be in investment, innovation, removing red tape, some of the work that Senator Farrell’s doing in trade, building a single national market, making it easy to engage with government, accelerating approvals, simplifying building regulations, building more homes, modernising energy markets—
Senator Bragg: You couldn’t make it up!
Senator GALLAGHER: better recognising skills, unlocking the data and AI opportunity, investing in science and innovation, strengthening the superannuation system, better coordinating government investment and driving ongoing regulatory reform. They are the 15 areas that were contained in the budget around improving productivity.
Senator Bragg laughs, but, of course, he won’t be on the record saying that the decade of the worst productivity in this country was actually the decade that you were in government, because you didn’t care and you didn’t do anything, including in housing, including in super and including in those other areas I’ve outlined.
The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, second supplementary?
Senator ROBERTS: Your economic report card is full of red ink: underutilised workers increasing to 1.68 million, real wages falling 1.5 per cent and labour market productivity falling five per cent, due in part to your obsession with net zero and wokeism nobbling the economy, reducing productivity, increasing inflation, running up debt and making working lives harder. Minister, where is your plan to turn this around to keep a roof over workers’ heads and food on their family table?
Senator GALLAGHER: Employment is up—this is from when we came to government—the participation rate’s up, gender pay gaps are down, the number of women employed full-time is up, industrial disputes are down, headline inflation is down and annual real wage growth is up. If you look at any of those measures, they don’t align with what One Nation seek to portray about our economy.
And I would note that those opposite, the conservative side of politics that sit over there, absolutely love to talk our economy down, when the data acknowledging that people are doing it tough in an inflationary environment tells a different story. There are more people working now than ever before, and we will continue to invest in those jobs and support those workers with secure jobs into the future.
Newly declassified US evidence and Dr. Anthony Fauci’s released records show COVID-19 was a man-made, lab-engineered virus from Wuhan. Alternative treatments (like Ivermectin) were suppressed to force uptake of rushed mRNA vaccines, which financially benefited NIAID through patent royalties.
Citing data from the McCullough Foundation and epidemiologist Nicolas Hulscher, mRNA injections cause “turbo-cancer” (aggressive cancer), which did not exist before COVID. 35 distinct cancer-promoting mechanisms have been identified in peer reviewed papers. These key mechanisms include DNA repair impairment, chronic inflammation from lipid nanoparticles and immune suppression.
Published clinical literature includes 333 documented turbo-cancer cases across 27 countries, involving lymphomas, leukaemia, melanoma, breast cancer, lung cancer, glioblastoma, sarcomas and pancreatic cancers. 86% of these cases occurred following vaccination, while 14% were following SARS CoV-2 infection. Preventions appear worse than the disease!
On population evidence, USA cancer deaths since the injections in 2021 is between 153,000 and 197,000 people. Early onset cancer incidence surged 6.4% in just two years, from 2021 to 2023, alongside sharp increases in brain and nervous system tumours, which are up 19.5%. Colorectal cancer is up 19.4%, small intestine cancer is up 15.5%, ovarian cancer is up 12.8%, stomach cancer is up 7.3%, and female breast cancer is up 3.6%. In South Korea, a nationwide cohort of 8.4 million people found vaccinated individuals had an increased one-year cancer risk across six cancer types: thyroid, gastric, colorectal, lung, breast and prostate cancer. In Italy, vaccinated residents had a 23% higher risk of cancer hospitalisation.
I would love to provide the latest data on cancer rates in Australia – however there is none. They don’t even bother. The official data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare stops at 2022. We don’t need to know the outcome of the disease or hospitalisation rates. We only need to know diagnosis. After four years, why is that simple data not available? Perhaps because they don’t want you to know!
Our health authorities accepted data from Pfizer and Moderna on their COVID products after only a few months of so-called testing — substandard testing. They promised to provide the data after they finished the trial, yet they never did.
COVID-19 vaccines received expedited testing compared to standard multi-year clinical trials – while the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) “allegedly” persecuted truth-telling doctors and medical professionals.
One Nation again calls for a comprehensive royal commission to investigate COVID-19 origins, mandates, vaccine safety and regulatory actions.
Transcript
Last Senate session, I presented the Senate with the latest evidence from the United States on the COVID scandal—the crimes and homicides and, in particular, the role of the former director of America’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, NIAID, Dr Anthony Fauci. This was evidence declassified through the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, and Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Murphy, who at the time was the inspector general of the US Department of Defense. This information was corroborated using Fauci’s own diaries and phone released under freedom of information just a few weeks ago. The unavoidable conclusion is that the world was brought to its knees using a man-made engineered virus developed through gain-of-function research to create a weaponised virus candidate which then escaped from a research lab in Wuhan, China, and infected the world.
What followed was a cover-up on the origin and suppression of effective early interventions to make the impact worse. Why? To sell vaccines—injections—that were rushed through and are now killing and maiming people. Who benefits from that? Well, Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, NIAID. NIAID under Fauci had a direct, well-documented institutional role in vaccine research, patenting of key technologies, licensing to companies and receiving of royalties. NIAID conducted the foundational work in the development of the mRNA platform and held patents on stabilised prefusion spike proteins—yes, those spike proteins. This means that the organisation that owned the patent related to spike proteins acted to ban alternative therapies such as Ivermectin, which was proven, and Fenbendazole, which is proven, so the world had no choice and was forced to use the COVID shots, which contain spike proteins, which then earned NIAID half a billion Australian dollars in royalties. All this was at the same time—as records show—that they knew the injections caused myocarditis and were next to useless. This is in their own words in their own diary, text messages and emails. All of this is public record, even if you have not heard about it. My other speeches on this subject are available on my website.
Tonight, I’ll expand on my comments that the injections are now killing and maiming people. As always, I use peer reviewed science, facts and data. I thank epidemiologist Nicolas Hulscher and the McCullough Foundation for the work I’m referencing tonight. The link between mRNA vaccines, injections and cancer is mechanistic, clinical and evident in population studies—scientific studies.
To the mechanistic evidence—35 distinct cancer-promoting mechanisms have been identified in peer reviewed papers. I will post a link to the literature review on my website. Key mechanisms include impaired DNA repair allowing damaged cells to become cancerous; presence of SV40 cell division enhancer that enhances cancer growth—that one was criminal; LINE-1 reverse transcription, DNA segments left over from the growing medium incorporating into a person’s DNA; frameshifting leading to cell damage and random mutations; chronic inflammation due to the lipid nanoparticles holding the messenger RNA strands; immune suppression through the ACE2 receptor, amongst others; and cancer stem cell expansion. The McCullough Foundation proposes a concurrent hit model. These processes do not necessarily operate independently or sequentially. Multiple cancer-promoting hits overlap in the same susceptible host person, compressing the time required for dormant, indolent or microscopic disease to become clinically aggressive. This is commonly referred to as ‘turbocancer’, which is just a layman’s term for an aggressive cancer, which did exist before COVID.
On clinical evidence, the published clinical literature includes 333 documented turbocancer cases across 27 countries involving lymphomas, leukaemia, melanoma, breast cancer, lung cancer, glioblastoma, sarcomas and pancreatic cancers. Eighty-six per cent of these cases occurred following COVID-19 injections, and just 14 per cent were following SARS CoV-2 infection. This is because 14 per cent of cases are from COVID; the rest are from the COVID injections. Was the prevention worse than the disease? That’s a matter for a royal commission. Most likely the answer is yes.
Across these cases, recurring patterns include rapid cancer progression, short latency recurrence, reactivation of previously controlled disease and tumours involving the injection site or nearby lymph nodes. The platform can distribute systemically, forcing vulnerable tissues, including the heart and brain, to express mutated tumour proteins. This raises the risk of off-target immune attack, cardiac injury and neurological damage. As I pointed out previously, health authorities in the USA knew the risk of myocarditis as early as March 2021 and covered it up. The information in this study puts the science behind the clinical observations of increased myocarditis, pericarditis and Alzheimer’s adjacent diseases.
Even more concerning, the liquid lipid nanoparticle delivery vehicle itself promoted metastatic growth in mice even without mRNA cargo. This suggests that some oncologic liabilities reside in the platform itself not only the encoded antigen. This confirms emerging research showing that the more COVID boosters, the more lipid nanoparticle and the more spike protein, the greater your risk.
On population evidence, there have been excess USA cancer deaths since 2021 injections of between 153,000 and 197,000 people. Early onset cancer incidence surged 6.4 per cent in just two years, from 2021 to 2023, alongside sharp increases in brain and nervous system tumours, which are up 19.5 per cent. Colorectal cancer is up 19.4 per cent. Small intestine cancer is up 15.5 per cent. Ovarian cancer is up 12.8 per cent. Stomach cancer is up 7.3 per cent, and female breast cancer is up 3.6 per cent. In South Korea, a nationwide cohort of 8.4 million people found vaccinated individuals had an increased one-year cancer risk across six cancer types: thyroid, gastric, colorectal, lung, breast and prostate cancer. In Italy, vaccinated residents had a 23 per cent higher risk of cancer hospitalisation. We have the mechanism, we have the science, and we have the data.
I would love to provide the latest data on cancer rates in Australia. There is none. Data showing cancer rates moderating through 2023-25 are actually projections—not real data—made in 2022. Some graphs show the dotted lines to indicate projection; others don’t. They don’t even bother. The official data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare stops at 2022. This is not acceptable. We don’t need to know the outcome of the disease or hospitalisation rates. We only need to know diagnosis, and that can be marked provisional until normal processes are followed through. After four years, why is that simple data not available? It’s because they don’t want you to know.
This is not a history lesson. The first randomised test of mRNA as monotherapy in residual cancer commenced in 2021 and is still underway, with the result expected in 2030. While Moderna advise wonderful outcomes, their data has not been made public nor shared with researchers, so I guess we’ll have to wait until 2030 to find out the truth. The point here is simple: this is a properly conducted mRNA trial, and it’s taking nine years. Our health authorities accepted data from Pfizer and Moderna on their COVID products after only a few months of so-called testing—substandard testing. They promised to provide the data after they finished the trial, yet they never did. The question for a royal commission is this: why was next to no safety testing—two months instead of nine years—accepted for a substance which was then injected into hundreds of millions or even billions of people? Surely the larger the cohort, the more care that was needed, not the reverse. As I showed last sitting, the American CDC, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, knew almost straightaway the injection was only slightly more effective than natural immunity, so urgency was not the reason.
Those following this scandal will find much of tonight’s information is familiar. Papers have been available for years on some of these pathways. I referenced some as far back as in 2022. It turns out those qualified epidemiologists and public health luminaries who opposed the official story were right. Many have paid dearly for their principled stand. Some doctors here in Australia are still debarred as a result of showing character when so many displayed cowardice and silence. The pharmaphiles at AHPRA still insist on persecuting the truth-tellers, the doctors of courage and principle, to send a message to the industry that truth will not be tolerated and that acting in the best interests of the patient will not be tolerated.
Because we did not intervene as strongly as needed back then, AHPRA are doing it again—this time with transgenderism and doctors opposing medicalisation of a psychological condition, a mental health condition. According to AHPRA, the job of a doctor is to keep the pharmaceuticals flowing. If this sounds extreme, you haven’t read the amount I have read on our COVID scandal and you haven’t spoken with the famous medical names from around the world who have given me advice from mid-2020 which has turned out to be accurate. To ensure this never happens again, tonight I repeat One Nation’s call for a royal commission into the COVID scandal, the COVID crimes and the COVID injection homicides. (Time expired)
The reality is simple: Australians are going backwards under the Albanese government.
Official data reveals growth this decade is the worst in 100 years, yet Labor is pushing ahead with bringing in millions of new arrivals.
Economic growth is negative per person. The economy isn’t growing on its own, so immigration is being used as a Ponzi scheme to artificially inflate the numbers.
Labour productivity is down, fuelled in part by massive public service job growth that drives up inflation for everyone.
While female participation rates are up, male participation rates are down. Growth should be for everyone.
Transcript
The reality is that people are going backwards under the Albanese government. Official data shows growth this decade is the worst in 100 years, and this is when Labor decides to dump a million new arrivals with a million more to come. The minister’s list of economic achievements rely on immigration to stay positive. Economic growth, for instance, is negative per person. Each person’s economic pie is shrinking, not growing. Immigration is the Ponzi scheme that I’m referring to and talking about here. Bringing in new people to artificially inflate the economy, which is now incapable of growing on its own.
Labour productivity is down in part because of the growth in employment in the Public Service, whose lower productivity contributes to inflation for everyone. Another of Senator Gallagher’s achievements was female participation rates are up—true—and male participation rates are down. You’re supposed to grow the economy for everyone, not pick sides. People are noticing— (Time expired)
