Ms BADGER (Lyons) – Honourable Speaker, I move –
That the House take note of the following matter: protecting essential services.
I’m sure, like many members, the influx of correspondence at the moment from essential services right across the board who are deeply concerned and anxious about what their state will be and how they will continue to operate in the forthcoming budget.
I just want to begin by acknowledging the Neighbourhood Houses that were at the front on Parliament lawns yesterday at lunchtime. The big question for them is not even what their future will be in the next 12 months, but in five years. Where will those houses be and what resources will they have to operate? The services that they provide the communities across Tasmania are absolutely critical. I want to flag that last year, the minister announced a $150,000 needs analysis of Neighbourhood Houses that was set to be underway in early 2026. We are yet to hear anything of that analysis, but it is absolutely crucial for the future of our Neighbourhood Houses. We hope that that gets underway very soon, if it isn’t already.
Of the services that are coming forward from the community, it has been interesting, the change in language that we’re hearing. So many constituents are reaching out to the Greens, as I’m sure they are to the opposition and independent members as well, where they have been encouraged by services or public servants to come into this place and to lobby the government to get their priorities for investment straight. It is deeply concerning.
I want to share one e-mail from a constituent who is fleeing a family violence situation and needs legal assistance. We all know that the various community-based legal services are backed up. They have more than they can possibly deal with coming at them, unfortunately for this constituent. I want to read the response that they got from a legal service that will remain anonymous, because they are already working far too hard with the limited resources that they have. It said:
We have a significant shortfall in free legal services compared to demand for them. Your case is complex and needs to have legal representation. Even if the magistrates refer you to a free legal service, that service can’t help if it is already full and most of us are beyond full. You could try seeing a local parliamentarian to discuss the need for more free legal services, instead of things like stadiums.
You can only imagine how the constituent would have felt when they received that email. And they’re not alone. We’re getting similar emails from people reaching out to Park Rangers, who are encouraging people to come in here and speak to politicians, instead of being able to do their basic work that they can be doing, because they’re simply not getting the funding for the priority areas.
An essential service is affordable and accessible public education, such as TasTAFE. What we saw the minister table yesterday, should have been in relation to the $45 million worth of cuts that the TasTAFE CEO told TasTAFE staff about through an e-mail that was leaked just a couple of weeks ago. That’s what this House called upon the minister to table. But, instead he’s given us cuts that actually already happened late last year. It’s absolutely not clear from the minister or the TasTAFE CEO about the $45 million worth of cuts. Are those cuts that have already happened? Is that the lab tech courses and the art screening? The CEO announced these further cuts after those cuts had already happened. What about the automotive cuts that have already happened?
What was outlined in the document that was tabled did not contain any figures, so we don’t know how much funding was actually saved from the cuts that the minister tabled. But we can definitely tell that it is nowhere close to $45 million. Where is the rest of that funding actually going to come from?
It’s really concerning that when we asked about the campuses that were going to be impacted, there are only two listed in that document. Yet RTI documents and things that the minister has said in the past in this place, and in budget Estimates, have [inaudible] publicly owned buildings in relation to what could be not just sold, but leased out to private RTOs, instead of publicly funded education. Why wasn’t any of that included? When the automotive cuts were happening, we were asking questions in this place in March of the minister. Not getting any answers. Then we put in RTIs, and it turns out a lot of the information that we are seeking around forced redundancies had already been made clear back in February.
Is the minister completely asleep at the wheel and he does not know what is going on? Or is he not telling this place? It is more than likely that is the exact same situation here. The minister said in Question Time that he couldn’t share with us about the $45 million. Only what they have so far. Is he not talking to the CEO that announced these cuts? Where is the discrepancy coming from, from what the minister claims is further investment, and what we’re hearing from the CEO have to be done in cuts.
This is simply not good enough. This is a political choice, and this government needs to get its priorities straight.
