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We Asked the Finance Minister What This Budget Really Does For You · She's On The Money

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Speaker 1: Hello, my name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud or
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Speaker 1: the Order Kerni Whaltbury and a waddery woman. And before
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Speaker 1: we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I
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Speaker 1: would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land
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Speaker 1: of which this podcast is recorded on a wondery country,
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Speaker 1: acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming
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Speaker 1: through as this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing
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Speaker 1: and the storytelling of you to make a difference for
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Speaker 1: today and lasting impact for tomorrow.
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Speaker 2: Let's get into it.
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Speaker 3: She's on the Money, She's on the Money.
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Speaker 4: Hello, and welcome to She's on the Money, the podcast
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Speaker 4: that translates government budgets into information that you are actually
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Speaker 4: going to be able to understand. If you felt like
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Speaker 4: you need a politics degree just to understand if the
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Speaker 4: budget this year is good or bad, or you're sitting
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Speaker 4: there like, wait, what is a structural deficit? And why
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Speaker 4: should I even care? Or maybe you're just wondering cool,
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Speaker 4: but does any of this actually help me or benefit me?
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Speaker 4: My friend, you are in exactly the right place. I'm
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Speaker 4: Victoria Devine, the one that's here to ask the real questions,
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Speaker 4: cut through the spin and make this budget makes sense
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Speaker 4: for real life. And today, which is actually the day
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Speaker 4: after the big budget announcement, I'm doing a very special
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Speaker 4: recording from Parliament House in Canberra. But I'm not doing
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Speaker 4: it alone, which would be a little bit sad. I
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Speaker 4: am joined by someone who helped shape this year's federal
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Speaker 4: budget from the inside. Senator Katie Gallagher is the Minister
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Speaker 4: for Finance and the Minister for Women, and she's here
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Speaker 4: to chat with us about what made it into the budget,
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Speaker 4: what didn't make it and what it actually means to you. Katie,
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Speaker 4: welcome to She's on the money. Thank you so much
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Speaker 4: for having me on. It's very exciting. It is, honestly
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Speaker 4: for me career highlight. Guys, I'm in parliament. Baby Victoria
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Speaker 4: would be shaking.
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Speaker 2: In her boots right now.
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Speaker 4: First of all, I'm just going to start this off
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Speaker 4: assuming that a lot of my community haven't dipped their
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Speaker 4: toes in the political waters yet. And I have seen
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Speaker 4: questions in my community of Victoria. What's the difference between
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Speaker 4: the Minister of Finance and the treasurer, How does that
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Speaker 4: relationship work and what are the different roles.
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Speaker 2: Okay, so that's a great question. Really Jim and I.
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Speaker 5: So, Jim Chalmers is the Treasurer, I'm the finance minister.
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Speaker 5: We work very closely together on all matters relating to
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Speaker 5: the budget, but really on all matters relating to economic
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Speaker 5: policy as well. But if I could sort of simplify
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Speaker 5: it down, I think really Jim is the lead economic minister.
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Speaker 5: He's in charge of economic policy across the country, revenue,
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Speaker 5: all those big kind of nationally important things. And I'm
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Speaker 5: responsible for the money, like where's the money coming from?
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Speaker 5: Where are the savings? More of like the accounting book
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Speaker 5: keeper part of the business. So are you in a
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Speaker 5: nitty gritty I am like, I'm gettings.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, you're in the one. I want that role. I
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Speaker 2: don't want to be treasurer. I want to be nosy.
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Speaker 2: I know, well the.
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Speaker 5: Treasure has a lot of responsibilities. He's busy, but he
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Speaker 5: can be nosy and give him the highlight I can
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Speaker 5: and love. They have my fingers really in every single
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Speaker 5: thing that happens across government. So I know what's happening
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Speaker 5: in other minister's portfolios. I know what policy is being
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Speaker 5: developed up. Yeah, it's a very interesting role, but I'm
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Speaker 5: kind of yeah, it really suits my personality, which is
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Speaker 5: naturally nosy.
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Speaker 4: O me too, like I don't want to be part
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Speaker 4: of the drama or the gossip, but I actually would
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Speaker 4: really like to know what's going on, just committing me
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Speaker 4: in the loop, Like if you give me a budget
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Speaker 4: or a spreadsheet, I will do a little bit of
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Speaker 4: a nosey into what that means and how that works.
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Speaker 4: You are also, in addition to being the Minister for Finance,
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Speaker 4: you are the Minister for Women, which I think is
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Speaker 4: so special and so cool. But let's wrap it back
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Speaker 4: to the budget. Was this a good budget for women?
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Speaker 1: Yeah?
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Speaker 2: I think so.
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Speaker 5: You know, we've worked hard on it. There's some really
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Speaker 5: good and important big announcements for women, but it shouldn't
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Speaker 5: be seen in isolation of the other three budgets we've
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Speaker 5: done where we've tried to shift the dial for women
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Speaker 5: as well. I think, you know, like for the last decade,
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Speaker 5: really I feel like women's policy had really been a
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Speaker 5: bit more of an afterthought. It wasn't kind of central
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Speaker 5: at the table, kind of a front of mind. And
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Speaker 5: you know, putting me as Finance Minister and Minister for
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Speaker 5: Women means the Minister for Women is at every kind
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Speaker 5: of decision of the budget and that helps, plus helps
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Speaker 5: having a PM who wanted me in that role because
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Speaker 5: he wanted women's policy right at the front and center
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Speaker 5: of And it helps enormously to have a Treasurer who
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Speaker 5: doesn't need convincing that women's economic equality, you know, getting
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Speaker 5: a fair deal for women is actually a national economic priority,
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Speaker 5: like it's good for the economy, and so I don't
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Speaker 5: have to convince anyone on that, and that's made a
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Speaker 5: big difference.
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Speaker 2: To what we can pull off.
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Speaker 4: And I feel like that is obvious, Like I feel
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Speaker 4: like you have had so much pull and have I guess,
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Speaker 4: garnered so much respect for that because it's obvious there's
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Speaker 4: a team. It's obvious that people are backing you to
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Speaker 4: go through this and you're not having to fight to
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Speaker 4: go No, do you know that this is also important?
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Speaker 4: And I, as a female or seeing that this year's
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Speaker 4: budget has had to walk, I would say a fine
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Speaker 4: line between helping people and then making sure we're not
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Speaker 4: fueling inflation. How in your role, how do you actually
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Speaker 4: make that balance work? How are you looking at inflation
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Speaker 4: but then also going oh, honestly, we're in the middle
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Speaker 4: of a cost of living crisis, and we want to
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Speaker 4: help people, but sometimes too much help actually sends it
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Speaker 4: the wrong way. Yeah, and I think part of the
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Speaker 4: challenge for people has been, like in the GFC and
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Speaker 4: in COVID, when there was sort of an economic crisis
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Speaker 4: or you know, something that we needed to a shock,
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Speaker 4: an economic shock, the response was to hand out money,
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Speaker 4: so we got money to keep the stimulate the economy.
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Speaker 4: The issue with the inflation shock is that.
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Speaker 2: It's the opposite response.
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Speaker 5: You've got to work out how to calm down demand
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Speaker 5: in the economy, and I think that's been part of
6:29
Speaker 5: our challenge is you know, people saying, well, I'm under
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Speaker 5: a lot of pressure. What are you doing for me now?
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Speaker 5: And why aren't I getting the support that perhaps I
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Speaker 5: got in the GFC, etc. You're right, it's a real
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Speaker 5: balance and we've had to find ways to help people.
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Speaker 5: But doesn't add to the inflation challenge. So it's not
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Speaker 5: simply like sending a check out in the mail or
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Speaker 5: something like that, which happened in the GFC.
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Speaker 2: It's more about Okay.
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Speaker 5: Well, let's take some pressure off your energy bill so
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Speaker 5: you're not out with more money in your pocket. But
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Speaker 5: it's reducing your costs in another away. And so you know,
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Speaker 5: we've made a lot of progress on inflation. It's come
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Speaker 5: back towards ben In this budget it shows that it's
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Speaker 5: coming back in sustainably into the normal range six months earlier,
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Speaker 5: which is really good news. But we also recognize people
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Speaker 5: still under pressure, and that's why we have to try
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Speaker 5: and find ways to help. Yeah, and I think a
7:20
Speaker 5: lot of people don't understand that balance. They go, well,
7:23
Speaker 5: why aren't they throwing more at this? You really have
7:27
Speaker 5: to step back and look at the bigger picture or
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Speaker 5: the bigger umbrella to be able to understand. Okay, well,
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Speaker 5: if we actually just lined your pockets like we did
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Speaker 5: in the GFC, we're actually stimulating the economy, and a
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Speaker 5: growing economy means inflation is going to increase the cost
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Speaker 5: of eggs. And like, it all comes back to that
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Speaker 5: and goes all right, well we could help you here,
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Speaker 5: and I love that you're like, Okay, well, let's look
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Speaker 5: at the energy bill side of things.
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Speaker 4: Let's actually take the pressure off while not hopefully stimulating
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Speaker 4: the economy in that way.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Speaker 4: I feel like there's been a lot of commentary, as
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Speaker 4: there always is when a budget happens, right.
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Speaker 2: I think the budget is exciting, but the.
8:01
Speaker 4: Day after the budget is more exciting because all of
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Speaker 4: the commentary comes out, all of the articles are online.
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Speaker 4: Every man in his dog has an opinion. Yes they do,
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Speaker 4: and I love it. Again, I'm nosy, so I'm reading
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Speaker 4: and devouring absolutely every part of it. In your view,
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Speaker 4: what was this year's most misunderstood part of the budget?
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Speaker 5: Well, to be honest, I have not even had time
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Speaker 5: to read much about what people are saying about the budget.
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Speaker 2: I had a whole flight here. I come up later.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, because, like you say, actually budget days more controlled
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Speaker 5: for us, Like because we've got the lock up, We've
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Speaker 5: got the set press conference, then the budget speech in
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Speaker 5: the evening, and then we do a few late press conferences.
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Speaker 5: But not a lot of people have read the detail.
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Speaker 5: But come Wednesday, yeah, everything's unleashed people, you know, stakeholders
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Speaker 5: are having their two cents worth, Economists are out with
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Speaker 5: all the big answers usually and a lot of free advice.
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Speaker 5: What's been the most misunderstood? Well, I think think for us,
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Speaker 5: you know, we feel very strongly Jim and I that
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Speaker 5: we've put together a budget that's right for the times.
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Speaker 5: Like right for the economy, and our thinking has been
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Speaker 5: about that, not about politics. And I think there's been
9:13
Speaker 5: from what I've seen, a lot of commentary saying, oh,
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Speaker 5: this is just a political budget, you know, to get
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Speaker 5: to the other side.
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Speaker 2: Of an election, because we're on the eve of an election.
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Speaker 5: And I know from the sort of tens of loads
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Speaker 5: of hours that we've sat in the ERC room that's
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Speaker 5: not the case. Like we look at all what's happening
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Speaker 5: in the economy, where are the areas of pressure, how
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Speaker 5: can the government help, And we've made decisions we think
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Speaker 5: in the national interests. But I think there's a lot
9:40
Speaker 5: of cynicism about politicians and politics and motivation. But yeah,
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Speaker 5: I really think that if this wasn't an election year,
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Speaker 5: we would still be handing down this budget.
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Speaker 4: That's good to hear because I feel like so much
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Speaker 4: of the narrative is, oh, it's a political budget. They're
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Speaker 4: going to announce it in the next six weeks, so
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Speaker 4: they're trying to appease everybody, and you just go that
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Speaker 4: actually wouldn't help their narrative. Let's say it comes back
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Speaker 4: in and labor stays in. It actually doesn't help to
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Speaker 4: just be political and say all these things that kept
10:09
Speaker 4: you in because you're going to be held to those
10:11
Speaker 4: standards as.
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Speaker 5: Well, right, yeah, exactly, exactly. I mean this is a
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Speaker 5: priority for the next twelve months, not for the next
10:17
Speaker 5: six weeks. And I think governments have a responsibility to
10:21
Speaker 5: make decisions. Every decision we make is in the nation's interests,
10:25
Speaker 5: regardless of whether you've voted for.
10:27
Speaker 2: Us or not.
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Speaker 5: I mean, you know, we're responsible, and we've tried to
10:31
Speaker 5: do our best. I think, as you say, kind of
10:33
Speaker 5: navigating that inflationary environment with really sensible and good and
10:38
Speaker 5: responsible assistance to help people, like medicare like hex step relief,
10:44
Speaker 5: cheaper medicines, like putting it all of that out in
10:47
Speaker 5: a way that doesn't put cash in people's pockets and
10:50
Speaker 5: fuels the inflation challenge, because in the long run, that
10:53
Speaker 5: makes everybody poorer. And that was the real challenge I
10:56
Speaker 5: think we've dealt with the last three years.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely.
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Speaker 4: The privilege of interviewing lots of people in business, and
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Speaker 4: I was having a beautiful conversation with someone this morning
11:06
Speaker 4: about how sometimes when you get to a certain level
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Speaker 4: in business or in politics, people stop seeing you as
11:12
Speaker 4: human and think that maybe you are this all magical
11:16
Speaker 4: beast that somehow knows absolutely everything. I would see that
11:21
Speaker 4: as a pretty big responsibility, right, Like I would feel
11:24
Speaker 4: like the weight of the world was on my shoulders.
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Speaker 2: Yes, like that is a lot.
11:27
Speaker 4: How do you from a more personal perspective, how do
11:30
Speaker 4: you deal with that? Because I'm in awe. I'm like,
11:32
Speaker 4: this woman is the coolest, Like she is the Minister
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Speaker 4: for Finance, not only that, the Minister for women. I
11:38
Speaker 4: think that there has been so much done, but then
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Speaker 4: people are vocal. That would be really hard. I get
11:45
Speaker 4: one Instagram message if someone saying that my hair doesn't
11:47
Speaker 4: look good, and I'm like, oh, maybe I'll cry under
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Speaker 4: the table. How are you dealing with not just commentary,
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Speaker 4: but knowing that that is a big responsibility. Yeah.
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Speaker 5: I think that's been a really big adjustment for me
12:00
Speaker 5: into this role. Really felt it, and I think it's
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Speaker 5: probably I sort of take the mystery away from it.
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Speaker 5: It's like every job. I think when you come into
12:09
Speaker 5: a new job, you feel the weight of the responsibility.
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Speaker 5: You don't want to mess up. There's things that you
12:14
Speaker 5: didn't know about the job that all of a sudden
12:16
Speaker 5: are part of the job, and over time you adjust
12:19
Speaker 5: to that and you get better at it, and so
12:21
Speaker 5: I feel like, you know, when people go, you know,
12:23
Speaker 5: tell me what your job's like, I feel like saying
12:25
Speaker 5: to them what it's probably very like yours. You know,
12:27
Speaker 5: every prosice, there's planning, there's teams to work with, deadlines
12:33
Speaker 5: to meet.
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Speaker 2: I'd have time for lunch, exactly.
12:36
Speaker 5: And I think mine's a little bit different and it's
12:38
Speaker 5: more public and more contested at times, but other than that,
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Speaker 5: it is like every other job. And I am like
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Speaker 5: every other woman going to work. I've got kids at home,
12:48
Speaker 5: I've got a dog that needs walking, I need groceries
12:51
Speaker 5: that need buying. You know, I have the same anxieties
12:53
Speaker 5: as everyone else. You have to push away imposter syndrome
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Speaker 5: and think, oh my god, am I really up to this?
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Speaker 4: You're telling me at this level you still have imposter syndrome.
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Speaker 4: I think everybody else is in a lot of trouble.
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Speaker 5: And I'm much better at it than when I was
13:07
Speaker 5: younger in my career, where I really kind of was
13:09
Speaker 5: looking around going does everyone know that I'm here and
13:12
Speaker 5: responsible for things? Whereas I'm much better now. You learn
13:16
Speaker 5: that as you get older, But I still feel like,
13:19
Speaker 5: you know, I guess For me, it's part of taking
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Speaker 5: the job seriously, not thinking that I've got all the answers,
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Speaker 5: being open to advice, being careful and thoughtful about how
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Speaker 5: you make decisions. But it's not a job for everyone.
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Speaker 5: I don't think and on the social media stuff, I
13:34
Speaker 5: just don't look at it because or when I do,
13:37
Speaker 5: I delve in and then I'm like wow, I'll straight
13:39
Speaker 5: back out again, like okay, because one I feel like
13:43
Speaker 5: engaging with people and going that is totally not true
13:46
Speaker 5: and there's no point.
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Speaker 2: There is no points, So.
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Speaker 4: You can't change the opinion of somebody who's already decided
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Speaker 4: what theirs is and is quite adamant with that, and
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Speaker 4: that's okay with that is a hard pill to swallow.
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Speaker 4: Let's get back to the questions, because I could talk
14:00
Speaker 4: about stuff like that for ages. This budget has a
14:04
Speaker 4: twenty seven point six million dollar deficit, and there's lots
14:09
Speaker 4: of commentary.
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Speaker 2: I'm telling it.
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Speaker 4: We can talk about it later, but there's lots of
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Speaker 4: commentary in the media about this and the government's forecasting
14:15
Speaker 4: more for years to come. For our community, who is
14:19
Speaker 4: sitting there trying to budget for their own lives, that
14:22
Speaker 4: honestly sounds quite scary like billions. What do you mean
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Speaker 4: even a million is out of reach? Can you explain
14:29
Speaker 4: why a deficit in government spending might actually be okay? Yeah, so,
14:35
Speaker 4: I mean this is part of my job to try
14:37
Speaker 4: and explain this. And there's a lot of you know,
14:39
Speaker 4: obviously this is a contested political environment, so there's a
14:42
Speaker 4: lot of oh my god, there's deficits and the rest
14:45
Speaker 4: of it. It's important to use the budget to support
14:48
Speaker 4: the economy at different times, and so particularly coming through COVID,
14:52
Speaker 4: the former government really lean in and borrowed a lot
14:57
Speaker 4: of money to try and get people through through job
15:00
Speaker 4: Keeper and other big payments like that. And what that
15:03
Speaker 4: did to the budget was it forced the budget into
15:05
Speaker 4: a pretty significant deficit. And it's important that you do
15:08
Speaker 4: that because we actually avoided a recession. People maintain their jobs,
15:12
Speaker 4: people were supported with social security payments. The media doesn't
15:16
Speaker 4: like that part though, No, they don't know, they don't
15:18
Speaker 4: like mind.
15:18
Speaker 2: It's not as exciting to talk about, that's right. But
15:21
Speaker 2: if you didn't do it.
15:22
Speaker 4: Yeah, we would be in trouble because that government made
15:25
Speaker 4: us go into a recession. Yes, so you're not going
15:28
Speaker 4: to win here. I'm so sorry to.
15:29
Speaker 5: It, you know, well, I feel like part of my
15:32
Speaker 5: job is to tell a broader story, to say the
15:34
Speaker 5: budget needs to lean in when government investment is needed,
15:38
Speaker 5: and then as you get through an economic shock, the
15:41
Speaker 5: private sector returns, usually because they withdraw during economic shocks.
15:45
Speaker 5: They return and they take over their rightful place in
15:48
Speaker 5: the economy. And the government can withdraw and not entirely
15:52
Speaker 5: because we pay, you know, all those payments to families
15:55
Speaker 5: and childcare subsidies and all our investments in other areas
15:59
Speaker 5: as well, but it means you don't have to lean
16:01
Speaker 5: in as heavily and you can take a step back,
16:03
Speaker 5: and then you can repair the budget, which is what
16:05
Speaker 5: we've been doing over this term where we've got more
16:09
Speaker 5: revenue coming in than expected, we pay down debt, we
16:12
Speaker 5: lower the deficits, and that's what we've been doing. But
16:15
Speaker 5: you can't just flick the switch off, because if you
16:17
Speaker 5: tried to get into surplus immediately, and we have delivered
16:22
Speaker 5: two surpluses because we got more revenue and employment remained
16:26
Speaker 5: really strong, so we were able to deliver those, but
16:30
Speaker 5: going forward it would mean some pretty significant cuts that
16:33
Speaker 5: people would really feel right now. And so it's sort
16:37
Speaker 5: of my calm, methodical approach. We repair the budget over
16:40
Speaker 5: time and you bring the budget back into balance, and
16:43
Speaker 5: that's completely appropriate and really part of pretty standard economic theory. Yeah,
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Speaker 5: I was explaining it in more I guess relatable terms
16:52
Speaker 5: to someone.
16:53
Speaker 2: Is that not the other day?
16:53
Speaker 4: No, it totally was relatable, But I was trying to like, go,
16:56
Speaker 4: we've got good debt and we've got bad debt, and
16:58
Speaker 4: sometimes we have to take on some bad debt to
17:01
Speaker 4: actually project ourselves forward, Like sometimes we have to take
17:05
Speaker 4: a step back and get a mortgage because we don't
17:07
Speaker 4: have the amount to purchase in full.
17:10
Speaker 2: Nobody does.
17:11
Speaker 4: But sometimes we need funding and the deficit is kind
17:14
Speaker 4: of like, all right, well we can't afford house, but
17:16
Speaker 4: we really need this and we're going through this process.
17:19
Speaker 4: And I think that just understanding that a deficit doesn't
17:22
Speaker 4: mean that you're going to be in deficit forever. No,
17:24
Speaker 4: there's strategy, there's planning. I think it makes me feel
17:28
Speaker 4: a lot lighter about it. I go, oh, okay, so
17:30
Speaker 4: we're not absolutely burying the economy. It's actually strategic and
17:34
Speaker 4: there was a reason for this.
17:36
Speaker 5: That's right, And you can't just spend irresponsibly and go
17:39
Speaker 5: who cares.
17:40
Speaker 2: You know who cares about the bottom line? We do,
17:42
Speaker 2: We totally do.
17:43
Speaker 5: But you've got to be kind of practical about the
17:46
Speaker 5: expectations of what you're going to fund and how you
17:49
Speaker 5: fund it. And the other thing I'd say is you've
17:51
Speaker 5: got to look at the Commonwealth has a lot of
17:53
Speaker 5: assets as well, like we've got a very good balance
17:55
Speaker 5: sheet from which to borrow against and debt for us
17:59
Speaker 5: is come a pretty low interest rates and things like that,
18:03
Speaker 5: and we can deliver other outcomes by borrowing to invest
18:06
Speaker 5: in things. And that's your good dip bad tinker on
18:09
Speaker 5: the same page about that, I do like the concept
18:12
Speaker 5: of investing. I've heard that Katie.
18:14
Speaker 4: We're going to go to a really quick break, but
18:16
Speaker 4: guys stick around because when we come back, we're going
18:18
Speaker 4: to get into the stuff that hits a.
18:20
Speaker 2: Little bit closer to home.
18:22
Speaker 4: Tax cuts, we're going to touch on grocery bills, energy rebates,
18:25
Speaker 4: and whether this budget actually is going to give you
18:28
Speaker 4: any breathing room. Don't go anywhere, Welcome back. We're here
18:35
Speaker 4: at Parliament House with Senator Katie Gallagher, the Minister for
18:39
Speaker 4: Finance and the Minister for Women, and we're going to
18:41
Speaker 4: dive into a few things parts of the budget that
18:43
Speaker 4: the community really want to understand. But Katie, in the
18:46
Speaker 4: middle of the break, you were like, I want to
18:48
Speaker 4: talk a little bit more about women's health.
18:49
Speaker 2: I'm really passionate about it. Let's do that.
18:52
Speaker 4: I mean you were touching on it before. I feel
18:54
Speaker 4: like we moved off it. Talk to me a little
18:57
Speaker 4: bit more about women's health and why it is so important. Yeah, well,
19:00
Speaker 4: this is a really big part of this budget. So
19:02
Speaker 4: each budget we've been trying to work through priorities for women,
19:06
Speaker 4: so women's wages, women in work, early education, and care,
19:11
Speaker 4: age care, all those kind of areas, and we keep
19:14
Speaker 4: doing that. But Jed Karney, who's the one of the
19:17
Speaker 4: Assistant Ministers for Health, has done this huge piece of
19:20
Speaker 4: work looking at how the health system works for women
19:23
Speaker 4: or doesn't work for women, and she found through her
19:26
Speaker 4: work some really you know, amazing things like the no
19:31
Speaker 4: oral contraceptive pill had been listed on the PBS for
19:34
Speaker 4: the last three decades, none of the new menopause treatments
19:38
Speaker 4: had been listed on PBS, and women were paying out
19:41
Speaker 4: a pocket because you know, many of those treatments are
19:43
Speaker 4: better for you, have less side effects. It makes sense yeah,
19:47
Speaker 4: and so like this is part of having women involved
19:51
Speaker 4: in politics. When you have enough women involved in politics,
19:54
Speaker 4: things like contraception, menopause, endometriosis, pelvic pain, IVF all those
20:01
Speaker 4: things start being considered as priorities. And this budget deals
20:06
Speaker 4: with all of those in a pretty comprehensive way. Lists
20:09
Speaker 4: all the new some of the new medications like Slender
20:12
Speaker 4: for the oral contraceptive pill, and a lot of new
20:14
Speaker 4: menopause treatment for women of my age going through that,
20:18
Speaker 4: and also training up and helping healthcare professionals actually treat women,
20:23
Speaker 4: you know, making sure the NBS allows doctors to insert
20:27
Speaker 4: IUDs without women paying those huge out.
20:31
Speaker 2: Of pocket costs. It's wild.
20:33
Speaker 5: All of that it's in this budget, and it's a
20:35
Speaker 5: big investment, almost eight hundred million dollars it costs. But
20:39
Speaker 5: the health system, because you know there hasn't been a
20:42
Speaker 5: lot of women in politics, has gone under recognized for
20:46
Speaker 5: too long, and you know, this budget fixes that and
20:48
Speaker 5: so hopefully women will be saving hundreds of dollars.
20:51
Speaker 4: Now, I have a question that's sidelining that it's on
20:54
Speaker 4: the same track. And you've probably heard this from a
20:58
Speaker 4: plethora of women before, but so many women go to
21:02
Speaker 4: the doctor and then have their pain or their symptoms dismissed.
21:05
Speaker 4: They go and obviously it is so fantastic to have
21:08
Speaker 4: more funding, but you know, is funding enough to get
21:13
Speaker 4: doctors and healthcare providers to start taking women's issues seriously? Yeah,
21:18
Speaker 4: that's I mean, that's a different size, right, Yeah, And
21:20
Speaker 4: it's so many of us that have gone shocks have
21:22
Speaker 4: been patted on the head and told well, yeah, no
21:27
Speaker 4: neurofen and lie down, you'll be fine.
21:30
Speaker 2: So this, yes, it does. It has a component here.
21:32
Speaker 5: One of the elements which Jed started and we're building
21:36
Speaker 5: on it is these indo and pelvic pain clinics which
21:39
Speaker 5: are actually staffed by specialist gps who are aware. You know,
21:45
Speaker 5: I visited one, I think in Melbourne and it was
21:49
Speaker 5: amazing just talking to the doctors, talking the women who
21:52
Speaker 5: use the service, the kind of care that they are getting,
21:55
Speaker 5: the recognition that their pain is not in their head,
21:59
Speaker 5: and also that they're something that you can do about it.
22:01
Speaker 5: Even changing your diet can help people who.
22:04
Speaker 4: Don't know if you haven't got access to those doctors exactly. So,
22:09
Speaker 4: you know, simple changes that can be made for more
22:11
Speaker 4: complex people. You know, you might be a referral to
22:14
Speaker 4: a specialist whatever. So we're opening some more of those
22:17
Speaker 4: and I just think they'll become a feature of the
22:20
Speaker 4: health landscape.
22:21
Speaker 2: As it should.
22:22
Speaker 4: And like you're the Minister for Women, I don't have
22:23
Speaker 4: to convince you, but I'm just in the background cheering
22:26
Speaker 4: you on, being like, yes, Queen, that is exactly what
22:29
Speaker 4: we want to see. I'm going to pivot because I
22:31
Speaker 4: know that they don't have a heap of time left
22:33
Speaker 4: with you. In the Treasurer's speech, he mentioned that we
22:37
Speaker 4: are going to be putting some more accountability onto supermarkets
22:40
Speaker 4: when it comes to the cost of living and the
22:42
Speaker 4: cost of groceries, which I know is going to appeal
22:45
Speaker 4: to my community because I think that's where most of
22:47
Speaker 4: us are starting to tap our cards and feel the pain.
22:50
Speaker 2: Right, So that sounds.
22:52
Speaker 4: Great, but how does that actually translate to dollars at
22:57
Speaker 4: the checkout? When are people going to start to feel
22:59
Speaker 4: the impacts of this budget and the conversations that are
23:02
Speaker 4: being had at the checkout?
23:04
Speaker 2: Yeah?
23:05
Speaker 5: No, I completely understand that. I do the shopping in
23:07
Speaker 5: my household too, and sometimes you just go what when
23:10
Speaker 5: you look at a price of something in the supermarket. So,
23:13
Speaker 5: particularly over the last couple of years I reckon. So
23:17
Speaker 5: a couple of things there. The HBLEC has done a
23:19
Speaker 5: piece of work. It's found that we've got a highly
23:21
Speaker 5: concentrated grocery market, so we have the two big players.
23:25
Speaker 5: We'd like more competition, so there's some effort going in there.
23:28
Speaker 5: We've got Aldi and they made a difference when it
23:30
Speaker 5: came in, but we need to make the system more
23:33
Speaker 5: competitive so that there's other players that feel like that
23:36
Speaker 5: they can compete. So part of it's making sure that
23:39
Speaker 5: system's right. We've also got this and I know it
23:41
Speaker 5: sounds probably doesn't sound real for people when they're going
23:44
Speaker 5: around with their trolleys and looking at the prices, but
23:47
Speaker 5: there's a mandatory code of conduct being put in place,
23:50
Speaker 5: a mandatory food and grocery code which actually sets out
23:55
Speaker 5: some pretty clear rules about how supermarkets are to behave.
24:01
Speaker 5: We're also attaching multimillion dollar penalties to that. Now there's
24:05
Speaker 5: been a voluntary code, but many people who work in
24:07
Speaker 5: this space or say voluntary codes never do anything. So
24:11
Speaker 5: we've made it mandatory law and we've significantly increased the penalty,
24:15
Speaker 5: so it actually if they breach that code not going
24:18
Speaker 5: to be a work. Yeah, it's not going to commercially
24:21
Speaker 5: work that, and it kind of assists with, you know,
24:23
Speaker 5: some of the complaints we've had from farmers who feel
24:26
Speaker 5: like that they can't raise a complaint if they're being
24:28
Speaker 5: treated badly by one of the supermarkets. They can now
24:32
Speaker 5: make an anonymous complaint to the A Triple C and
24:34
Speaker 5: have that investigated so they don't have to fear retaliation.
24:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, we've all it's really important.
24:39
Speaker 5: Yeah, massively important, because yeah, it's all about power, and
24:43
Speaker 5: when you've got a concentrated market, we know where the
24:46
Speaker 5: power sits. The other thing I'd say, and it's good
24:49
Speaker 5: if people take a look at it. We've funded Choice
24:52
Speaker 5: to basically do a series of you know, shopping basket
24:56
Speaker 5: assessments and publish that. So where is the cheapest basket
25:00
Speaker 5: of goods and who's offering it? And they publish that
25:03
Speaker 5: now and it's free for everybody. And I think, you know, again,
25:07
Speaker 5: it might not change things overnight, but I think that
25:10
Speaker 5: transparency and accountability and consumers have a lot of power
25:13
Speaker 5: here too to kind of take the time if they can,
25:17
Speaker 5: to work out where they shop and what they shop for.
25:20
Speaker 5: And you know, there'll be more to say on this.
25:22
Speaker 5: I think because it's not a finished piece of work totally.
25:25
Speaker 4: My last question, because I am very aware that we
25:28
Speaker 4: are time limited. Labour's said that this budget is about
25:31
Speaker 4: responsible spending, and I feel like we're all being very responsible,
25:35
Speaker 4: like we are pinching our pennies, which makes total sense
25:39
Speaker 4: in an inflation environment.
25:41
Speaker 2: But for someone in my community who might be.
25:43
Speaker 4: Skipping meals or spending sixty percent of their income on
25:47
Speaker 4: their rent, I feel like sometimes that doesn't feel like
25:50
Speaker 4: it's enough. How do you define responsibility in that context
25:55
Speaker 4: and how do you balance what the economy needs versus
25:58
Speaker 4: what the people needs? And I guess that it's very
26:00
Speaker 4: nicely back around to what we were saying before, where
26:02
Speaker 4: you know, sometimes we can't just put money in your
26:04
Speaker 4: pocket because it would grow the economy and that is
26:07
Speaker 4: literally the exact opposite of what we want to.
26:09
Speaker 2: Occur right now. Yeah, no, exactly.
26:12
Speaker 5: So I think budgets are often seen in isolation, so
26:16
Speaker 5: they think, oh, that it's only the new things that
26:18
Speaker 5: are funded in this budget, where they actually, you know,
26:21
Speaker 5: have money running through the year on year from what
26:24
Speaker 5: we did last year to you know, what will happen
26:26
Speaker 5: next year. So firstly, I'd say we've tried to look
26:30
Speaker 5: at all of the ways that we can help people,
26:32
Speaker 5: particularly on low and fixed incomes. You know, for example,
26:36
Speaker 5: with renters who have been feeling the pinch. You know,
26:39
Speaker 5: part of the issue is the supply of housing, so
26:41
Speaker 5: we need to build more houses now that you know,
26:44
Speaker 5: for a person right now, they'll say, oh, well, that's
26:46
Speaker 5: not going to help me right now. So then it's
26:48
Speaker 5: things like rent assistance and increasing rent assistance, which we've
26:52
Speaker 5: done in two budgets, So we're trying to come at
26:55
Speaker 5: it each way, but without adding to inflation, and that
26:58
Speaker 5: has been tricky. The government is a big player in
27:00
Speaker 5: the economy. If the government pours a whole lot of
27:03
Speaker 5: money into an economy at a time when inflation is high,
27:07
Speaker 5: that hurts everyone, but it most hurts though. I was
27:10
Speaker 5: on low and fixed incomes who don't have a lot
27:12
Speaker 5: of discretionary use of their money. They spend almost all
27:16
Speaker 5: of their money just to keep up with living costs. Basically,
27:21
Speaker 5: a budget is really about striking that balance and also
27:24
Speaker 5: accepting that this is a point in time. In a
27:28
Speaker 5: normal year, we finish the budget and we pretty much
27:31
Speaker 5: go into what's called the mid year Economic and Fiscal
27:34
Speaker 5: update or commonly known as my EFO. If you hear
27:36
Speaker 5: that word like, we usually start my EFO maybe three
27:40
Speaker 5: weeks after we finished the budget, so it's a continuous process.
27:44
Speaker 5: It never finishes and so there's always room for new ideas.
27:47
Speaker 4: I love that, Katie. Thank you so much for your time.
27:50
Speaker 4: This has been an absolute privilege and getting to sit
27:54
Speaker 4: down with you, especially after budget night.
27:56
Speaker 2: I am very.
27:57
Speaker 4: Grateful because I am absolutely certain that your inbox is
27:59
Speaker 4: on fire. I haven't even looked at it may don't
28:03
Speaker 4: very right, but thank you for having me on. It's
28:05
Speaker 4: so great to be able to try and explain what
28:08
Speaker 4: we're doing, what we're up to.
28:09
Speaker 2: You are so welcome anytime let me know.
28:12
Speaker 4: And that's a wrap on our special budget episode recorded
28:16
Speaker 4: right here in Parliament House. A massive thank you to
28:19
Speaker 4: Senator Katie Gallagher for sitting down with us, especially after
28:23
Speaker 4: budget night when I am absolutely certain that her inbox
28:26
Speaker 4: is on fire. So if you're walking away from this
28:29
Speaker 4: episode feeling a little bit clearer, a little bit more empowered,
28:33
Speaker 4: or even just like someone finally explained what a structural
28:36
Speaker 4: death as it actually is.
28:37
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