Friends, in just six days’ time we can choose a better future.
 
A better future for Australia.
 
A better future for the great state of Queensland.
 
You can choose a government that wants to work with Queensland, not against Queensland.
 
You can choose a Prime Minister who visits Queensland even when there’s no election on…
 
…who Queenslanders can rely upon when the going gets tough…
 
…and who doesn’t bag Queenslanders as “cave dwellers” when your Premier does the right thing to protect the health and safety of her state.

Thank you, Annastacia, for everything you’ve done to keep Queensland strong.
 
I will always back Queensland…Well, I’ll back Queensland 365 days a year and 362 nights.
 
Friends,
 
Today I want to talk to you about what a better future will look like if we elect a Labor Government on next Saturday.
 
Just a couple of days ago Scott Morrison said he was a “bulldozer”. I kid you not.
 
His words.
 
A bulldozer wrecks things.
 
A bulldozer tears things down.
 
But I’m a builder. That’s just who I am.
 
Who I’ve always been.
 
Whether it’s building roads or building relationships…
 
…building rail links or building connections…
 
…building a better future has always been my goal, and it’s what this campaign is all about.
 
Building a better future where we address the skyrocketing cost of living and get people’s wages growing again.
 
A future with cheaper child care, to boost women’s economic participation.
 
A future where we strengthen Medicare, where it’s easier to see a doctor and medicines are cheaper.
 
A future where we put the care back into aged care.
 
A future where we seize the opportunity that comes with tackling climate change…
 
…and where we use cheap, renewable energy to power new industries and advanced manufacturing, and create good jobs.
 
Where we then train more Australians for those jobs by making investments in fee-free TAFE and university places.
 
A future where we build things here in our own country and stand on our own two feet – just as the great train-builders in Maryborough have shown we can do.
 
A future where we have a real plan to mitigate the ever-intensifying natural disasters.
 
This weekend, I know a lot of people are nervously keeping an eye on the Brisbane River.
 
It feels almost unbelievable that we could be doing this again, just a matter of weeks after the last time.
 
People watching in apprehension. People trying to cope. People who haven’t even recovered from last time bracing for another round.
 
Yet the Morrison Government treats the Emergency Response Fund as a term deposit, pocketing the interest, and failing to build a single disaster mitigation project in three years.
 
It sounds dystopian, but it’s true.
 
As if that isn’t bad enough, they then decide where the relief goes according to how people vote.
 
This just has to stop.
 
We can do better. And we will do better.
 
If I have the honour of serving as Prime Minister, the plans I’ve just talked about will help build a better future…
 
…not just for the next couple of years but for the next generation as well.
 
When you vote for a Labor candidate, you’re voting to make life better — for yourself, your children, your community, your state of Queensland, and your nation.
 
Because when you elect a Labor member to Parliament, you’re also getting a team.

Sometimes – just sometimes – I do feel a little sorry for Scott Morrison, because who’s he got on his team?
 
Peter Dutton. Alan Tudge. Barnaby Joyce.
 
And then I look at the extraordinary people who will form the next government with me.
 
People like Queensland’s Jim Chalmers, who we all hope will soon be Australia’s Treasurer.
 
I lead a team with the experience, the intellect, the compassion and the ambition to shape Australia’s future.
 
Just as it has always been, our priority will be to use the power of government to change the lives of Australians for the better.

Because we are driven by two very straightforward principles.
 
No-one left behind.

No-one held back.
 

BETTER HEALTHCARE

Those have always been our driving principles.
 
We are the party that built Medicare in the face of fierce opposition from the Liberals.
 
Protecting universal healthcare has been one of the fundamental divides in Australian politics.
 
Strengthening Medicare will be a key focus of an incoming Labor government.
 
Yesterday I announced Labor’s Strengthening Medicare Fund and Taskforce, a major investment in universal healthcare.
 
People all across the country have told me during this campaign that it’s becoming harder to see a doctor.
 
GP clinics need more support to do the important work they do.
 
They stepped up during the pandemic, keeping people healthy and strong, which kept our economy running.
 
Our Strengthening Medicare Fund will support and strengthen GP practices, improve primary care, provide better after-hours access, and make sure that people with complex, chronic conditions can access the care they need. 
 
Our Strengthening Medicare GP grants support and strengthen GP practices, through investments that will help them upgrade their medical practices and expand access.

We will roll out 50 GP-led Medicare Urgent Care Clinics across the country – including one just down the road near the Mater in South Brisbane, one in Chermside and another in Redcliffe.

These clinics will be open longer hours, seven days a week. 

They’ll provide a whole range of medical services that you never know when you are going to need - whether it’s for a broken bone or an ear infection. 
 
Importantly, these services will be bulk billed. And that will make a difference.
 
When you walk in, you won’t need your wallet – just your Medicare card. 
 
We will make medicines cheaper for Australians.

We will reduce the cost of medication on the PBS by $12.50, making it cheaper for general patients.

Under Labor, the maximum price for PBS medicines will be $30.
 
The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme is another great Australian achievement established by the Labor Party. We will always protect it.
 
These are precisely the kinds of policies that can make a real difference — the kind I think about when I say no one held back, and no one left behind.
 

BETTER ON HOUSING

Just as we know Australians need us to strengthen Medicare, we know Australians need real solutions on affordable housing.
 
Our Housing Australia Future Fund will build 20,000 new social housing units and 10,000 affordable homes in the next five years — as well as new housing for homeless veterans.

We will provide $100 million for crisis and transitional housing for women and children at risk of violence.
 
And if the Australian people give me the privilege of leading our great nation, we will create a new Help to Buy program.
 
This national shared equity scheme will provide an equity contribution from the Commonwealth Government for up to 10,000 aspiring homeowners on low and middle incomes, every year.

Help to Buy will assist Australians to buy a home with a smaller deposit, a smaller mortgage, and smaller mortgage repayments.

Help to Buy is exactly what I mean when I talk, as I do often, about an economy that works for people, not people just working for an economy.

Scott Morrison’s advice to Australians struggling to make the rent is to go buy a house.
 
That isn’t just out of touch. That’s completely separated from reality.
 

BETTER ON JOBS 

Back here in the real world, we know the best way to get the economy working for our people is to create good, secure jobs.
 
Australia needs a plan to create an economy where we have high wage jobs and we have economic growth without increasing inflation.
 
We need to help families with rising costs, and make sure their incomes are going up.
 
That’s exactly what Labor will do, because our economic plans focus on increasing productivity.
 
That’s what our plan for infrastructure is all about.
 
Better infrastructure makes our economy more efficient – moving goods, people and information more effectively.

Today I announce that a Labor Government will partner with the Palaszczuk Government to deliver $733 million to upgrade the Bruce Highway between Anzac Ave and Uhlmann Road.
 
A Labor Government will also embrace the jobs-generating powerhouse that is renewable energy.
 
Renewable energy is cheap and abundant in Australia.

We can be a renewable energy superpower.
 
Labor’s Powering Australia plan will harness our renewables and turn them into jobs and new industries.

Powering Australia will create 604,000 new jobs by 2030, five out of every six of those new jobs will be in the regions.

It will deliver cheaper power to homes and businesses alike.
 
Jobs up.
 
Profits up.
 
Cost of living down.

Bring people together – businesses, farmers, unions and workers – to find common ground and advance our common interests.
 
That’s what good policy looks like.

A couple of days ago I was up in Gladstone announcing that a Labor Government will partner with the Palaszczuk Government to kickstart battery manufacturing here.
 
Resource exports will always be critical to Queensland’s economy.
 
But we can and should be adding value here too.
 
Australian-made batteries should power your house, your business, your school, and eventually maybe even your car. 
 
We can shore up our electricity grid with safe, reliable and sustainable energy that’s Australian from top to bottom – and then we can sell those batteries to the world.
 
We can make Australia a world leader in a future industry that will create good jobs for generations. 
 
In that spirit, today I announce that Labor will invest $1 billion in advanced manufacturing, create skilled, well-paid jobs and build a future made in Australia.
 
The dedicated Advanced Manufacturing Fund will be part of Labor’s National Reconstruction Fund, which aims to ensure that Australia will again become a country that makes things.
 
We will rebuild our industrial base creating new capabilities and opportunities to innovate in transport, defence, resources, agricultural and food processing, medical science, renewables and low emission technologies.

This is the sort of vision that we can seize, right now. 

This Government had 22 energy policies, but they still haven't landed one of them.

Along the way, we were treated to the spectacle of Scott Morrison going to Glasgow, where he proceeded to give an empty speech to an empty room.

What does it take to give some of the numpties in this Government a wakeup call to tell them climate change is right here, right now?
 
The problem is they can’t wake up. They can’t even budge, because they are lumbered with the lead weight that is Barnaby Joyce.

Let’s talk about Barnaby for a moment.
 
They tried him out as Deputy Prime Minister once, saw what that was like, and got rid of him.
 
And then they decided to try him again.
 
Talk about the sequel nobody asked for.

Labor has a plan.

Reducing emissions. Tackling climate change. Creating new jobs.
 
We will end the climate wars.
 

YOUNG AUSTRALIANS

Young Australians know perhaps better than any of us that we must get serious about acting on climate change.
 
We have a responsibility to them, and a duty to put the next generation in the best possible position to keep taking our nation from strength to strength.
 
We have to ensure that young Australians can get into TAFE and university and acquire the skills they need for the secure, well-paid jobs…
 
…which is why Labor has plans for 465,000 fee-free TAFE places and extra university places.
 
There are few things more critical than getting young Australians engaged with our democracy.
 
Labor will introduce a new youth engagement model to provide younger Australians with a voice and an avenue to directly engage with government.
 
We will establish an Office for Youth, so there is a dedicated unit in Government to make sure we are working with younger Australians.
 
And we have committed to a Minister for Youth.
 
All of these actions are designed to ensure that a Labor government is inclusive, and brings people together.
 
That’s how we’ll build a better future.
 

CHANGE

Friends, Scott Morrison has said Australians know him.
 
He’s not wrong about that.
 
I reckon people know all about Scott Morrison.
 
They’ve worked him out.
 
They know he never steps up, never takes responsibility.

He will always go missing when the going gets tough.
 
Scott Morrison used to say that it’s better the devil you know.
 
Now this week even Scott Morrison is distancing himself from Scott Morrison.

He said that if you vote for him, instead of getting another three years of the same, he’ll change.
 
He said he was bulldozer, and when it was pointed out that a bulldozer wrecks things…
 
…Today he has likened himself to a car.
 
If this Government is a car, it’s blowing smoke, it’s low on fuel and the wheels are falling off.
 
I’ll tell you what Australians know.
 
They know Scott Morrison failed on bushfires and they know he failed on floods.

They know he didn’t order enough vaccines and then didn’t order enough rapid antigen tests.
 
They know that the only time frame he thinks about – for anything including himself – is the 24-hour news cycle.
 
He will say anything and do anything to get through.

And they know the cost of living is rising – now.
 
They know climate change is here – now.
 
They know jobs and skills and infrastructure that will grow our economy are needed – now.
 
They know there is a crisis in aged care, right now.
 
In a rare moment of honesty, Scott Morrison recently said he didn’t want to leave a legacy.
 
But that is his legacy.
 
The truth is he won’t change. Because he can’t change.
 
The only way you can get real change is to change the government.

If you want a National Anti-Corruption Commission, vote for change.
 
If you want to end to the waste and the rorts, vote for change.
 
If you want a Prime Minister who thinks our lowest paid workers deserve an extra dollar an hour in their pay, vote for change.
 
If you want First Nations people recognised in our constitution, vote for change.
 
If you want to get serious on climate change, vote for change.
 
If you want equality for women, vote for change.
 
If you want in cheaper child care, vote for change.
 
If you want to strengthen Medicare, vote for change.
 
If you want to fix the crisis in aged care, vote for change.
 
If you believe in hope and unity over fear and division, vote for change.
 
Friends, this Saturday we can be the change Australia needs.
 
We can’t afford three more years of more of the same.
 
Three more years of a Prime Minister who looks at the problems facing us and says, “That’s not my job”.

Well, I want the job. And I want to do that job.
 
Our best days are ahead of us. And Labor knows how to get Australia there.

We know how to get Queensland there.
 
With a Labor Government that holds no-one back – and leaves no-one behind.
  
A better government that will deliver a better future.
 
Thank you.