Mr GREG WARREN (Campbelltown) (15:48): I am delighted to contribute to the take-note debate on budget estimates and related papers for 2024-25. At the outset, I acknowledge the efforts of Treasurer Daniel Mookhey, the Hon. Courtney Houssos and all the other parties that were involved. I also acknowledge all the Cabinet Ministers, including the Premier and the Deputy Premier, and their efforts to bring a budget together during challenging circumstances. The budget contains the priority agenda items of the Government and the most important priority of budget repair. As we know, the New South Wales budget, like every other budget around the world, was heavily affected by COVID. But it is comforting to know that the Government is giving budget repair the priority that it needs and deserves so that we can fund and implement the priority agenda items that we need into the future.

During the course of my contribution, I will speak at a micro and a macro level. I will refer to my own electorate. But, more broadly and in my capacity as the Parliamentary Secretary for Western Sydney, I will outline some of the priority agenda items that are seeing funding at this time. Without any doubt, one of the highlights of the budget was the investment in social and affordable housing. In many conversations taking place around dinner tables—or at shopping centres, pubs and cafes—people are talking about affordability. If they own a home, they are talking about how they afford to pay for it. If they are trying to get a home, they are talking about what capacity they have to save for a deposit. Many other people, including me—and other members in this place—are thinking about how our children get into the market.

The enormous record investment in social and affordable housing will see new homes built in the areas we need them and will also see many homes fixed and repaired. Many houses have lay dilapidated for a very long time. One of the biggest social challenges in my electorate of Campbelltown has been providing for those communities that have been living for generations in what used to be the Housing Commission areas. Now, of course, social housing has been redeveloped in Airds, Claymore, Rosemeadow, Ambarvale and St Helens Park. All of those areas are beautiful communities, but they have had their challenges. The Government is not pretending otherwise. The Premier makes no apologies for that; we do have a lot more to do. But the budget found the balance between having those important steps of budget repair in place and also funding the commitments that we took to the election in 2023.

This is our second budget. We inherited the first one. We are now continuing the measures to repair the mistakes of the past. To be fair, not all of them were mistakes. There were many things that had budget implications that were totally out of the control of the former Government. I have no doubt that at that time it was doing its best to try to put measures in place. COVID, particularly, was a very unique circumstance that we have not ever seen in history. We cannot look past the inflation issue that we continue to grapple with, as does every other government in Australia, including the Federal Government.

Getting inflation under control means that we keep interest rates under control, which, of course, means we have an affordable market in which the consumer can spend. When you break that down further, it ultimately comes down to the spending capacity of the consumer: what they can and cannot afford. Right now, many people are struggling to afford just their groceries and rent—and that is if they can find a house to rent. That is an important and welcome measure. The feedback has been encouraging from my electorate and other areas in the State that I have visited. It is a good step, but it has also been brought to my attention—and we concede—that there is still much more to do.

I am very proud of the fact that there was also record funding in education. The overwhelming majority of casual teachers have been transferred to permanent positions, because the system was just bleeding staff. It still struggles to get staff. The education Minister and her team have been doing a lot of work to try to bring teachers back into the fold, including those who have retired. They have been looking at any and every measure to support having educators in schools teaching our kids so that they can have every opportunity to get the best education they can, which will be the foundation and platform that they will build their lives on in the future.

In terms of health funding, what a shocker of a flu season it has been, despite the efforts of the health Minister, Ryan Park, who has been working very hard. There have been major investments in our health system. But we on this side of the House know that it is people who cure people. Bricks and mortar are great, but at the end of the day we need to be fund a fair day's pay for a fair day's work for those people who work in our system. We cannot overlook the damage that we are now continuing to play catch‑up with. The wage cap was an abhorrent initiative and policy in a lot of ways. It was simply not fair. People deserve to be paid and remunerated their worth.

Members on the other side of the Chamber are very critical of the Government because of the wage rises. The reality is we are playing catch-up. People are leaving Sydney to go to the Hunter or the coast or the regions. That is great. I was born and raised in country New South Wales. It is a beautiful part of the world. But the reason they are going there is because they cannot afford to live in Sydney. People are going to other States. Over the time the wage cap was in place, paramedics, nurses and teachers were going to Queensland, South Australia, Victoria and even Tasmania, because they were being remunerated appropriately in those places for the professional contribution that they made in their chosen industry.

Whether you are a nurse, a teacher, a paramedic, a truck driver or a lawyer—no matter what you do—you deserve to be remunerated adequately. That just did not happen. It affected our frontline workers immensely, which is why they went to other States. They were getting paid adequately there. In relation to the health system, I again acknowledge Minister Ryan Park and his team, who work very hard. I am in constant contact with them and know the issues they confront every day. We also know how wonderful the staff are in our hospitals. I know the Minister is motivated by supporting those good people to do good things in our hospitals, but there are only so many of them.

I have a great relationship with my local health district and the general manager and all the workers at Campbelltown Hospital. One of them told me, "We're having patients that are appearing at the emergency ward at Campbelltown Hospital who have Influenza A, respiratory syncytial virus [RSV] and COVID that developed into pneumonia." It is just the whole kit and caboodle. I remember going to the children's ward at Easter time, which I like to do to see the kids and say g'day and take a few Easter eggs around for those who can have them. Nearly every child in the place had this respiratory virus, RSV. It has been absolutely devastating. It has really affected the seniors in our community. But, that said, our staff have stepped up to the plate. They are doing what they do best, which is caring for our patients. I want to publicly acknowledge and thank them.

I would also like to say how delighted I am about the investment in the environment, particularly in my own electorate, with $80 million for the Georges River koala national park. I thank the Hon. Penny Sharpe, who has been an enormous supporter of koala preservation. Koala preservation is very important and precious to us in Campbelltown because we have the only chlamydia-free koala colony, I think, left in Australia. A lot of that is because of the two rivers, the Nepean and the Georges. They do not drift outside that, and other koalas do not come inside the area where the koala colony is.

I do not have the specific data, but I am advised that the koala colony in Campbelltown has grown, despite the many ongoing challenges that exist with urban population growth and development. We are trying to find the balance between environmental preservation and habitat conservation while also building the homes that young people need now and into the future. It would be remiss of me to not commend the initiative of the police Minister, who is in the Chamber, to pay graduates and trainees down in Goulburn. I did not know that they did not get paid. I thought, "Struth, how does that happen?" We have seen a turnaround. I look forward to continuing the good news at another time in future.