Bill Shorten capped off Tuesday’s visit to Nowra – the first by an Opposition Leader for many years – with a town hall style meeting at the Shoalhaven Entertainment Centre.
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Flanked by Gilmore candidate Fiona Phillips and Throsby MP and candidate for the new seat of Whitlam, Stephen Jones, Mr Shorten strode into the packed venue to rapturous applause from the party faithful.
“I choose to be in Nowra tonight because we can win Gilmore with Fiona Phillips,” he told the crowd.
Choices was the theme of his opening speech before he invited the crowd to ask questions.
“You can choose to save Medicare and you can choose to undermine Medicare. You can choose to properly fund our hospitals or you can choose to give a $50 billion tax cut to the largest companies in Australia.
“Education, healthcare – that’s what Labor chooses.”
He said Labor presented a choice on the NBN, “second-rate technology” offered by the Coalition or “first-class technology” offered by Labor.
Mr Shorten also pointed to differences in climate policy, saying Labor had clear targets and had put renewable energy at the centre of what it plans to do.
“Or you can choose the Liberal Party policy of climate change, which was written by Tony Abbott,” he said.
He told the crowd Labor would act on marriage equality within 100 days of coming to office, rather than take the divided path of a “non-binding opinion poll”.
Labor would also act to increase the number of apprentices and crack down on 457 visas which, he said, were being rorted by criminals “under the noses of the government”.
Mr Shorten then turned to the Brexit vote, which the Coalition capitalised on by saying at times of uncertainty it was important to have stable government.
“You cannot be a stable government when you have a weak conservative leader unable to lead his party in the direction he wants,” he said.
“That’s exactly what went wrong in the UK.”
Mr Shorten took a number of questions from the floor, ranging from queries about incentives for businesses to take on extra apprentices, to the NBN and Indigenous disadvantage.
Most were friendly but one challenged Labor’s position on the Safe Schools program, designed to stop bullying of LGBTI students at schools, asking why “more sensible” anti-bullying initiatives weren’t favoured.
Mr Shorten said Labor did not believe the Safe Schools program should be compulsory but should be at the discretion of individual school councils.
Subcontractor Mark Nelson asked Mr Shorten what Labor proposed to do, to prevent the situation in which he found himself millions of dollars out of pocket, after a lead contractor of works at HMAS Albatross went into liquidation.
The Opposition Leader said Labor proposed a tradies’ payment guarantee and a rapid repayment system that ensured contractors and subbies were paid for work performed on behalf of the government.