Peter Costello (Higgins, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

The member for Swan interjects—one of the voices of Brian Burke in this parliament. One wonders whether he has had a phone call telling him when to interject and when not to.

The Leader of the Opposition then moved on to South Australia, where he promised money for a desalination plant for BHP in the Spencer Gulf, and he is moving back to Queensland at the end of this week to promise the Queensland government money for sequestration in relation to the Stanwell power project. All of this would be serious, and if he had actually done some work on any of these projects he could tell you how much water they use, he could tell you how much these projects would save and he could give you some estimate, dollar per litre, of why this may actually be in the national interest. But when he was asked in South Australia how the project for desalination was going to work, he had no idea of the water BHP was using and no idea of how much it would save. He said: ‘It’s 160 from us and 160 from the state.’ Matt Abraham asked him:

How much from BHP?

Mr Rudd answered:

BHP’s investment is already substantial.

Matt Abraham asked:

In the desalination project, how much are they putting in?

Mr Rudd answered:

In terms of the precise investments, in terms of their individual use, those figures I don’t have to hand.

He did not have to hand how much water they were using, how much he was going to save or how much they were going to invest. The only thing he had to hand was that he had 160—as he calls it; this Leader of the Opposition is used to big sums—for the state of South Australia.

Let me remind the House of one of the cardinal, iron laws of Australian politics: never stand between a pot of money and a state Premier. You will be run down on every occasion. And if you open up the federal Treasury to the state premiers, you will be killed in a stampede. State premiers would make the running of the bulls look like a cat race. They would run right over you. The state premiers see this bloke coming. What they want is somebody who could open the federal Treasury, lie down and make himself a doormat. What better person to do that than an ex state public servant—somebody who is used to taking his orders from a state Premier? You can see why the state premiers of Australia, gearing up like the bulls for their run in Pamplona, are licking their lips. This will be no bullfighter; this will be a doormat opening the federal Treasury to a rapacious group of people against Australia’s national interest.

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