Mal Brough (Longman, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Today we saw the Treasurer tear apart yet another ill-thought-out, ill-prepared and unfortunately dishonest Labor Party proposal, which they put on television last night. Yet again we saw the Leader of the Opposition in a can-do moment, sitting in someone’s kitchen lamenting the cost of a rental house; there he was, empathising. He is a great empathiser. He has empathised about fuel costs, he has empathised about food costs and he has now empathised about rental costs. But what has he actually done for the lady on television last night? What has he done for the pensioners? What has he done as the Leader of the Opposition, in the form of policy, that would help that lady? He actually misled that woman in her very own kitchen. Talk about the used-car salesman or the door-to-door salesman—be careful who knocks on your door! The Leader of the Opposition and the member for Lilley—the fellow who would be Treasurer—knock on your door, slick back their hair and say, ‘I’ve got a deal for you: I’m going to make you $50 or $60 a week better off.’ That woman was sitting there thinking, ‘If I vote Labor I’m going to get another $50 or $60.’ When they left, the poor woman found that there was not one iota of truth in that. It was shown today to be what it was—a fraud, a con, nothing more than a set-up for a television picture, in the hope that, on the television news, they would get the equivalent of free advertising, where people would get the perception but not the reality of something positive being done by the opposition.

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