Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I very much welcome this question from the Leader of the Opposition. Can I say to him: we would welcome bipartisanship on delivering the government’s budget in these uncertain global times. It seems to me remarkable that the Leader of the Opposition would call for bipartisanship on a day on which his Liberal Party has shown less economic responsibility than every independent member of the Senate and even the Greens. His Liberal Party have stood in the way of the condensate measure in the Senate. They voted against it. It has been delivered on the votes of the government, the Independents and the Greens. He was there ready to punch a $2.1 billion hole in the government’s surplus this morning. This morning in the Senate, as we prepared for question time, there was the Liberal Party punching a $2.1 billion hole in the government’s budget—less economic responsibility than Senator Fielding, less economic responsibility than Senator Xenophon and less economic responsibility than the Greens.

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