Craig Emerson (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Minister Assisting the Finance Minister on Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

that were put in place by the Rudd government when the Rudd government acted early and decisively. The Leader of the Opposition, on the financial stability measures that were announced, said on 12 October:

We welcome this measure, we support it and we will give the Prime Minister every assistance.

He said every assistance! Just 10 days later, he said:

But let me say this: the policy that was announced on the 12th of October was a failure …

Here we have him, 10 days before, saying, ‘We welcome the measure, we support it and we will give the Prime Minister every assistance,’ and then 10 days later saying it was a failure.

Then on 27 October—that is a day ending in ‘AY’, so that would be a different position again—the Leader of the Opposition said, ‘The unlimited bank deposit guarantee was a very big policy blunder.’ So he said, ‘We welcome the measure, we support the measure, we will give the Prime Minister every assistance,’ and shortly after that he described it as ‘a very big policy blunder’.

That is the problem here. The Leader of the Opposition is sacrificing the important national interest at a time when we need to stabilise the situation here in Australia and to instil confidence in our business community, including our small business community. The undermining that has been going on by the Leader of the Opposition has occurred every day. Most recently, talking about instability, the opposition has attacked the leaders of our most important financial institutions and regulatory authorities, our government institutions and regulatory authorities. They were cowardly attacks. They should be withdrawn. The Leader of the Opposition should repudiate the frontbench of his opposition, who, along with backbenchers, have systematically sought to undermine and pour scorn over the reputation of some of the most respectable, decent human beings and the job that they do on behalf of the Australian people. They have come into this chamber, gone to the doorstop interviews and taken every opportunity to destabilise our financial institutions by attacking personally the leaders of these institutions.

The member for Goldstein, a senior frontbencher, has said that he was not attacking the Secretary of the Treasury, Ken Henry. He was talking about manipulation but he did not think that Ken Henry would manipulate the economic forecasts. Well, it would take two to tango. It would take the Secretary of the Treasury to agree to some sort of manipulation. So this is a direct slur on the Secretary of the Treasury by the member for Goldstein, a senior frontbencher. The opposition leader had every chance today to repudiate him, to ask him to apologise or to get up and say, ‘We have full confidence in the Secretary of the Treasury and we have full confidence in the Governor of the Reserve Bank,’ but he will not because he knows that this is orchestrated. He has got his backbenchers, including the member for Canning, who is here in the chamber today, doing his dirty work. (Quorum formed)

It is great that the member for Canning is here, because he has an opportunity in about nine minutes to apologise to the Secretary of Treasury, to apologise to the Governor of the Reserve Bank and to apologise to the people of Australia.

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