Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

I will speak to the amendment. The case against the Treasurer does not rest or rely upon the email allegedly sent by Mr Charlton to Mr Grech. The Prime Minister has made very grave allegations against the opposition, accusing it of being party to the forging of this email. Those allegations are disgraceful and entirely without foundation. The email is now the subject of an AFP investigation, and that should be allowed to proceed unimpeded by political accusations such as those that have been made today by the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister has set up this AFP inquiry to determine, he says, whether the email has been forged, and yet he is alleging that it has been forged, by the opposition he says, and he repeatedly says: ‘Let the police do their work.’ As we have said, and I say again to this House, categorically: the email was not created or composed, nor was the text provided to the News Ltd journalist Steve Lewis, by anybody in the opposition. I repeat: the email was not created or composed, nor was the text provided to the News Ltd journalist Steve Lewis, by anybody in the opposition. Our interest here, on behalf of the Australian people, is only in getting to the truth of the matter. That is why we have said that we will give the Australian Federal Police full cooperation in their investigation.

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