Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I refer the House to the words of Senator Abetz before the Senate inquiry on Friday: ‘A person, a journalist in fact, has suggested to me that there may have been a communication from the Prime Minister’s office.’ He went on to ask about that communication. He finished by saying, ‘This is what has been suggested to me by somebody, and there is of course the suggestion in today’s media that such a document exists.’ That is point 2. So, firstly, the Prime Minister said that there is no email and that there is no email on the computer system of the government. It now emerges that there are reports that the email exists. That is point 1. Point 2: the report suggests that the email was concocted within the Treasury department. Point 3: the Prime Minister said, with some measure of authority, that somehow he knows, before the Federal Police, that the email is a forgery. Before the Federal Police have completed their investigations, the Prime Minister knows that it is a forgery.

There is one thing about this whole matter that we will not be distracted from and it is this: the integrity of the Treasurer. The Prime Minister can have the diversion of an email—an alleged email or an email—that is now reported to be real. He can have that distraction, but I will tell you that we are not going to let Wayne Swan off the hook. We are not going to let the Treasurer off the hook. I will tell you why: because the Treasurer stated in this place with absolute conviction that Mr Grant was being treated ‘just like everybody else’. He said it was an entirely normal situation the way that Mr Grant was being treated. And he had the audacity to repeat it in an interview with Laurie Oakes yesterday on Channel Nine, where he stated:

And in the case of Mr Grant, he was not treated any differently from any other car dealer.

Not treated any differently—just a normal run-of-the-mill case. And what is irrefutable is the evidence that has been presented to the Senate by the Treasury. But ironically it was Labor Party senators that tabled the emails—not even the treasury department tabled those emails—that belled the cat in relation to the Treasurer’s lies to this parliament. The truth of the matter is that this all started with our Prime Minister receiving a free motor vehicle from a car dealer. Our Prime Minister, when he was Leader of the Opposition, was in receipt of a car from John Grant. That is the first moment of compromise of our Prime Minister. Secondly, our Prime Minister and the Treasurer stood in this place and said—

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