Chris Bowen (Prospect, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law) Share this | Hansard source

What a weak attempt from a desperate opposition. Is it any surprise that the Leader of the Opposition is not in the chamber? Just last Friday he was calling for the resignation of the Prime Minister of Australia and the Treasurer of Australia. It comes to Tuesday and he has not even turned up for the first MPI on this matter. It just shows how seriously the Leader of the Opposition has miscalculated. He has gone from calling for the resignation of the leader of this nation to being missing in action within a couple of days.

Yesterday was a remarkable day. It is not often you see the credibility of a member of this House shredded in the course of 24 hours, and that is what we saw yesterday with the Leader of the Opposition and alternative Prime Minister. His credibility was destroyed within 24 hours, such that it is no longer tenable or sustainable for him to remain in his office and he must resign.

The opposition has been a flailing around trying to salvage a skerrick of credibility over the last 24 hours out of this imbroglio that they have created for themselves. There have been some bizarre moments as they do that. Bizarre moment No. 1 came yesterday when the shadow Treasurer, the member for North Sydney, who we just heard from, laid claim to some form of vindication because the Australian Federal Police had found an email. He breathlessly rose at 12.50 pm yesterday in the House and said:

Mr Speaker, I should inform the House of a news report on the ABC Broadcasting site which is headlined, ‘Australian Federal Police descend on Grech’s house’ …

He went on to say:

The report goes on to say the ‘police are now interviewing Mr Grech about the email which appears to have been concocted inside the Treasury Department.’

Breathless, he was. He then said:

So, an email does exist, according to this report. The Prime Minister said there was no email, and yet evidence … from a Federal Police investigation suggests that an email—

does exist—

Evidence from an emerging report suggests, firstly, that an email does exist, which contradicts what the Prime Minister said on Friday night, that an extensive search of the computer systems of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet as well as the Treasury department said no email exists.

So the member for North Sydney did not seem to care it was a fake or a forgery or a fraud; he was just happy that they had found an email, as he tried desperately to seek some vindication for himself out of the events that he and his leader had created.

Bizarre moment No. 2 came last night. This has already been referred to but it is too good to let go. This is just breathtaking. Last night on the 7.30 Report we saw the Leader of the Opposition in what must go down as one of the most woeful performances in the history of that fine program. It is a big call but I am prepared to make it—that that was the most woeful performance we have seen on the 7.30 Report. This is what the Leader of the Opposition said last night:

All we’ve heard, as we heard in the introduction to this program, is that it appears that if it was concocted, it was concocted in the Treasury. That’s Mr Swan’s responsibility, not mine.

Now we have heard it all: the Treasurer has been conspiring against himself! It is his responsibility that this has happened—not the Leader of the Opposition’s responsibility that he took a forgery, a fraud, a fake and based upon it a call for the resignation of the Prime Minister of Australia. That apparently is not the member for Wentworth’s responsibility; that is somehow Mr Swan’s responsibility. So desperate to distract from the fact that the Leader of the Opposition had called for the resignation of the Prime Minister, based upon a lie, that he is prepared to claim that a forgery that was allegedly concocted in the Treasury to ensnare the Prime Minister and the Treasurer is the responsibility of the Treasurer.

The Treasurer has been conspiring against himself, according to the Leader of the Opposition, but of course none of this can divert from the fact that the Leader of the Opposition is failing to adequately account for his knowledge of events leading up to yesterday.

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