Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Hansard source

I am asked who made the commitment. I have had four shadow infrastructure ministers so far—not quite the same number as shadow finance ministers—and some of you might remember who the third shadow infrastructure minister was, even though there were no speeches, no questions in the parliament and just one media release, but there was one commitment. And to give the member for Groom credit, he made it on day 1. He peaked early. On day 1 in his own electorate he committed $1.75 billion for the Toowoomba bypass—day 1, in his electorate. So what we want to see tonight in the Leader of the Opposition’s budget response is this. Will the $1.75 billion be there, or will he dump it just like he dumped the deal that was done by the member for Groom on the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme? We will see that tonight. They had 12 years to act and did nothing about it, but on day 1 made a $1.75 billion commitment. There was of course a $6 billion commitment two weeks ago from the Leader of the National Party, but we might hear some more about that on another day. I am sure that will be there tonight as well.

We do have some more creative coalition members across there—those who say one thing in the parliament and another in their electorate. They vote against projects here, but they are champions of them and claim victory when they go back to their electorate. There is no-one better at that than the member for Gippsland. There is a wealth of material on the member for Gippsland. Here he is in his newsletter: ‘Princes Highway duplication gets started’. I wonder where the funding for that came from? The Nation Building Program that he voted against and that was brought forward as part of the economic stimulus plan that he voted against. So there he is, out there saying how terrific it is. But it does not have to be the big projects; it can be the smaller ones as well. He also voted against the community infrastructure part of the economic stimulus plan, but here he is, under the heading ‘$7 million boost for sport’:

Darren Chester discusses the benefits of the new sports complex with Joan Foot, Sale Netball Association and Johnny Paraskevas, Construction Manager …

So we are creating jobs in his electorate under the program that he voted against. But there is more from the member for Gippsland. He has been out there promising extensions to the Princes Highway. There is not a day goes past that this bloke does not spend a million bucks. Not a day goes past—but we will see it all there in the opposition leader’s response tonight.

When it comes to waste, of course there is one program that comes to mind—the regional rorts program. We all recall it. We recall the Gunnedah ethanol plant that did not exist; we recall the train line that burned down; we recall the dog food—who could forget the dog food and the two-headed dog; and of course we recall the cheese factory in the electorate of Indi—the cheese factory that got $22,000 of taxpayers’ money paid to it on 28 June 2007. There was only one problem—it had shut its doors in March 2007. You would think the member for Indi would know that this was a dodgy program and that now instead of paying for-profit organisations—

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