Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I was asked by the member for Gilmore about a matter in her electorate and I am making the simple common-sense point that Australians would understand—which is, when you are building the nation and building infrastructure then obviously building requires you to do things. It is just like when you are building a major road project—for a period of time people suffer the constraints on their ability to use that highway because part of it is fenced off for the construction. The same things will happen as we roll out the National Broadband Network. I am going to be very transparent about that.

I would also say to the Liberal Party: is its advocacy in this place that we somehow put a dome over the nation now, that we freeze it in time, that we pickle it, that we keep it in its current form and we do not move one brick, we do not create one road, we do not build one bit of rail track, we do not change one port, we do not engage in one school construction and we do not roll out the NBN because people do not want to see the natural consequences of construction? Is that really the position—the luddite position—of a political party that calls itself the Liberal Party?

There has been a theme in these questions. Apparently they do not like cable. Do they want us to take all the electricity wires down? Apparently they do not like wiring. Do they want all the telephones wires gone? Apparently they do not like progress. Which part of time would they like us to go back to—1960, 1930 or 1910? Which age would they pick as the party of the past? This does not befit a political party that calls itself the ‘Liberal Party’. If they want to go out and rename their political party the ‘Luddite Party’ then they should do it by the time this parliament next convenes and at least then they will be honest with the Australia people about what they stand for in politics—a denial of progress, a denial of the future and no vision for the country.

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