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

I was optimistic—perhaps naive but optimistic—that over the break somehow the Leader of the Opposition would discover some semblance of leadership. But, once again, we have seen today why he is the most negative opposition leader in Australia's history: all opposition and no leader. He is so determined to continue to run on the absurd line that what we need is an election because he does not think he will make it until 2013 as the opposition leader.

The opposition are running a two-pronged strategy here. On the one hand they say, 'Oh, we need an election,' and that the crossbenchers should give them one. On the other hand they abuse the crossbenchers, they go to their seats, they denigrate them, they attack them and they seek to humiliate them. And then they wonder why this government is completely secure and why this government has not lost a single piece of legislation before this House—164 pieces of legislation have been carried and not a single amendment has been carried without the support of the government. It is not surprising, because those people who sit on the crossbenches, those people who view things objectively, know a rank opportunist when they see one.

We have seen it evidenced in the last week. There he was, returned from overseas, and he went on the Alan Jones program. It was not so much Alan Jones interviewing the Leader of the Opposition about what his views were; it was more the Leader of the Opposition going on the Alan Jones program to tell him how terrific he thinks Alan is. Alan put an idea to the Leader of the Opposition and, of course, he agreed with him. He determined that he was on the side of the farmers of New South Wales against the miners of Western Australia. The only problem was that he forgot that he was on his way to Western Australia. So when he got to Western Australia he did a press conference. There, of course, he decided that he was then for the miners and against the farmers—typical Tony Abbott: the inconsistency, the rank opportunism and no platform too low. He is the only living Liberal leader who does not support putting a price on carbon.

Of course, that has not always been the case. The Leader of the Opposition has had a very strong view about carbon over the years, a very strong view indeed on climate change. At one stage he was a non-believer. In October 2009, at a public meeting in Beaufort, he said:

The … argument is absolute crap.

Then he was a sceptic on the Four Corners program on 16 August 2010, saying:

I certainly think that there is a credible scientific counterpoint but, in the end, I'm not going to win an argument over the science, I'll leave that to the scientists.

Then he was a believer. On 3 March 2011 he said:

I think climate change is real.

On 8 March 2011, he went even further. He had always been a believer! He said:

I've always thought that climate change was real.

That was what he had to say then. But then of course, six days later, he was back to being a sceptic. In a public forum in Perth he said:

I don't think we can say that the science is settled here.

The only thing that is consistent is that the Leader of the Opposition says whatever he thinks people want to hear. That is what he does: he travels around the country telling people what he thinks they want to hear.

The problem is that today in modern politics there are things called recordings, there are things like DVDs and there are things like the internet. We know that he does not understand the internet; we know that from the 7.30 Report interview that he gave during the election campaign. He does not understand this new technology thing, but I say to the Leader of the Opposition that he should understand it and he should understand that he needs to be held to account. We saw again on the weekend another Mark Riley moment: another moment where he was asked questions and he just stared at the interviewer menacingly, trying to intimidate them into backing off. We saw that occur.

The fact is that the Leader of the Opposition has failed to wreck the parliament. The parliament is functioning effectively. So now he is trying to wreck the economy, without a care or concern for those who may lose their jobs or businesses—no concern whatsoever. Today again we have seen an announcement by Qantas that is indeed very unfortunate about the shedding of jobs. Senator Eric Abetz has put out a statement blaming Labor's carbon tax for that issue. He has not spoken to Alan Joyce of Qantas. He has not looked at the facts. If you look at the facts, they are these. One is that the measures that Qantas has announced are about what is going on with the globalisation in aviation; it has made that very clear. It is also the case that the carbon price does not apply to international air traffic. The fact is, of course, that the opposition do not worry about those details and facts; they just put out their scare campaign regardless of what the reality is—regardless of the fact that Qantas is saying that the areas of the company that are under pressure are those international routes. The domestic part of the business is, indeed, extremely profitable and doing well. That is why the cutbacks Qantas has announced are about reducing some of its international business. But this opposition is so opportunistic that there is no opportunity it will not try to seize.

The Leader of the Opposition, of course, has to answer some questions about how he is going to fill his incredible $70 billion black hole. I note that the shadow Treasurer last week on television was saying: 'Oh, $50 billion, $60 billion or $70 billion? We can just find that.' It was an extraordinary statement. Seventy billion dollars is the equivalent of twice the current six-year federal infrastructure program, stopping the age pension for two years, stopping Medicare payments for four years, stopping assistance to people with disabilities for three years or stopping family tax benefit payments for three years. It would require savings equivalent to doubling the GST for a year. But that is the position that the opposition have brought themselves into. Why have they brought themselves into that? First, they want to unwind the mining company tax, because of course, although those big mining companies say that they can afford to pay the tax, the opposition are determined to make them not pay the tax. They want ordinary Australian taxpayers to pick up that difference. Of course, there is $27 billion from unwinding the price on carbon, because the opposition are determined that, rather than taxing the big polluters and providing assistance and support to Australian families, to businesses and to clean energy, they will tax ordinary Australians so they can provide subsidies to the big polluters. It is an absolutely extraordinary position.

But nothing is too great in terms of being prepared to talk down the economy. We saw it again in question time today. We saw it in the response of the shadow Treasurer to the Treasurer's ministerial statement. The shadow finance minister—who is no threat, I must say, to the shadow Treasurer; I say that to you in your defence, Shadow Treasurer—said this this morning at the doors: 'No wonder we've got a deficit vulnerable to world meltdown in terms of finances.' He was speaking about world meltdown. The Australian economy is about to melt down according to the shadow finance minister. It is absolutely extraordinary. The fact is that those people opposite are determined to talk the Australian economy down in spite of the fact that we are in the strongest position of any advanced economy in the world. We are in a position where we have strong public finances and strong employment—a 5.1 per cent figure, the envy of the industrialised world. We are in a strong position, with a plan to deal with our infrastructure and skills deficits going forward. We have an investment pipeline of over $400 billion. Yet those opposite say all these industries are just going to collapse. It is absolutely extraordinary.

The $70 billion figure is really just the starting point, because that does not take into account the fact that they have run around the country and made all sorts of promises without having any money attached. There is the Midland Highway in Tasmania. Last Thursday in Hobart I met with all the mayors up and down the highway and with the Tasmanian Minister for Infrastructure. The opposition have said they will duplicate the entire Midland Highway. They have said they will provide $400 million for it. That will not even pay for the land acquisition, before you start to spend one cent on concrete or any other activity. Four hundred million dollars will not pay for the land acquisition. The opposition have said they will duplicate the highway from Geelong through to Adelaide—again, without any money whatsoever. The Leader of the National Party runs around the country making promises almost on a daily basis. He is a bit like the Leader of the Opposition; he has not discovered the internet. He does not know that we are keeping that record of all of these commitments and there will be dollars attached to them, and at the end of the day they will have to come clean about whether the commitments will be delivered and whether they are real or not. In a speech recently the Leader of the Opposition said he would build new motorways and rail lines in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. These things just roll off the tongue without any money being attached to them, and that is before you get to the $70 billion debacle which is there.

The fact of the matter is that this Leader of the Opposition simply cannot be trusted, and he has said that himself. In terms of transport, which he raises, the fact is that in 2007 the opposition went to an election with a comprehensive plan to have the world's most comprehensive emissions trading scheme, and they wanted all transport fuels in. I saw them out there today at the rally on the box talking about heavy vehicles. The fact is that the coalition stated in the document they produced for the 2007 election, with cabinet ministers including the current Leader of the Opposition and the then Leader of the National Party, who went to that election as the Deputy Prime Minister, that the coalition:

… recognises the importance of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from transport, which currently comprise around 14 per cent of Australia's total emissions. By bringing transport fuels into the Australian emissions-trading system, consumers will be given greater incentive to improve the energy efficiency of their transport choices.

They wanted emissions trading to apply to the passenger vehicle, to every vehicle right across the transport sector, something that we have said that we will not do in the position that we have put forward.

The fact is that the Leader of the Opposition will make any claim no matter how untruthful, offer any promise no matter how outlandish, discard any principle no matter how dearly held, vilify any person no matter how well meaning and nonpartisan their motives and betray any loyalty no matter how longstanding. And didn't Peter Reith find that out? The Leader of the Opposition got Peter Reith to run for national president of the Liberal Party and then voted for Alan Stockdale, who won by one vote. That is the integrity of the Leader of the Opposition, who is leading a party of talk-back, not a party of government. The party is irresponsible in the way that it has engaged in the economic debate, including the one that has taken place today. The Leader of the Opposition is a walking vuvuzela with just one noise coming out of his mouth—no, no, no, no. He is incapable of putting forward a positive alternative, and that is why this government is determined to not be distracted by the negativity of the opposition leader. This government is determined to pursue the important reform agenda that it has put forward, including pricing carbon, the national health reform agenda and the MORT, during this sitting of parliament. These important reforms will stand Australia in good stead and further back up the good economic management of this government. (Time expired)

See this speech in context