Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Hindmarsh for asking a question that is of interest to literally over 100,000 Australians and people from other countries who are travelling on Qantas, both in Australia and overseas, and who were caught up in this issue. It is an issue that affected employees—they have been trapped in hotels overseas and cannot get back to their families because of this action. It is an issue that is important to the insurance industry, which I will return to in more detail in a moment. What rights travellers have in this—an issue conspicuously absent from the coalition's questions; it took a government member to ask this question—are influenced heavily by the turn of events from Saturday afternoon. The rights of travellers are influenced heavily by the disproportionate and precipitant action of Qantas. They are the people who grounded the planes and now make it a live issue about the insurance rights of people.

Why is it we never hear the opposition criticise Qantas? Why is it that they only ever criticise one side of the debate? They have been deafeningly silent on what they think about Qantas.

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