John Cobb (Calare, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture and Food Security) Share this | Hansard source

a somewhat justifiable claim that the Prime Minister has never led this government and that it is the Greens that are running the country. Nevertheless, we have the carbon tax that has accelerated the demise of our manufacturing and processing industry as well as devastating the wafer-thin profits of the agricultural sector.

Labor used to stand for the workers. Now it stands for closing the manufacturing industry, closing the food-processing industry and squeezing out the mining sector. The fishing industry is also hit by the carbon tax, with its high reliance on refrigeration and the resultant high electricity costs. Add to that the world's largest marine park networks shutting out the fishing industry, and we have another sector alienated by this government. But the government does not care. The government has built on its disasters—on backflips, broken promises and policy disasters. The coalition will not stand for it. Australia is a fantastic country and it can be again. Its people do not deserve to be treated like mugs. These marine parks are thought bubbles by the minister for the environment—poorly designed, poorly implemented. I implore the parliament to support this disallowance motion so that these marine parks do not become another symbol of the scourge of the Rudd and Gillard governments.

I would like to repeat something I said in this place earlier today when the member for Watson, the minister for the environment, accused us of wanting to get rid of a park that we had designated under the Howard government. In actual fact, I do not know whether the minister was telling untruths or he just does not know his own legislation and does not know the facts. On reflection, the latter is likely, because the disallowance motion does not—I repeat, does not—get rid of the maritime area the Howard government put in place. It does not get rid of the interim management plan put in place by the Howard government. In fact, it enshrines it, make sure that it stays there. It does get rid of the management plan being put by the Gillard government and the member for Watson.

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