Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I hear the members from the government backbench jumping in and intervening and saying there's no case to answer. Well, people think there is a case to answer. If you'd watched 60 Minutes or you'd read the papers, you would've seen the strongest of allegations being made against ministers. And, when those allegations are being made, unless every minister in here is in a position to stand up, hand on heart, and say they did nothing wrong, and unless the Prime Minister is in a position to say: 'I have conducted a full and thorough investigation and none of my ministers have done anything wrong'—unless that is the case, which I suspect it won't be—we are entitled to an answer.

So I commend this motion. And, if this motion fails, as it's likely to do, if there's no change of heart, if the protection racket for ministers and former ministers continues, then we will press ahead in the Senate, because there is the possibility of a Senate inquiry as well. But if we don't get a parliamentary inquiry—because that is the way to hold ministers to account—then this parliament will have exposed the links between the gambling industry and the highest levels of government in this country, and we will not rest until the same standards that this government wants to impose on refugees and Newstart recipients are imposed on their very own frontbench as well.

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