Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party, Shadow Minister for Trade and Tourism) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to second the amendment moved by the Manager of Opposition Business regarding the suspension of standing orders that the government has moved. This amendment is very important to debate, as the Manager of Opposition Business has said. I acknowledge the number of crossbenchers who are here for this debate. This is a really important discussion that we're having this morning, so I acknowledge and thank you for contributing to this debate.

What we have going on here is very clear. As the Manager of Opposition Business just said, there are two things happening this morning. One is government incompetence with the situation in Nauru. We acknowledge their incompetence and will help rush that through today. The other one, as the Manager of Opposition Business just said, is that, again, we have a lack of transparency happening here. As the Manager of Opposition Business just said regarding what the changes to the superannuation funds will do, super fund members will no longer be able to see how their funds are spent, in the sense of political donations or other transactions that are suddenly there. Why are they doing this? This is their behaviour, and it's starting to be a trend that I'm noticing and I know a lot of people are noticing. It's sneaky behaviour. It was never mentioned during the campaign that they were going to do this. These types of policies were never mentioned.

I'll tell you some other sneaky things that this government have done. And this is obviously about unions. This is about the unions in control of the industry super funds. This is one of the sneakiest things this government did: they have passed extreme industrial relations laws that were never mentioned during the campaign. Could you imagine the outcry of all of the left-wing political commentators in this country if we, as the previous government, had won the election and then brought through legislation that we didn't mention during the campaign? Let's repeat that: would the left-wing media in this country, of which there are many, have accepted us as a government passing legislation that was quite extreme that we'd never mentioned during the campaign? Because that's what the government have done. They never mentioned the multilevel bargaining processes that they passed through parliament. They never mentioned that during the campaign. It takes us back to Whitlam-type industrial laws. It takes away some of the reforms that the Hawke-Keating government did with enterprise bargaining. So that, again, is a very sneaky thing that this government has done.

Now, the crossbenchers will be aware of this—one of the other very sneaky things that this government did. We were rushed back, as you know. We all came back to parliament. We spent a day here late last year when the government put their gas and coal price cap legislation through parliament. Were you told? Were you, crossbenchers, told that there would be up to $1 billion in compensation paid to coal-fired power stations? Because parliament wasn't. The Prime Minister said there was nothing to see there. Anastasia Palaszczuk, the Queensland Premier, contradicted the Prime Minister in public comments about what would happen there as well. Dominic Perrottet, the New South Wales Premier, said, 'No, that was all part of our negotiations.' It was never mentioned that day. Nothing to see here! Again, it is sneaky behaviour.

Even the ISIS bride issue—was that mentioned during the campaign? Was it mentioned that they were going to change the policy and bring these families back? It was all very secretive that they had done that. It was an alleged leak from the department while we knew that was happening. Then families were placed in communities—all very secretive. Again, it was a sneaky type of behaviour.

It's even getting down to just language, which is just misleading—again, sneaky. The prime minister went to Woodford; he wanted to do a sort of Bob Hawke re-enactment up there at the music festival. There he said that we, as the previous government, 'chose to stop speaking to China'. That is just misleading language. I, as the shadow trade and tourism minister, have quite a bit to do with the trade minister, Don Farrell, who I think is doing some very good things, and I'm happy to acknowledge that. I'm happy to acknowledge some of the things that the minister has done in that space. When we see the government do things that we think are good for our country or good for our people, I think we as an opposition do and should compliment that. But how could the Prime Minister speak to an audience like that and say that we chose not to? It's exceptionally well-documented that China put 14 conditions on us that we would have to adhere to for us to start dialogue. We never wanted to stop speaking to them. The Chinese government chose to not speak to us. So, again, it was sneaky behaviour. What the government is doing today is sneaky. This is about lack of transparency, and I appreciate the crossbench contribution to this.

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