Aaron Violi (Casey, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you. He spent 27 years in parliament—20 years in opposition; seven years in government. He has had 18 months now as Prime Minister, but six of those years were in the glory years of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd era. This is the reality. This Prime Minister knows opposition. It's his natural habitat. So when he gets asked a question, he can't provide solutions to the Australian people; he just attacks and criticises the opposition. That's all he knows—being in opposition. It would be funny if it didn't actually hurt the Australian people.

There are many examples of these—and I've only got a minute and a half left; I can't go through them all—but one great example of this Prime Minister being more suited to opposition is with fuel prices. Fuel prices today in Canberra are at around $2.13 at the bowser and $2.35 for diesel. In 2021, when it was $1.79, the then opposition leader, now Prime Minister, was very happy to criticise the Prime Minister of the day for petrol prices and not doing enough to bring them down. So, apparently, when you're in opposition, and it's at $1.79, it's an issue. When it's $2.13 now for the Australian people, and he's actually in power and can do something about it, he has not a word about it, not a solution.

But what did the then government, now opposition, do when petrol hit over $2 because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine? It acted. It cut the fuel excise in half and capped it at six months, a policy that gave relief to the Australian people when they needed it, straightaway, but made it limited so it didn't have long-term structural impacts on the budget. That's an action that the former government took with petrol prices. But what do this Prime Minister and those opposite have to say about petrol prices when they're at $2.13? Nothing. The Australian people know this Prime Minister can complain and his natural habitat is in opposition. He has no solutions for the Australian people, and they feel it every day.

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