Kate Thwaites (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition began this debate this afternoon by trying to pretend that he in fact has a plan for our country's future. He gave it a red-hot crack. I have to hand that to him; he certainly did try to present a plan for our future. The trouble is, like all the plans that the Leader of the Opposition tries to serve up, it was wafer thin and it just doesn't add up. There were no details, and we all know that famous slogan—made famous, I think, in fact by the Leader of the Opposition and those opposite: 'If you don't know, vote no'. When we're served up plans with no details and we're told that this is what the Australian people should rely on for their future—when times are tough and when we do need serious governments which are going to do serious work—then, if you don't know, vote no.

What the Leader of the Opposition is putting in front of us is a giant con. He's pretending that he is trying to address the climate crisis which is in front of us. In fact, what we're getting from the Leader of the Opposition is the type of climate denial that we got under the lot opposite in their nearly a decade in power. It's the kind of climate denial that has left our country in the position where our government is now stepping in to do the work we need to do to build the country of the future and to make the transition to renewables. While we're doing that work and doing it in the way that sensible governments do it, the opposition gives us a two-page plan for nuclear.

So what do we know about the plan? What do we know about what Peter Dutton has proposed? We do know that it will cost more.

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