Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is, again, to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to his earlier answer regarding the Home Insulation Program. I ask the Prime Minister: is he really telling Australians that four deaths, 93 additional house fires and 1,000 deadly, electrified roofs is an acceptable price to pay for insulating one million homes?

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would say to the Leader of the Opposition that any industrial death in Australia is one death too many. I would say to the Leader of the Opposition that any industrial accident, of which there are 138,000 in Australia each year, is one accident too many, and those are the ones that involve serious injury. These are challenges which governments of the day have to deal with and we have to reduce these, including in this sector. These four absolute tragedies are extreme, human, personal tragedies for the families concerned.

As I said in response to an earlier question from the Leader of the Opposition, the challenges the government faces in dealing with this program and the Renewable Energy Rebate Program of the future are, firstly, to wrestle with the challenges faced by households—and they are real challenges—secondly, to deal with the real practical problems faced by workers losing their jobs and, thirdly, to deal with those concerns which members here and on the other side of the House have raised in relation to firms.

I would also draw the Leader of the Opposition’s attention to the response I gave, I think, to the question from the member for Hume before in terms of the results of the initial survey work done by the government in relation to those homes which were identified to be most at risk at this stage. There is much more work to be done, but the government intends to get on with the business of doing it.