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

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the Member for Warringah moving immediately—That this House calls on the Prime Minister to apologise because in breaking her promise not to introduce a carbon tax she is compounding the world’s highest electricity prices with the world’s biggest carbon tax.

Standing orders must be suspended because the election in Queensland on Saturday will be a referendum on the Prime Minister's carbon tax. It will be a referendum on political leaders who do not tell the truth. It will be a referendum on political leaders without honour and principle. That is why standing orders should be suspended. This Prime Minister should not scurry out of the chamber to hide in the whip's office. She should face this chamber; she should face this motion. The voters of Queensland will be passing judgment on her tax and her government as well as on Premier Bligh and the Queensland government. This is why standing orders should be suspended.

Standing orders should be suspended because Australians pay the world's highest power prices already. Our power prices are 70 per cent higher than those in the United States. They are 130 per cent higher than those in Canada. And it is going to get much worse under the Prime Minister's carbon tax, which she will not defend in this parliament. She scurried out to hide in the whip's office rather than stay to defend her carbon tax in this parliament on the eve of the Queensland election.

The Energy Users Association—and this is why standing orders must be suspended—told us this week that power prices had already risen by 40 per cent. They are your constituents, Madam Deputy Speaker, and they have paid 40 per cent more on the power bills every quarter since this government came into office. Now those bills are going to rise by another 20 per cent under the carbon tax thanks to this Prime Minister, who is too frightened to face the parliament on this subject. That is why standing orders should be suspended.

This Prime Minister is making a bad situation worse with a carbon tax based on a lie. The voters of Queensland know that six days before the last election this Prime Minister said, 'There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.' The voters of Queensland know that. They have not forgotten; they remember. And this Prime Minister has not forgotten, either—that is why she is hiding out in the whip's office rather than facing this motion for the suspension of standing orders, which should take priority over all other business in this House.

The situation of the consumers of Queensland is getting desperate and it will only get worse because of this government's carbon tax. Already the consumers of Queensland pay power prices that are higher than those in every single country in the European Union. The consumers of Queensland pay power prices that are higher than those in every single state of the United States. And it is going to get much worse under the carbon tax which this Prime Minister said would never happen under the government that she leads. That is why standing orders should be suspended.

The Prime Minister says that it is all right, because people want a clean energy future. Tell that to the pensioners of Queensland facing a 20 per cent increase in their power bills. Tell that to the people who ride the bus, who are facing an increase in their fares. Tell that to the ratepayers of Queensland facing an increase in their rates. Supposedly, it is all about a clean energy future. It is not. If you look at the government's modelling, under the government's carbon tax, our emissions are 578 million tonnes a year and are projected to be 621 million tonnes a year with the carbon tax. So electricity prices go up by 20 per cent and emissions go up too. What a completely fraudulent statement that is from the Prime Minister. That is why standing orders must be suspended.

It is all very well for the Prime Minister to come into this parliament and play the class war card. The people of Queensland want real answers and they want good policies. They want to get rid of this carbon tax and that is why standing orders must be suspended. The Prime Minister comes into this parliament and, yes, we know her words attack billionaires—people who succeed—but her policies attack the decent, ordinary families of Queensland. Her policies attack the forgotten families of Queensland and aren't they waiting to pass judgment? Their baseball bats are not there for Anna Bligh; their baseball bats are there for the Prime Minister hiding out in the whips office. That is why standing orders must be suspended.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition will return to the suspension.

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

The voters of Queensland are not mugs.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition will return to the suspension before the House.

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

We need to suspend standing orders to give the Prime Minister a chance to explain, on the eve of the election in Queensland, just what she meant when she told the member for Griffith that she was not going to challenge him. We have a Prime Minister who was not straight with the member for Griffith about the prime ministership, she was not straight with the people about the carbon tax, she was not straight with the member for Denison about pokies and she was not straight with this parliament about Senator Carr. Standing orders need to be suspended because this Prime Minister is suffering. I think she really is suffering. I am trying to be charitable. I think she has a new form of clinical disorder—TDD: truth deficit disorder—but there is a cure. This is why standing orders should be suspended.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition will be silent. The Leader of the Opposition will sit down. If you are not going to let me be heard, you will sit down. I am in the chair and I am trying to get your attention. I am going to ask you to withdraw and return to the suspension.

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

I am happy to withdraw. There is a cure and this is why standing orders must be suspended.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition will go to the suspension and will get off this attack, or I will sit him down.

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

It is very important that we suspend standing orders, because this Prime Minister needs to make amends to this parliament, to the people of Australia and to the people of Queensland for her words before the last election:

There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.

She needs to make amends and that is what my motion gives her the chance to do. Imagine if the Prime Minister had gone to the last election saying, 'Yes, there will be a carbon tax under the government I lead.' Image if Premier Bligh had gone to the last election saying, 'Yes, there will be privatisation under the government I lead,' and, 'Yes, there will be a petrol tax under the government I lead.'

This is why standing orders must be suspended. The Prime Minister needs to be given the chance to atone for this breach of faith with the Australian people, because—

Mr Danby interjecting—

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The honourable member for Melbourne Ports will remove himself from the chamber under the provisions of standing order 94(a).

The member for Melbourne Ports then left the chamber.

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

I am trying to give this Prime Minister a chance, belatedly, to apologise. That is why standing orders ought to be suspended. If she does not take this chance, if she does not apologise, the people of Queensland and Australia will not just conclude that you cannot trust this Prime Minister, they will conclude that the Labor brand is toxic right around this country.

Standing orders must be suspended. The Prime Minister must stop hiding out in the whips office. She must come into this chamber and explain herself.

The people of Australia are waiting to pass their verdict. We do not have a federal election but we certainly do have a state election. And isn't the whole of Australia waiting for this!

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition will return to the substance.

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

This is why standing orders must be suspended. We do not have a federal election but we have a Queensland one and the voters of Queensland will not miss. This Prime Minister and this— (Time expired)

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion. To remind the House, the motion is that the standing orders be suspended so that the following motion can be passed:

That this House calls on the Prime Minister to apologise because in breaking her promise not to introduce a carbon tax she is compounding the world’s highest electricity prices with the world’s biggest carbon tax.

It is important that standing and sessional orders be suspended because the most central promise that the Prime Minister made in the last election was, 'There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.' Then, within weeks of the election—not months, not years, but weeks—she broke that promise. For that reason she must apologise. She said one thing to get elected, to fool the Australian people, and she chose to do the opposite to save her political skin.

This Prime Minister's epitaph will be, 'Here lies Julia Gillard, lying to the end.' Or: 'Here lies Julia Gillard. She chose to mislead when the truth would do.'

Daryl Melham (Banks, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on a point of order. The member should be required to withdraw in relation to those matters. He is using a mechanism to undermine the existing standing orders, to disparage a member of this House, the current Prime Minister. It is unparliamentary.

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! We are debating a motion to suspend standing and sessional orders. The comments made were inappropriate. The honourable member will withdraw.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I withdraw any imputation from the word I used, but I was not using it in the way that has been suggested by the member. But I withdraw.

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The honourable member will withdraw unreservedly.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw unreservedly, Mr Speaker. Mr Speaker, do you know what the Prime Minister also had the gall to say before the last election? She said 'The Labor Party is the party of truth telling.' We go out into the electorate and make promises. Do you know what we would do in government? We would keep them. We gave our word to the Australian people in the election—and this is a government that prides itself on delivering election promises.

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Manager of Opposition Business will return to the substance of the motion moved by the Leader of the Opposition.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Exactly, Mr Speaker, and that is why standing orders must be suspended, to allow the Prime Minister to apologise to the House for making these promises before the last election and then breaking them when she got elected. In fact, she not only broke them but trumpets them as great successes. She told the press gallery on Tuesday that they had said she would never get a carbon tax in, but she had done it. She now wants to be congratulated for breaking these promises. She wants to wear them as a wreath of victory, as a wreath of success. She mocks the Australian people by saying things before the election, fooling them into voting for her, because nobody believes she would be in The Lodge today if she had told the truth before the election. She now mocks the Australian people by expecting to be congratulated, by being triumphed through the streets of Canberra for breaking this promise and introducing a carbon tax.

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Manager of Opposition Business will withdraw his accusation of untruthfulness.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw, Mr Speaker. I am sure the Australian people think this Prime Minister tells the truth on a daily basis. What concerns me and why the suspension of standing orders should be carried is how can the Prime Minister simply disown her words? How can she calmly and so ruthlessly and without any regret simply refuse to accept the statement that she made before the election and that she has broken? When her own unambiguous words are put to her, she personally denigrates the questioner. That is why the Australian people have no faith in this Prime Minister. It no longer matters what this Prime Minister says—

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Manager of Opposition Business will return to the substance of the motion to suspend standing orders.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, standing orders must be suspended, because the Prime Minister should apologise. We now have a situation in this country where, whatever the Prime Minister says, whatever she tells the Australian people, they simply do not believe her. She has no credibility—she has betrayed the trust of the Australian people and, on Saturday, the verdict the Queensland people will deliver will be a verdict on this Prime Minister and this carbon tax. (Time expired)

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We have just seen, if we needed any reminder, why the Leader of the Opposition is simply not up to the highest office in this land. What we saw when the Leader of the Opposition said across the chamber that the Prime Minister and I had targets on our foreheads—from the political party that quite proudly introduced John Howard's gun laws—was an outrage. Earlier on today we saw a Mark Riley moment from the Leader of the Opposition directed at the chair. Day after day we see that he simply does not have the temperament required of a Prime Minister.

That is why we should not suspend standing orders, because we in this chamber have some big tasks ahead of us. There are challenges ahead—the economy, the environment and social policy. There are a range of issues that we could discuss and that we should be discussing. Yet what we have had, on 50 separate occasions, is the Leader of the Opposition having a premeditated suspension of standing orders attempt, shutting down question time. That is telling the Australian people that he is not interested in trying to hold the government to account on the issues of the day.

The Leader of the Opposition is not interested in debating the economy or jobs. Did we have a single question today about the announcement by Holden, which is significant not just for manufacturing jobs but for all those who depend upon the manufacturing industry? There was not a word. The opposition shut down question time after six questions. In the 43rd Parliament we have already lost 27 hours of question time as a result of their shutting down question time. That is enough time to watch all the Harry Potter movies—all 18 hours—and the Lord of the Rings trilogy as well—another nine hours. It is enough time to fly to Los Angeles and back and it is enough time to complete a course in basic Spanish or Italian. Those opposite have wasted 27 hours and more than 230 questions have been abandoned. No other opposition since Federation have said: 'We don't care about question time. We'll move motions to suspend standing orders day after day, because we're not interested in holding the government to account, we're not interested in debating the economy, we're not interested in debating jobs and we're not interested in debating climate change.'

They are condemned by their own actions, because it is all about the politics. That is what this motion today is about and that is why we should reject it. It is all about cheap political point-scoring and there is no line that is uncrossable by the Leader of the Opposition, as shown by his comment 'targets on foreheads'.

We know there are consequences behind that sort of language. We saw it in the United States last year. We should not hear, from the Leader of the Opposition, the sort of provocative language used by extremists. But, once again, there is no line incapable of being crossed. Perhaps we should not be too harsh, because he is struggling. He said himself, about losing office: 'We all need grief counselling. It's like a bereavement. Not as bad as losing a child or a spouse, but up there with losing a parent.'

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the House will return to the substance of the motion for suspension.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. During the Leader of the Opposition's contribution, and my contribution, a great deal of time was used by the government to take up our time—

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member will explain his point of order.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We were asked to withdraw statements which I would not have regarded as offensive, but I was happy to withdraw them. The Leader of the House has made a quite unpleasant imputation against the Leader of the Opposition and therefore he should be asked to withdraw it.

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Manager of Opposition Business will resume his seat; otherwise, he will join his colleague outside.

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What we see in here day after day is motions for suspension of standing orders based on spurious reasons. Today we have it yet again. House of Representatives Practice makes it very clear that suspensions of standing orders happen when there is an urgent item before the parliament, when there is some momentum—not worked out at eight o'clock in the morning, typed out, presigned and brought in here day after day. In the past fortnight we have had this motion for suspension, motions for suspensions demanding a royal commission and motions for suspensions over police investigations and over issues of guns on the streets of New South Wales. We have had all sorts of bizarre attempts at suspension. I am only surprised that we did not get a motion for suspension blaming the government for Ian Thorpe's failure to make the London Olympics! We have had everything else because everything is the responsibility of the government and the responsibility of the carbon price—or perhaps the CIA and the connection between the two.

In these motions to suspend standing orders we have an attempt to distract from their failure to engage in the real debates, their failure to engage in debates on the economy, their failure to debate issues of climate change and its substance. We saw today the Leader of the Opposition trying to distance himself from some of the rhetoric of those who were demonstrating outside—not a demonstration against the carbon price but a demonstration called the 'global warming hoax rally'. They were the same people who demonstrated outside my electorate office.

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the House will return to the motion.

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The reason we should not support this motion is that we might have got a question about that from those opposite. They might have asked, 'Why didn't the minister for climate change go outside and have a chat with the global warming hoax people?' He might have been able to get a question. We might have asked him if they did not.

We are quite happy to debate issues of substance and not to engage in this nonsense day after day, because when you get into issues of substance you actually see how little those opposite stand for. You see the extreme rhetoric that we saw today. You see the connections that they have with the bizarre behaviour of those outside—Clive Palmer and the CIA-Greens conspiracy that is going on. You see the associations with Lord Monckton, Mick Patel and others like them. That is why standing orders should not be suspended.

What we want to debate in this House is issues of substance. Earlier today we had a vote trying to shut down the parliament rather than deal with issues of financial advisers. A standard procedural motion was put on the blues that we move at the end of every session. Never before has it been divided upon by those opposite. Never before has it been voted against. I have been in this place for 16 years and it has never been voted against. But of course there is nothing that those opposite are not prepared to say no to.

At the start of this session the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition said we would have an economic debate. We should not suspend standing orders—so that we can continue to engage in these economic issues, including the financial advisers bill, which is up—

Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time allotted for this debate has expired.

Mr Albanese interjecting—

No. The Leader of the House will be able to seek indulgence after the question has been put. The time allotted for this debate has expired. Indulgence is not given. The question is that the motion moved by the Leader of the Opposition for the suspension of standing and sessional orders be agreed to.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper.