Emma McBride (Dobell, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Page 40 of Budget Paper No. 1 states that 'slower vaccine rollouts will weigh on recoveries'. Will the Prime Minister now admit that his slow, bungled vaccine rollout is weighing on Australia's economic recovery? Does the Prime Minister expect Australians to believe that a first-rate economic recovery is possible with a third-rate vaccine rollout?

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We've seen this a lot from the Labor Party over the course of the last 18 months: while we are fighting the virus, the Labor Party just want to fight the government—that's when they're not fighting each other. Our job is to fight the virus, and in this budget what you see are further commitments, including to the vaccination program, the securing of vaccines and ensuring that the vaccination program is rolling out. You'll also notice in those budget papers that the biggest threat in the short term, particularly while the virus is still raging around the world, relates to ensuring that we keep our internal borders open in this country, and it is noted in the assumptions of Treasury in these budget papers that we need to keep the broader international borders shut to ensure that we can protect Australia from the COVID-19 pandemic that is raging around the world. I would have thought that in this place, as we are seeking to vaccinate the country, there would have been bipartisan support for that initiative. If those opposite can't bring themselves to join a united national effort on this vaccine, then I will let the Australian people judge them for that.

On that vaccination program, as we speak today, our rate of vaccinations at this time—compared with comparative countries that are in a situation just like Australia, where we've had low rates of cases—is higher than that of New Zealand, higher than that of South Korea, higher than that of Canada and higher than that of Japan. Those opposite, in the middle of a pandemic, seek to undermine and play politics with the health of this nation. The Leader of the Opposition and the Labor Party may be desperate. They may have no answers. They may have no plan. They may have no clue. But I can guarantee the Leader of the Opposition this: he may wish to fight me, but I'm fighting this virus on behalf of the Australian people.