Ian Campbell (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Heritage) Share this | Hansard source

Of course you did. He walks in here and says: ‘Look, these DLOs are getting paid too much. There’s too many of them, and they get paid too much.’ He attacks the DLOs. He will not get away from it. He can walk into this place and attack them. Furthermore, he comes in and attacks DLOs and then he says, ‘We have had this blow-out in staff,’ yet I have just revealed to you by a short calculation on a calculator that in fact the allocation for the opposition has gone up under this government on a ratio basis, which is the only fair way to deal with it.

The other thing he needs to answer is: did he have the guts or abide by any normal terms of civility and advise Senator Boswell that he was going to drop a bucket on his staffing allocation before he did so tonight? Did Senator Ray do what any person should do in this place following long practice and protocol? If he is going to drop a bucket on Ron Boswell, did he do the decent thing, the honest thing and the thing that any man would do in this place and ring Senator Boswell before he walked in here and dropped a bucket on him and Senator Boswell’s staff? The answer is no because, as usual, he is full of bluster and very good at taking people out, coming in here and attacking female members of the parliament, attacking the colour of their hair and attacking their weight, but when someone gives it back, he cannot take it.

One again, we have got another example of Senator Ray going over the top attacking people under parliamentary privilege, attacking staff and attacking members of the Australian Public Service. He should be ashamed of himself.