Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Hansard source

It is interesting that Senator Brown is allowed to interject and say that other people interjecting are disorderly, when he is in fact interjecting at the same time. I just love the double standard, and the Greens have made it into an absolute art form. What Senator Milne was saying before was that—and she even went to speak ill of the dead—in relation to some conspiracy to reduce the size of the parliament and get rid of the Greens out of the House of Assembly, yes, the Greens did suffer a huge electoral backlash at that time. Who was the leader of Greens at the time? I think Senator Milne has forgotten. Allow me to remind her: it was her, the now Senator Milne. She oversaw the demise of the Green vote in Tasmania, when they had one representative left. Now, in that smaller parliament that was allegedly designed to get rid of the Greens forever, they have four Greens. What I am suggesting—and as I said last night, I do not know why I am giving them this gratuitous advice—is that when you have electoral defeat, do not try to scapegoat a religious minority like the Exclusive Brethren, do not try to scapegoat certain businesspeople and do not try to scapegoat a now deceased Premier of Tasmania: look at yourselves and ask the question, ‘Why didn’t as many people put a No. 1 next to the Green candidates as they did before?’