Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Isn’t it amazing where the Labor Party is headed—it is the Days of our Lives commentary; that is where they have gone. They are now talking about the argumentum ad hominem of personal politics because they are completely and utterly lacking policy depth after their housing fiasco. The Labor Party’s statement yesterday was that their view for Australia is that we would be renters in public housing estates. The conservative side of politics believes in this ‘amazing new concept’ that you should own your home. What the Labor Party came up with in its place was the giving of a tax break and incentive break to big business and big unions over the individual mum and dad, who would prefer that the money went into their own bank account to pay for their housing loan so that they could then put their heads on the pillows where they live.

The opposition are surprised that there is more than one person in the coalition who wants to be Prime Minister. I can tell you that there are quite a number of people in the coalition who would like to be Prime Minister because it is a team of talent, and talent always aspires to lead. We can look at Costello and at Downer, but let us talk about the Labor team. Maybe Garrett is an aspirant; Prime Minister Garrett—now that would be an interesting day for Australia—or Prime Minister Swan. What a beacon of leadership Swan is! We could have some of the others that you do not even hear of—Fergusons 1 and 2. It is like B1 and B2. I know they are down there but you never hear from them. They do not really matter.