Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

For the Hansard, there is silence on that.

The Labor senators’ report then goes on to talk about plebiscites and their mates in the Queensland Labor Party. The Labor Party in Queensland is one and the same Labor Party; there are not two Labor parties in Queensland. The union heavies who control state preselections are the same union heavies who control federal preselections. They all meet at the one conference; there are not two different conferences. It is one political party, and yet half of them are saying: ‘We didn’t agree with this. Look what we’ve done—we’ve introduced legislation to repeal the draconian legislation we just passed two weeks previously.’ Come on—the people of Queensland understand duplicity when they see it, and they will not forgive the Labor Party for the duplicity and the attempt to remove democratic freedoms from Queenslanders.

As of two days ago, when I inquired, the Labor Party in Queensland had still not dealt with legislation to repeal this. All the way through the hearing, we had Labor senators telling us: ‘The Queensland government have seen the error of their ways. They’re going to introduce legislation. They are going to remove the legislation that has been introduced.’ But here we are several weeks later and it has still not been dealt with by the Queensland parliament—unless it happened this morning and I have not caught up with it. It was certainly not on the top of the legislative agenda for the Queensland parliament—controlled by the Labor Party—when parliament resumed after the break. Then they have the stupidity—I would love to get a lawyer’s view on this—to pass a regulation to amend the principal bill. It defies any logic of the law. It is absolutely amazing.

This is the sort of duplicity that the Labor Party go on with. Heaven forbid that the Labor Party should control every state and the federal government in Australia as, if you believe the opinion polls, is going to happen. Can you imagine what would have happened if the federal government had not been around to say to the Queensland government, ‘We are going to override your legislation to remove this antidemocratic piece of legislation’? If the Labor Party were in power federally, they would not have done it and we, the people of Queensland, would have been thrown into jail had we had the temerity to ask for a poll.

I am disgusted by the attitude of Labor Party people at the hearing, in their speeches today, and in this minority report suggesting that we should have a poll on nuclear power plants. If any council wants to have a poll—on nuclear power plants, for example—they can, unless the council is in Queensland and it happens to be a poll on the right of people to vote at a local government election; in that case, they cannot. Any council in Australia can have a poll tomorrow. They can have a poll on whether Senator Conroy should remain the deputy leader, or whatever he is, of the Labor Party in the Senate. They can have a poll about anything if they want to. Any council in Australia, except any council in Queensland, has the right to have a poll about anything. The people of Queensland would have been thrown into jail if they had asked for a poll on the future of their local authority.

As I said before, the duplicity of this report and of the Labor Party speakers knows no bounds. The suggestion that the Labor Party has had a second thought about this is just preposterous. If it had not been for the Howard government using fairly unusual circumstances and relying on the external affairs power to override Queensland legislation, things would not have changed in Queensland and the bill would still be as it is. The Labor Party—the one Labor Party there is in Australia and in Queensland—pushed this bill through the Queensland parliament in double-quick time. There was never a committee hearing in the Queensland parliament.

Senator Bartlett—one of the lackeys of the Labor Party in Queensland—came along and said: ‘The federal government are duplicitous in this. They are horrible; they only allowed a three-day hearing. They didn’t allow us time.’ How many days of hearing did the Queensland parliament, run by the Labor Party, allow for looking at this bill before it was rammed through the Queensland parliament? I hear no response from the other side. Well, let me give the response: there was no committee hearing in the Queensland parliament.

The question of amalgamations in Queensland is a matter for the Queensland government, not for the federal government. We have never pretended and have never suggested that it is a matter for the federal government. All we have said is that we would restore to Queensland the right to vote on the future of local government. We understand that the polls that will now be conducted in Queensland will have no impact on an arrogant, out-of-touch Labor Party government in Queensland. In the federal Labor Party, the Leader of the Opposition displays the same sort of arrogance. Can you imagine his arrogance when the Labor Party control every state and territory government in Australia and the federal government?

The arrogance displayed by Mr Rudd yesterday in that cheap political speech in front of a foreign dignitary will be multiplied. The arrogance displayed by Mr Rudd yesterday in pre-empting a gift by the Canadian people to the Australian people, with some ridiculous self-centred story about his people coming out in the First Fleet, will be multiplied when the Labor Party controls every government in Australia. Mr Rudd’s arrogance and the hubris he exhibits now—just relying on opinion polls, as he does—will multiply 10-fold if the Labor Party hold every government in Australia. I do not believe it will be the case, but the opinion polls are there.

Under our leader, John Howard, we will be fighting a very determined campaign to save for Australia all of the benefits that Australians have received over the last 11 years of good government in this country. I shudder to think what might be the case in Australia if the Labor Party wins in the federal election. Mr Beattie’s arrogance and the way he has dealt with this undemocratic issue would be multiplied 10-fold. I suppose it is against standing orders to have a bet, but let me make this prediction: should the Labor Party win federally, the GST will be the first thing to go up, because the Labor Party cannot pay for the promises they have already made. They have promised to give everyone dental health care.