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

Before the arrogant Leader of the Opposition in the Senate gets too whipped up, his own party supported this and there was unanimity around this chamber. Nobody opposed it, other than, it seems, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, and if he had been in here he would have opposed it. The reality is, it got through this Senate on the voices. The reason it got through is that it made such good common sense. Rather than Senator O’Brien trying to play Inspector Clouseau, rather having a bumbling inspector going around, we thought a High Court judge of the experience of Ian Callinan QC would be the sort of person whom we would want to inquire into all the aspects surrounding the outbreak of equine influenza. If Senator O’Brien thinks he can make cheap political comment about this, can I tell him that the $3.6 billion industry that surrounds the 10,000 commercial horses in this country and all the people who gain their livelihoods from the horse industry—