Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I do not know of any senator in this place, Senator Abetz, including you, who supports child abuse or is not committed to fighting child abuse with every measure available to federal government. I think an attempt to score some sort of political point by trying to make some sort of allegation that Senator Crossin is not committed to the fight against child abuse, as I say, does you no credit. Senator Crossin has had a long interest not only in Indigenous affairs but in children’s services, and she has followed those interests throughout her career in the Senate.

What you do know, Senator Scullion, and what the Senate knows is that there was bipartisan support for the Northern Territory intervention. The Labor side of politics, prior to the last election, offered bipartisan support to the then Howard government immediately it came up with its plan to intervene in the Northern Territory to try and combat child abuse. We offered total bipartisan support immediately and we supported you through all the measures aimed at intervening.

Senator Crossin has been part of that Labor commitment to combat child abuse in the Northern Territory, and when we took government we continued that plan. There have been a couple of minor adjustments, but in large part the intervention has proceeded along the same lines. To come into this Senate and somehow try to take one part of one comment that the senator may or may not have made—I have not actually seen the comments that you refer to, and I would like to see them before I pass any judgement on the veracity of what you have said—I think does the opposition no credit.

What we have seen in the last few days is the Liberal opposition in the Senate take the low road. We saw it yesterday with Senator Ronaldson. He made accusations in this place that the Liberal Party were not prepared to make in the House of Representatives. That is the amount of bottle they had—they were not prepared to carry their allegations against a Labor member of the House of Representatives there. They did not have the bottle.