Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

But the government has been ranting, especially in the other place—and now Senator Cameron after about a fortnight has cottoned on to what occurs in the other place—about this protecting Lamborghini owners and Porsche owners et cetera. Surely the government must have some information available to it as to how many Lamborghinis and Rolls Royces were sold in Australia last year to see if the arguments put forward by the Prime Minister and the Treasurer are true. I think we know that they are quite the opposite.

Surely for them to be able to make the arguments that they have sought at question time, they must have information available to them? Or is it a case of: ‘I’ve got the information but I’m not going to share it with you, therefore you have to trust us. Believe us. We are from the government. I am Kevin 747. Believe me.’ On what basis were you able to convince the crossbenchers of the integrity of that analysis? Did they ask for it or did they just swallow it? We really are concerned about the robustness of the information on page 1 of the explanatory memorandum, headed ‘General outline and financial impact’. It seeks to assert a financial impact, but we are told that the figures are not even available for the numbers of cars sold. Where did these figures come from?