Michael Ronaldson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Special Minister of State) Share this | Hansard source

Exactly: how many millions of dollars did it cost? It was the 24-hour news cycle, the spin and the substance—and, as soon as they turned the lights off in this place at the end of the summit, they turned the lights off in relation to the Prime Minister’s interest in these matters. They just flicked both switches, and he went on to the next one. We have heard the drum bang, time after time, about openness and transparency and about the government listening to the people. Do you know what the website said, no ifs, no buts? ‘This will all be answered by the end of the year at the latest. I’m going to make sure that the views expressed to me are actually acted upon by the government.’ Then, all of a sudden, the website changed: it went from ‘the end of the year’ to ‘the New Year’. Well, even given its most expansive interpretation, we are no longer in the New Year. We are in the middle of March. It is no longer the New Year. We will not get a response in relation to the 2020 Summit, and every single one of those people who came here in good faith has been let down by the government.

In relation to this issue, again it is back to this ‘openness and transparency’; it is about the ‘new way’. Well, the new way has not delivered. There is no interest in changing these processes that apparently were so diabolical. There are 160-odd unanswered questions after 90-plus days. And, as I said before, if I had not done something about it they would still be unanswered. Then we had the discourteous behaviour of a number of ministers who left the chamber today. It was complete and utter discourtesy.

I am aware for the time pressures today and that this discussion has probably gone on a bit longer than we all anticipated, so I will finish my remarks on this basis. I know what Senator Ludwig is going to jump up and say in a second. He will rattle off figures about 90 days or 93 days—we will hear the lot—and he will say: ‘They were terrible. We are better.’ You are not better at all.