Julian McGauran (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I get you all the time, don’t I, Senator Collins? You must watch me on television and come in here. And you are good at it. But that is about all you are good at; you are a top interjector. As Doug Cameron subsides, you are starting to rise. You are all good interjectors over there, but you are not good debaters. Nor are you very good defenders of your own government after three years. Let me go through the report card and you can interject during it, Senator Collins. Firstly, in the three years, incredibly—historically!—you have had two prime ministers. That situation was born out of failure and division.

Secondly, according to that respected elder and great historian of the Labor Party, Senator Faulkner, you are a government with no courage. He said you have ‘more cunning than courage’ in leadership. Those were his words. According to the former Labor senator and respected powerbroker Senator Richardson, or Richo, you are a government with no agenda,. Senator Carr has just walked in. When I mention Senator Richardson, he should shudder. Didn’t Richo do him over a few times? Senator Richardson said you are a government with no agenda.

You have had two Prime Ministers, you have no courage, you have no agenda and, to top it off, according to Senator Cameron you have no brains. He said that you are all ‘zombies’. He says you are a government with no brains. The ‘respected’ Senator Cameron—for the sake of argument, I will use that word—said:

They—

meaning all of you on that side—

… are stifled in the caucus, they are stifled in the public … and so people see the Labor Party having no values and no vision on a whole range of issues and I think that must change ...

It seems to be like having a political lobotomy.

That is his report card on you all after three years in government. You are a government with no trust—the Australian people told you that at the last election. You are the first government since Federation to lose its majority—the last one was in 1929. You will go down in the record books for that. The Australian people sent you that message because they did not trust you. You had hyped up all the things you were going to do in your first three years and you did not deliver. You are a government with no competence. In the three years of Labor, you have squandered the surplus and turned it into debt. You spent it on pink batts, Julia Gillard memorial halls and, worst of all, the $35 billion broadband network. You are a government with absolutely no ideas or direction. When you first came into government you set up some 80 reviews, and the new Prime Minister has done no better. She set up climate change committees and she has continued with those reviews. You have no direction. You are a government which, under the old Prime Minister and the new Prime Minister, has just wasted taxpayers’ money. Lastly, you have no control, because the Greens have the control. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.