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

Caucus had no idea, no. During the last 3½ or four years they have had no idea. Sorry, Senator Evans, I do not accept your limp answer to that question earlier in the week. Sure, you discussed it when it was a fait accompli in cabinet, and that is about the extent of it that I will accept. Poor old caucus, as my colleague interjects, had no idea it was coming. Yet again they have been let down and stitched up by another leader. They have no input. They have had very little input during this whole government. What a miserable time they have had in government. They have had no time to enjoy it, let down by every single leader—let alone that the Australian people have been betrayed.

But history will catch up with this broken commitment and promise. I know we are not to use the words ‘untruth’ or ‘lie’, but it will not be lost on the Australian people. This is not a beltway issue. You hear on the radio the Prime Minister defending her backflip. It is excruciating. It is delusional. It is embarrassing. It is humiliating. It is just plain fake, and it is not working. I know there is much conjecture about whether we are listening to the real Julia or the fake Julia. I say they are one and the same: the real Julia is a fake. The truth is that this tax will have a cascading effect through the economy, hitting working families, business and the rural sector. The Greens want the rural sector in eventually, and it will come in.