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

Thank you, Mr President. We all know that the greatest threat to the family budget, of course, is the coalition. Last month Tony Abbott endorsed the extreme Work Choices law of the Howard govern­ment as good policy and made it clear it continued to have his personal support. He said: 'Work Choices didn't fail because it was bad policy. It failed because it had never been put properly to the people.' So Tony Abbott asserts that the failure of Work Choices was merely a failure of salesman­ship not of policy.

We know that the Liberal Party does not change on this question and, despite Senator Abetz trying to keep the talk down and telling people they ought to continue to run the line 'we are working on new policy', we have seen backbencher after backbencher—and of course the return of Peter Reith—arguing the case for abolishing penalty rates and arguing the case to rip Australian families of much needed income. The Liberal Party is a threat to Australian wages. (Time expired)