Trish Crossin (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

What I am trying to highlight again is that the opposition have no matters of policy they want to debate, because they are a policy-free zone. They have time and time again shown to us in this community, particularly in the last 12 months, that all they are good at is saying no, no, no, no. They have no positive policies at all, except of course that if they got elected they would rip $70 billion out of the coffers of the federal government. In order to do that they would need to cut services, cut public service jobs, cut access to Medicare, cut access to pension payments, cut access to the family tax benefits and cut access to programs. So what they want to do is ensure that we talk about anything in this chamber except their policies, because they have none. They cannot come up with anything at all that they could use to get out there and positively say to the Australian public: 'If we were elected as a government, this is what you could get from us as a benefit.' They are saying, 'In fact, all you are going to get from us is a ripping away of $70 billion of services and benefits that are already provided.' So this opposition is going to go to any lengths, any means at all, to ensure that we debate anything other than alternative policies, because there are no alternative policies.

So what are their alternative sports policies? I do not think I have heard the opposition ask Senator Arbib one question in relation to his sports portfolio—not one question, as I said, about the Australian netball team's triumph in Singapore, not one question at all about the cycling fraternity's success or celebrating Cadel Evans's success in France, not one question at all about World Cup soccer, not one question at all about what the AFL are doing to promote the game overseas. There have been no questions about sport at all from the opposition to Senator Arbib, and how disappointing is that? I think once upon a time—