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

That is the problem that we have in this chamber. We have on record the answer from Minister Arbib where he quite clearly said that the questions asked of him did not come within his area of portfolio responsibility. Therefore, what we really have is an opposition that are not prepared to debate the real policy issues, because they have no policies—that is the issue. What I was trying to helpfully do was redirect the opposition's attention to matters of substantial policy—the issues to which Minister Evans referred to today in his answers—but instead we are going to spend half an hour debating answers to questions which Minister Arbib repeatedly said he could not answer because they did not come within his area of portfolio responsibility. What we have is an opposition that cannot ask any questions at all about sport. They have never asked any questions at all about how fantastically well the Australian netball team did in Singapore to win an international trophy. They cannot ask any questions at all about how fantastically well the cycling community is doing—