Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Conroy, can I say to you: since I last spoke I have had a couple of very interesting emails—unfortunately, I have come from the other side of the building, or I would have brought this letter down, because I would have liked to have read it to the chamber. Suffice to say that a constituent—well, actually, not a constituent of mine; he is from New South Wales—indicated that he had been listening. He was grateful that we were standing up for those people who work for the private contractors who are dealing with the greenfields sites that are going to be put out of business by this government's activities—yet more unemployment. He thanked me, and Senator Birmingham as well, for standing up for them and for putting the government through its paces and for trying to get the government to answer questions. He did say that he was disgusted that the Senate had to call quorums to make sure that the minister was in the chamber and listening to the questions and actually responding to them.