Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It would be remiss of me to miss this opportunity. I heard that you, Senator Sinodinos, have been promoted to the finance committee. To be really honest with you, I heard a collective 'Whew!' coming out of the red halls up here when they heard that. They thought to themselves, 'Thank goodness—someone with a brain!' I have not seen you operate in the Senate too much, but I have no doubt your credibility is extremely high. But I tell you what: you do not need the other three. Do the party a favour and give them something else to do, like checking out the gardens. You get on with it. I know that I speak from the majority of Australians looking forward to hearing something positive come out of that side on what they are going to do at the next election.

But I really did want to go to the small business opportunities that this government has provided. I got to see Senator Joyce, the Leader of the Nationals in the Senate, which he forgot about last night—he was reminded by Senator Evans that he was the Leader of the Nationals in the Senate—struggle through the most ridiculous set of questions about what the Labor Party is doing for small business and to see Minister Arbib completely wipe the floor with and embarrass that side of the chamber on a ridiculous question. We have done so much for small business, not least the Building the Education Revolution of $16.2 billion. I have done some 50 BERs where small business people were rewarded with not only keeping their job but keeping the jobs of their employees. On that, thank you very much.