Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Education) Share this | Hansard source

It is no wonder that people across regional communities and right across this country keep coming up to me and saying, 'Will this government please tell the truth! Every single time we turn around we get another mistruth from this government.' People out there are getting mighty sick of it. Today, in answers to questions, we have seen yet more of that.

Let me take the chamber to a comment by the Treasurer just this morning, talking about the estimates for the RSPT and the MRRT. The Treasurer said, 'Well, we don't do those 10-year estimates.' Let me just repeat that: 'Well, we don't do those 10-year estimates.' Guess what? Apparently, they do. Because here in this document, when I turn the page, is the 10-year estimate from Treasury. So on this hand, Treasurer: 'We do not do the 10-year estimates'; on this hand, the document: yes they do.

So the Treasurer is either completely inept or he was misleading the Australian people this morning when he made that comment. He said, 'That is a figure that has been bandied around by all manner of people.'

Senator Cormann interjecting—

I will take the gesture interjection, thank you Senator Cormann! Arms up in the air in despair! Is the Treasurer completely inept or, simply, does he know he is misleading the Australian people and he does not care? 'That is a figure that has been bandied around by all manner of people'—what sort of comment is that for the Treasurer to make about something as important as the costings for the RSPT and the MRRT? 'Being bandied around,'—it is here right in front of us on the page from the Treasury documents that were provided under FOI on 14 February last year, and placed on the website. What on earth is this Treasurer doing? If he cannot get something right which is as simple as a question about whether or not 10-year estimates were provided, how on earth can the Australian people trust him to be in charge of the finances of this nation? They cannot.