Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party, Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Yes, job security and profitability. Correct me if I am wrong, but this is the same party that is going to bring in the carbon tax. Is that correct? You may ask how this is relevant to the airline industry. I will tell you exactly how it is relevant. The carbon tax is going to go on airlines that operate domestically but not on the ones coming into Australia. So, they are creating a tariff against their own workers. They are part of a process to drive their own workers out of a job. Why would they do that?

It seems the Labor Party thinks there are two types of planes. There are evil, nasty, naughty Australian planes with evil, nasty, naughty Australian workers in them. Then there are righteous planes, the ones that come in from overseas. They become righteous as they pass over water towards us. But they are evil if they are owned in Australia and go in the other direction.

We now have a situation where if you go to Fiji you will not pay the carbon tax, but God help you if you go to Cairns. It is completely immoral to go to Cairns, so you must pay the carbon tax. If you go to Fiji or go surfing in Bali it is okay. But if you go to Margaret River in Senator Sterle's state to go surfing you pay the carbon tax. And they talk about job security!

At one stage Paul Howes of the AWU told us that if the carbon tax cost one job he would stand up against it. Brave Paul Howes! Anyway, brave Paul Howes is nowhere to be seen these days. We have not heard much lately from brave Paul Howes about the carbon tax. Brave Paul Howes has become invisible Paul Howes. He is probably writing another book. He is the only man I now who has written more books than he has read. He will be out there writing a book about how influential he is. It will be great bedtime reading. Circulation might not be so good, but he will be out there writing. I would love to see him stand up and do something for the workers he represents.