Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr President. It was actually a group called the Humane Society International. Now you want to talk about foreign investment problems and our agricultural industries being controlled by foreign boardrooms, this was a classic case of the then minister for the environment being controlled by a foreign activist group. The Humane Society International championed the listing of the Murray-Darling Basin and Macquarie Marshes et cetera under this particular legislative instrument and category. So rather than using good process, the former Labor government, as they rushed and hurtled towards the last election, typically threw this in as the 'kitchen sink'. They thought it was going to get them the votes that they might have needed. I see Senator Ludlam from the Greens in WA is here. Labor might have needed a couple of percentage points from Green votes right across Australia or to get back some of their core vote, the left-leaning progressive Labor voters who bled to the Greens—hats off, Greens; hats off—over successive elections. Butler was trying his very best to hold some of the seats that he knew Labor were facing losing. It is why they swapped the leaders when they did; it is why they ended up putting in legislative instruments to keep their mates happy. But the Australian people had the last laugh, didn't they? They saw through the farce that was the previous three governments—Rudd, Gillard, Rudd—and made their views very, very clear on election day. They were very clear on who they wanted to take this country forward and the program that they wanted implemented.

In the very short amount of time I have left to me, I would like to say, on the second last day that we sit here for 2013, we are a frustrated government in the Senate as the opposition refuses to accept the outcome of the election, refuses to accept that the Australian people want the carbon tax repealed. Regional Australia wants the carbon tax repealed; the communities and businesses in the Murray-Darling Basin want the carbon tax repealed so that we can get on irrigating, so that we can get on growing great food and so that we can get on processing and manufacturing the high quality products that come out of the Murray-Darling Basin.

It is a fabulous result to have this motion disallowed, and I commend the government. I am proud of my Murray-Darling Basin communities—Echuca, Cobram, Yarrawonga, Mildura, Shepparton and the rest—and I am proud to be part of the government. (Time expired)