Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

This is a government that has been unable to make the case today about the urgency of these bills, the Business Services Wage Assessment Tool Payment Scheme Amendment Bill 2016 and the Trade Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 1) 2016. This is a government that just wants any distraction. Please just give us a distraction from the shambolic performance of Senator Cormann cutting loose the Treasurer seven or eight times on national television. He says, 'No, it's nothing to do with me. Go and ask Mr Morrison. I don't know about any excesses in negative gearing. Mr Morrison said that. I don't talk to the Treasurer about things like that. That's not my portfolio.' I thought they worked on budgetary matters together. So it is no wonder that Mr Morrison has been calling Senator Cormann the chief bed-wetter, because he has cut him off at the knees in public. The finance minister—