Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I do appreciate the protection being offered to me in relation to some of these comments, but, as Senator McKim pointed out, I have been called worse in my time—as has every other member of this chamber, I suspect.

I have been disappointed at the questions asked every day this week—apart from one question on policy, tacked onto the end of question time today, when they thought they had scored all the political points they needed, so they ventured into the area of jobs policy. In his answer, the Attorney-General spoke about our track record on job creation. In the last year alone, there have been 180,000 new jobs under this government, with a jobs growth rate twice that of the last year of the Labor government.

Senator Sterle interjecting—

Thank you very much for your contributions.

All I can call this is overreach. They flew into Canberra this week thinking they were going to get a scalp: 'We are going to prosecute this until we get what we want.' They have gone down every burrow and split every hair. They have been semantic and pedants on every level, using up their entire time in question time every day trying to land a blow—which they have not done. They cannot prosecute this issue. They really do miss the point of why they are here, which is one of the most disappointing things about having come here and listened to them today and every day this week.

Senator Carr in his contribution just prior to mine talked about fitness for office. If you want to talk about fitness for office, I think the Australian people got it right when they returned the government to this side of the chamber and the opposition to where they should be. It is incredibly disappointing that they think this is what the people of Tasmania or Western Australia want—that they really want to hear all of these ridiculous detailed questions. Where are the questions about health and education, about our defence strategy, about what is going on with the Bass Strait equalisation scheme? Where are those questions? They do not exist. The questions we get are all about detail, insider politics, the Canberra press gallery hype about trying to knock off a minister—as I say, completely disappointing. Then, from the entire opposition, there is one question on policy right at the end. I think Tasmanians deserve better and I think Australians deserve better.

My colleagues from Tasmania have spent a lot of time interjecting on me. I challenge them to ask a question relevant to our state instead of allowing their questions committee to run these ridiculous political lines. Prove to the Tasmanian people that you want to stand up for them rather than just score political points. That is what I say to them. That is what we got elected to do. That is what senators in this place are paid well to do. I encourage the opposition, with one question time remaining this week, to talk about things that are relevant to the Australian people rather than try to score political points to get a headline here, a headline there, so they can go upstairs and do a Sky News interview afterwards. It is disappointing—I have said it a million times. I hope they lift their game.