Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Labor Party doesn't need to advise the Australian people to have the clarity of vision that they have about the disunity that is characteristic of this government—the chaos of this government. There are people sitting here in the chamber today who aren't able to go to the green place because nobody's there. Nobody's there because this government is running from itself. It's eating itself alive, and it didn't want to put on a show in the green house, so it just decided not to show up. Three words: chaos, dysfunction and disunity. Those are the hallmarks of the Turnbull government.

With the Labor Party, we are fighting for the things that Australians need. We are fighting to protect penalty rates for workers. We are fighting to restore funding to schools and ensure funding is needs based, instead of having the $17 billion cut that this divided government wants to deliver—or has, in fact, delivered. We're fighting to make housing more affordable, fighting to ensure a fairer taxation system and fighting to make sure that young Australians and people who want to retrain don't have to go to university and be saddled with the albatross of a $100,000 debt around their neck. That is what they're trying to push through this place. That's the kind of government they are, and they don't want people to see it.

While they're doing all of this malicious damage to the nation of Australia and our social fabric, the Turnbull government is entertaining itself with massive internal fights. The disunity has become clearer every single day, and in the past fortnight it's been absolutely clear for the whole of the country to see. Mr Turnbull, the Prime Minister, has completely lost his authority. He's lost the confidence of his party and he has certainly lost the confidence of the Australian people. But you don't need to take my word for it; just look at the Prime Minister's actions, which reveal what's really going on. Everyone else, including even in his own disunified party, was ready to show up, but Mr Turnbull makes a call, a captain's pick of his own kind. Why? Because he is absolutely running scared of his own backroom.