Jim Molan (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's hard to know what this take note motion is about. Senator Sterle has certainly spoken to us in glowing terms about a range of things, but nothing specifically precise. Senator Bilyk mentioned that she asked a question about overwhelming support, a question which, of course, Senator Cormann answered in the very first answer in question time today. It's a great comfort to me personally to know that Senator Sterle actually watches my Facebook page. That puts him in a very great group of people many, many tens of thousands strong. And Senator Bilyk said that she felt Senator Sterle's pain. I can assure you, Senator Bilyk, that we feel it as well. We listened to Senator Sterle for quite some time and we feel that pain very, very much.

What I'd like to talk about really is: what does Labor believe in? This seems to be a question of overwhelming support, but overwhelming support for who or what? Whenever I think of overwhelming support for Labor Party policies, I immediately go to border control. Border control in the Labor Party is a classic example of a greatly confused series of people who find they do not and cannot support the policies of their own party. I need only mention Ms Ged Kearney MP and Ms Linda Burney MP. At the last election at least 30 Labor Party members, although their leader kept saying that their policy was exactly the same as the coalition government's policy, declared that they did not believe in regional processing centres.

Let me assure you that I support government policy. I will go through a few of the policies in order to illustrate what I mean. We stand for affordable and reliable energy for household and businesses; Mr Shorten stands for blackouts, higher power prices and a brand new tax on electricity. We stand for lower business and personal taxes for stronger economic growth, more jobs and money in the pockets of Australian workers; Mr Shorten and the Labor Party stand for appalling higher income taxes, company taxes and small-business taxes, and new taxes on electricity, housing and investment. We stand for strong border protection; on the Labor side Mr Shorten stands for weak border policies that led to 1,200 deaths at sea, 50,000 illegal arrivals and the opening of 17 detention centres, which we subsequently closed. We stand for reforming private health insurance to make it simpler and more affordable; the Labor Party will cut the rebate, increase costs and hurt millions of Australian families. We stand for a guaranteed and fully funded Medicare—despite the lies we hear from the Labor side—via a dedicated fund, the lifting of Labor's freeze, and record levels of bulk-billing; Mr Shorten has no guarantee for Medicare and stands for the politicisation of the health system. We stand for drug-testing welfare recipients to help them get into work, and getting 120,000 young people to experience work through the PaTH program; Mr Shorten and the Labor Party oppose drug-testing of welfare recipients to help them get into work, and getting young people to even experience work. We stand for fair, needs based funding for schools, yet the Labor Party stands for unfunded school promises and special deals that do not deliver needs based funding.

In the take-note debate today, if we're going to talk about overwhelming support, we should make a comparison of who supports what, what individuals don't support their own party's policy and what makes a very good government, which is the coalition government. (Time expired)