Barry O'Sullivan (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I know that this is a bit sensitive for you, Senator, but these are the facts. We had a motion in this place not 20 minutes ago supporting jobs in the coal industry—supporting the coal industry, supporting new investment in the coal industry. That's going to produce more jobs for these workers, blue-collar workers, workers of the union who support the Australian Labor Party. I hope they were watching when we saw the Australian Labor Party vote against a positive motion about jobs in the coal industry. That's what it was. We said: let's celebrate the jobs in the coal industry.

They supported the motion here earlier today to stop beef production in this country, not to minimise it or mitigate it; they want to stop beef production in this country, which, of course, is the policy of the Greens. Truly, we're seeing an emergence here: this coalition is getting tighter. It's getting tighter by the hour. We must have an election in the wind. We must be starting to have a little fiddle around talking about preferences, do you think? It's getting tighter. They are becoming one again. That's what the Australian people get. They don't just get the Labor Party. They won't just get the Australian Labor Party if there's a change of government; they will get a Labor-Greens government. We know what their attitude is to agriculture. Their big, sterling, touchstone policy last time was to stop the live cattle trade out of this country. Now they want to go a step further and stop beef production in the nation. They won't have to worry about exports of live animals; they want to stop the production of live animals. It's not just around beef. They can pick beef. They have already taken chickens on. They don't like chickens. They don't like sheep. They have called for the suspension of the live trade for sheep. You're a Western Australian, Mr Acting Deputy President Brockman. You know what will happen to those sheep. They will perish in the paddock. They will die an horrific death in the paddock. We have seen it with beef when the suspension of the live cattle trade happened. In a time when there were some climatic challenges around drought—normal droughts, big drought, I think the sixth biggest drought in about 100 years. We've had the millennium drought, the century drought. They all had a name; they all had a skirt and lipstick and a moustache. Of course this is the first one. There has never been any history about this.

This is the sort of rhetoric we're getting from people who want to manage the economy of this nation. The Greens-Labor alignment want to manage the economy. Last time, can I tell Australians, they left us—this is a great little sum—with a debt that was costing $1 billion a week to service. That's what they left the nation with. You wonder why there were structural deficits. It was $1 billion a week. They were borrowing a billion dollars a week to pay the interest on the debt. Even Mr and Mrs Stringbag in the suburbs understand what that means, when you borrow some money and then borrow some money to pay the debt. They absolutely know that at some stage the music stops. It's like with musical chairs: when you try to sit down there won't be any chair. You'll be flat on your back. That's what happens under Labor's economic management. It's $1 billion a week. A government's in for a term of 156 weeks. There are 150 members in the other place. Imagine this: if we didn't have to pay off Labor's debt, there would be $1 billion every electoral term that could be spent in every seat in the country. Think about it. You reflect on a division within your states and wonder what they could do with $1 billion. I know that where I live there's plenty they could do.

They want to talk about education, health, investment in aged care, the National Disability Insurance Scheme—fully funded under us, not funded under the Australian Labor Party. These are people with flowery ideas. I have run into hundreds of them. They are bootleggers. They have nothing. Most of these people don't even understand basic home economics. I remember the wonderful contribution on the economy here one time by Senator Ludlam, who's no longer with us, sadly or not. I went back to understand how he could get it so wrong. I looked up his senator's register. You know what he had on his register? This is a mature man who's been in a high-paying job for a lot of the time. He had put on his register one laptop and a pair of sandshoes. That was it. You need to go back and look at it. I've got it framed—a laptop and a pair of sandshoes after 23 years in the workforce in very good positions. And they have the hide to stand up and lecture my side in relation to economic management.

Well, I'll tell you what: we're stone deaf to what you've got to say, as are the electorate. They know. One of the most common things said to me as I move around the electorate and talk to people, when the issue comes to the economy, is, 'Labor can't manage money.' They're full of big ideas, such as the ones that were articulated by the senator in her contribution. They're full of ideas about how to take away negative gearing. They're full of ideas about how to attack self-funded retirees in this country with their franking credits. Many of these are long-term Labor people who have been wise: teachers, policemen, firemen or self-employed electricians. They are people who support the Australian Labor Party—not as much anymore, but they did support the Australian Labor Party—and who funded for their retirement. They didn't get along and just collect a pair of sandshoes and a computer. So I say to you, Mr Acting Deputy President, that I won't be lectured by the Australian Labor Party on issues of the economy, and I'm quite certain the good people of Australia won't be lectured by them either.