Pauline Hanson (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

You want to listen to all this! This is what Labor did. There's the home insulation scheme that wasted $2.4 billion, or what about the Building the Education Revolution? They were great policies but they wasted $16.2 billion and saw money spent on schools that closed a short time later. I love this one: the cash for clunkers scheme. It wasted $430 million. It was supposed to be a good idea for pensioners. And there's the set-top box scheme that wasted another $308 million. The promise made by Bill Shorten this month, that no-one will be left behind—doesn't it sound good? It sounds wonderful, but it's as hollow as Bob Hawke's promise that no child would live in poverty. Today, 17 per cent of children in Australia live in poverty. In fact, ads are going on TV to support those children who are living in poverty in our own country.

Labor have a long history of selling out workers. I'm thinking of enterprise bargaining agreements and Labor's recent failure to support personal tax cuts for working families. To hear Senator Cameron say today that the 1,630 apprenticeship places One Nation has put up are going to be detrimental and that there will be lives lost—how disgusting. We have actually pushed forward for apprenticeship schemes in this country, yet they're criticising it. They will not stand by it. They're supposed to be for the workers; they're not for the workers. They've never stood up for the workers in this country unless it fills their own back pockets with money from union fees. They push around an agenda to get their seats in this place, and then they forget about the people out there. They're not looking after the battlers.

Labor's irresponsible plan to rapidly transition to a low-carbon-emitting Australia will end in tragedy. About 38 per cent of carbon emissions comes from the production of electricity, gas and water, so that sector cannot on its own deliver the 50 per cent savings promised by Labor. So I ask: where will savings in carbon emissions be made? There is a real danger that petrol and diesel prices will rise just as they have in France. Labor must rule out taxing carbon emissions on Australian passenger cars, trucks and other vehicles, including those used in agriculture and mining. The major emitters are in the Northern Hemisphere, not Australia, so go and clean up the rest of the world before you start having a go at us. (Time expired)