James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

And I'm not necessarily saying for those opposite; I'm saying for those who take the people for granted, for those who only listen to the shrill, loud voices of Twitter, for those who only listen to the commentariat who write on the pages of Fairfax and for those who do not listen to the quiet Australians—those people who go on with their lives, who have a job, who would like to get a job, who would like to start a business, who would like to just to get on with life and who don't want the heavy hand of government, the heavy hand of unions, the heavy hand of leftist politicians telling them what to do.

For those who are still a bit surprised by the result, 18 May was a wake-up call, and I say to my friends on the left of politics, my friends on the other side of the chamber—I use 'friends' in the broadest sense of the word—that you should listen to those quiet Australians. You should listen in terms of not only what they said but what they didn't say, and of why they said that, because 18 May was not just a wake-up call. It was a clarion call to the political class to stop chasing after vested interests, to stop chasing after those who put the interests of radical minority groups before the interests of those quiet Australians who live in the suburbs and drive second-hand cars. Sometimes they might be lucky enough to buy a new car. Sometimes they can only afford a new car when they retire and use that super to buy a new car for the first time in their lives.

The quiet Australians aren't flash. They get pretty excited when they get one of those nice, big flat-screen TVs and it goes up on the wall. They're really happy they've got this great, big TV. And you know what? Sometimes they might leave it on stand-by—accidentally—because what they want to do is make sure they can get on with life. They also don't want people to interfere with them. They want to make sure that their kids and their families can have the best, and sometimes—