Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

Again, we seem to be in a situation whereby Mr Albanese is asking the Australian people to (a) trust him—he has let them down plenty of times before, so I don't think they should trust him now and (b) vote on the vibe, because you are clearly putting the cart before the horse. The Australian people would actually like to know the answers to these questions now.

As Peter Dutton so articulately stated in his letter, the Prime Minister of Australia is treating the Australian people like mugs. You have referred to the design principles as if they are some huge documents that the government should be proud of. I have read the design intervals. It wasn't very hard. Do you know why? It's a glossy brochure. In fact, it's not actually a glossy brochure. That's actually offensive to glossy brochures! A glossy brochure would at least have some substance. This has no substance at all. You insult the people of Australia by telling them that brochure is basically the answers to these questions. You are asking the Australian people to put the cart before the horse. If you don't know or if the question is fundamentally uncertain, you should say so, so the Australian people can take that into account. What you are saying here—you established question 1 on eligibility: you need to be of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent. No. 2 on prerequisites: there is none other than you need to be of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent. The third question is: will the Voice members be subject to the same requirements around citizenship, bankruptcy and criminal conviction as members of parliament? You are unable to answer that question as that is yet to be determined. Is that correct, Senator Watt?