Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

TT (—) (): As I said and we have said now for two straight weeks, Minister King has made very clear that her decision was based on the national interest. I suspect that was the basis of the decision that Minister McCormack, as he then was, made in February 2018 when he 'put a hold on an application by Qatar Airways'. Those were his exact words from a couple of weeks ago. He was honest. At least we have one honest member of the National Party. He owned up to the fact that when he was a minister he made a decision to put on hold an application by Qatar Airways.

I haven't seen any calls from the opposition over the last couple of weeks for any of the airlines that currently have the ability under the law, under the rules, to bring more flights to Australia to actually do so. How about you join our calls on those other airlines to get more flights to Australia and relieve pressure on prices? I also take the opportunity to remind the chamber that the price of aviation tickets first went up under the coalition, so again maybe there was an opportunity for you to do something about it when you were there. (Time expired)