Catryna Bilyk (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's always interesting when you have to sit and listen to Senator Rennick! I didn't have the option of leaving today, because I'm speaking now, but there you go. I will say that Senator Dean Smith's contribution was quite interesting today, too, because he started talking about the cost of living. Perhaps he was in a different question time to me, because I didn't hear one question today about cost of living—not one. If you're that concerned about cost of living, ask us some questions. As Senator Sheldon said, we know why you don't, because you know that we have the answers to that.

But I actually want to speak about the questions to Minister Farrell. Like Minister Farrell, I was pretty surprised today when he was asked about former senator Ketter's appointment. I remember reading months ago about that appointment. Are you just trawling back through old newspapers? What are you doing to get your questions today? It's quite bizarre. I'd just like to remind those opposite of these people: former minister George Brandis, former minister Mitch Fifield, former senator Arthur Sinodinos and Peter McGauran, just to name four. All those people were appointed to positions by you when you were in government. But the classic one was when former Tasmanian senator David Bushby was appointed to a position one hour after his resignation from the Senate. Don't tell me that there was due process taken there. That's ridiculous. We know that you stacked the AAT. You put former politicians into the AAT. The list is endless. I didn't even bother writing the list down so I could remember them to say. You stacked the arts council. And yet here we have Senator Farrell, who went through due process. Those on the other side have got nothing to offer us, so they come in just trying to claim a scalp—and doesn't it backfire on them?

Those on the other side remind me of a story I read to a group of children the other day. It just keeps coming back to me, especially through question time, in relation to those on the other side. The story was about Henny Penny. I'm not going to say who I think Henny Penny was. For those that don't know the Henny Penny story, Henny Penny was walking through the forest, an acorn fell down, and she thought the sky was falling, and so she started repeating this. This is what they do on the other side. They just create mayhem and distort things to try and win their own ways. They have alarmist stories. They make alarmist comments. They stoke fear amongst people. Henny Penny was convinced that the sky was falling. She kept walking through the forest and met all her friends. She met Goosey Loosey, Ducky Lucky and Turkey Lurkey. They all joined with her. Gee, what does that remind me of? That reminds me of those on the other side. Someone gives them a line, and they just follow it straight down the line. They all join together to repeat the alarmist stories. First of all, we were going to have all the pharmacists close. I haven't seen that happen since we brought in 60-day prescriptions.

We know that those opposite are defined not by what they support but by what they oppose, because all they can say is 'no'. They say no to anything. It's not called the 'no-alition' for nothing. It's led by the Leader of the Opposition, who the Prime Minister has said has nothing positive to offer Australia. You don't come in and offer solutions; you don't have policies. I remember when we first took government. There were people on your side saying very clearly—it's in the Hansard'We don't do policies; we're the opposition.' What a disgrace. Don't come in here and try to gain a scalp over something that is completely legitimate when you guys just have no policies, you say no to everything, you object to everything and you don't want us to progress anything. I think you probably think that's the way you will win government back, but, let me tell you, you won't. (Time expired)