Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

What an embarrassment of riches for the opposition to pursue, in terms of the non-answers given to questions asked by coalition senators in question time today. It could not be more perfectly bounded than by the example set by the acting Leader of the Government in the Senate who could not give to the parliament and to the Australian people the definition of 'mortgage stress' when asked by my colleague in question time today. We see this time and time again. We see the refusal to answer a question. We see the deflection of blame to somebody else or to something else: 'It's not our fault.' They're not willing to take responsibility for holding the Treasury benches, which they do at the will of the Australian people. They trot out the talking points. You can see the ball bouncing along the talking points. 'We understand Australians are doing it tough,' they say. But Australians are tired of hearing that from the government because, as we know, the government is not actually doing anything about it. The government continues to blame everybody else.

Likewise, when it comes to salmon farming on the west coast of Tasmania, we see extraordinary concerns. We see threatening letters from the Minister for the Environment and Water, and it just follows on from other things. In particular, people on the east coast of Tasmania in those resource based industries are suffering from the lack of capacity of this government to make a decision. I congratulate the Premier on his response to the environment minister's letter. We will be supporting the salmon industry. What did Premier Rockliff say? He said: 'I want to be clear. I will not stand by and allow the federal Labor government to kill off our salmon industry and the 350 jobs that it supports.' Mind you, the government couldn't even tell us today how many jobs the salmon industry supports. I give a shout-out to the mayor of the West Coast Council, Mr Shane Pitt, who is completely unimpressed with Ms Plibersek's threats. 'Minister Plibersek is playing political games with the lives of people in our community, and it's a bloody disgrace,' Councillor Pitt says, and good on Councillor Pitt for sticking up for his community.

It's just like the workers at MMG, who are waiting for a decision on being able to continue the life of that mine on the west coast. The salmon farmers and the communities of people they support should be supported by this government, and all we hear are threats from the minister and a refusal to make decisions in support of the industry. The Tasmanian government, along with industry, has put a strong plan on the table to protect the maugean skate, and what we want to see from this government is unequivocal support for the Tasmanian salmon industry.

Question agreed to.