Tim Ayres (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Trade) Share this | Hansard source

I have watched the contributions of various senators who have been engaged in this over some time. I have watched them. This is the apotheosis of those contributions—partisanship over the interests of ordinary Australians who have a disability, who need the support of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and who need the certainty of a scheme for the future that will deliver. All this is about is crude politics and trying to position in the last half of 2024 and the first half of 2025. There is no interest in the public policy outcome and no interest in engaging with families and stakeholders.

I know that it may be a futile task here, but my job is to ask people in this place to reflect on their duty to ordinary Australians—to disabled Australians, in particular—and to put the public interest first. But I know that, when the sordid partisan fix is in, the fix is in.