Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by Opposition Senators today.

Last night at the departing senators' valedictory addresses Senator McGauran likened politics to opera, with love, hate, lust and betrayal all featuring—but, fortunately, no singing. 'Operatic' actually isn't a bad start to describe this Labor government. But, let's face it, The Magic Flute it ain't; it is more like some operatic farce from 18th-century Italy.

When I think back to the 2007 federal election, enter stage right—or should I say stage left!—the member for Kingsford Smith, Mr Garrett. Remember he said, 'Don't worry, once we get in we'll just change it all.' All of us in the opposition know that Labor will do or say anything to get elected, that is true, but the problem over the past four years is not just dishonesty—it is actually far more dangerous than dishonesty—it is incompetence. It is bad enough that Labor makes popular and populist election promises, but it is far worse: they actually take those promises seriously and then—for God's sake!—they try to implement them. The dishonest promises are bad enough, but to take them seriously is a crime and it is a crime on the taxpayer.

Labor governs through a series of brain snaps, glib slogans and, always, broken promises. Remember, Deputy President—how could you forget?—the education revolution, the slowest revolution in recorded history. Its earliest manifestations were the computers in schools fiasco. Mr Rudd holding a laptop—you will recall that—said it was the toolbox of the 21st century. He promised one for each student. What happened? The maintenance and the upkeep of those laptop computers cost three times the capital cost. What had to happen in the end? The parents and schools had to pay more for them. Now what did we learn at the last estimates? In fact schools are charging students to take home those laptops. So, in any case, they are not free. Have any of those laptops been connected, as promised, to high-speed broadband after four years? No. We are waiting for the NBN. Don't worry, Senator Conroy and the NBN will fix it. By the time they are connected the laptops will be redundant.

Remember the trade training centres promised for every school—there were supposed to be 2,650. How many are there after 3½ years? Eighty-nine. At this rate it will take 100 years for there to be a trade training centre in every secondary school. Another abject failure. It goes on. Who could ever forget the farce of GroceryWatch and the horror of Fuelwatch—the theory being, apparently, that if you watched the carrots and pumpkins and the bananas, prices would not go up; that if you fixed an aggressive stare on a bunch of bananas, the bananas wouldn't dare go up in price! And what happens now? They are 13 bucks a kilo. So that didn't work either. Another failure of the Labor government. The granddaddy of all broken promises is the carbon tax. Hopefully that dishonesty will prove terminal.

What all these slogans and brain snaps have in common is this: they sounded pretty cool to Mr Rudd's 26-year-old advisers, but when it came to implementation it was apparent there was no planning, no detail, no costings, no cost-benefit analysis and no business case . It was a total and utter shambles. We have government by brain snap, glib slogan and broken promises.

I know that many are leaving the Senate—many great senators—so on this historic moment I cite Karl Marx, Senator Carr's friend and mentor and grooming inspiration, who once said, 'History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.' With modern communications and the perpetual news cycle, we now have them occurring in fact simultaneously. This government is clearly a farce and it is a tragedy for Australia taxpayers.

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

To call this government 'a farce' is just typical scaremongering and another silly comment and stunt put up by those on the other side. It does not quite match the stunt of wanting to have a plebiscite and then saying that they wouldn't take any notice of the result. What must the people of Australia think about that? Here they go: 'We want to have a plebiscite, we want to spend millions of dollars'—all that money that goes into running a plebiscite—but then their leader says, 'But I won't take any notice of it.' I don't think the people of Australia are conned for one moment with the scare campaign and the silly tactics we see coming from the other side.

The first question of the day in today's question time was probably, in my three years in this place, one of the most bizarre I have heard. If that is what their first question of the day is going to be about they really need to look at their tactics committee. We are seeing the scare campaign and we have seen it before. We have seen it in a number of areas. It is exactly the same one we saw through the global financial crisis. The scare campaign then was that a large number of people in Australia were going to lose their jobs. I think Mr Hockey said that 300,000 Australians were going to lose their jobs. Instead, what happened? We have 700,000 more Australians in jobs today than when the government took office. That is despite the impact of the GFC.

Those on that side completely waste question time. I know that you, Mr Deputy Speaker, personally have a great interest in how question time is run. I listened intently to your speech the other night regarding how question time should be run. For those on your side to have so little respect for what you have to say and for your philosophy and beliefs does not augur well for them as a group or as individuals.

Recently we had 13 of Australia's most prominent economists, including a former deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia and several financial market economists, come out in support of a carbon price. The group of economists included Grattan Institute director Saul Eslake, St George chief economist Besa Deda, Citigroup Global Markets' Paul Brennan and Westpac chief economist Bill Evans. Still those on the other side deny the need for a carbon price. Those people I just mentioned declared that putting a price on pollution is the best way to reduce carbon pollution. They described a price on carbon as 'a necessary and desirable structural reform for the Australian economy'. This reinforces yet again is that every credible participant in this debate knows that the only responsible thing for our nation to do is to put a price on carbon. As former Liberal leader John Hewson said:

Australia needs to take substantive, urgent and apolitical action on carbon pricing for the sake of our economy and our environment. The failure of our generation to act will cost future generations dearly.

That is the important thing. It is the cost to the future generations that is of key concern to us on this side of the chamber. Those on the other side come in here and it does not matter what we want to put up they say: 'No, no, no.' As I said earlier in the week, their policy on climate change should not be called direct action; I believe it should be called direct no-action because that is what they are the party of—direct no-action on everything.

Opposition Senators:

Opposition senators interjecting—

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

They remind me of the two-year-olds I used to care for, their little tantrums and two-year-olds who say no all the time. I am so often reminded of that when I come in here and all I hear is negativity, harping and interjections that I can talk over because, as the senator knows, I used to work with children. I can talk over 30 screaming three-year-olds and I am happy to keep doing that here. It is interesting to note what other people on their side have said about the carbon price. The shadow Treasurer used to support— (Time expired)

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Bilyk, we will have to hear about that another day.

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

I am sure you will look forward to it!

Judith Adams (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Bilyk thinks we are a party of no action. I have about 23 broken promises by the Gillard government since the 2010 election.

In taking note of answers to questions, I rise to speak on issues mentioned by the ministers. Firstly, Senator Arbib told us about the very good training programs for Indigenous people. I wish that I had asked just what he is going to do about the 700 Aboriginal employees on the cattle stations in the Kimberley. There are 30 stations owned by Aboriginal corporations and families. A number of employees, and a lot of these are trainees, based at Roebuck Plains Station, where the Federal government has put a lot of money into training, are desperate. They do not know where they are going with the live export trade being suspended and no indication, even though the minister tried to tell us today, of when that trade might start again. It is very worrying. That might be a question for Senator Arbib tomorrow.

It is time that this chamber was reminded of the election promises broken by the Gillard government since election day in 2010. We start with the carbon tax, then the citizens assembly that was a great idea but we never, ever saw it. There was a community consensus on taxing carbon; I do not know where that went. There was a new era of openness and transparency; we are not going too well there and it seems even the ministers and the government at the moment have to put all their media and any interviews through to the Prime Minister's office before they are allowed to go out and tell the public. How do we go there? Is that evidence of an era of openness and transparency for government ministers?

Then there was onshore processing which was going to take place at Curtin and the Scherger RAAF base, and processing refugees at Broadmeadows, which is the Melbourne immigration transit accommodation. Then there was the offshore processing centre in East Timor; what has happened to that? There was cash for clunkers; I think that came and it went. Then there was the mining tax royalties; that is very dear to my heart and to Senator Cormann's, and it is an absolute mess. If I have time, I will quote Sam Walsh saying how they thought they had done a deal with government and then it all backfired. Senator Mason spoke about the cost of the BER and the failure to implement Orgill's recommendations. There was the solar credits scheme. There was the delay of the national curriculum and the delay of the new My School website. Then there was reform of health and hospitals, goodness me, just before the budget; what happened there? The whole health reform was turned on its head and that made it very difficult for us in budget estimates to really work out if it was reform or just what was going to happen. It is still not worked out and, looking at some of the legislation that is coming through, no wonder it is being sent to Senate committees to sort it out.

Then we go on to the convening of a tax summit before 30 June 2011. I think that is in eight days time. Are we going to have a tax summit? I do not know what happened there. There was sparing the Public Service from budget cuts. There was sending asylum seekers to Malaysia; we are still not there with that and one wonders if it will ever happen. There was the hypocrisy about the Pacific solution, temporary protection visas and now reinvesting the Defence budget savings into Defence and increasing Defence spending. I think we have a lot of things to follow up. In the House Hansard on 10 May 2005, Julia Gillard said— (Time expired)

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Adams, you must refer to the Prime Minister by her proper title.

Judith Adams (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

She was not the Prime Minister in 2005.

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I apologise.

Ursula Stephens (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I, too, rise to take note of answers to questions without notice asked today, particularly given who is in the chamber today—both you, Mr Deputy President and Senator Scullion. I think that the issues arising out of questions to Minister Ludwig around the live cattle export industry and its future are pretty important. I think we are all in furious agreement that we need to have public confidence in that industry and we are also in furious agreement about the outrage of the animal cruelty that we witnessed on the television program that led to the suspension of the live export trade by the minister.

In the first instance, congratulations go to the minister for taking the action that he did and for going to Indonesia to negotiate some outcomes. As we have just heard from the previous speaker, there are some real vested interests in this industry that are looking for some security and certainty. It is very clear what the suspension of the live export trade is seeking to achieve, and the minister highlighted those today. First of all there is the strengthening of the export licences, strengthening the supply chain security and reinvesting in confidence in the system, which I think has been seriously depleted by the actions of Meat and Livestock Australia and by the actions that we witnessed on the television program. We also all want to see adherence to the international animal welfare guidelines that should underpin good stewardship in this regard. The minister said today that trade would reopen when the set of mutual standards have been established and he is working to ensure that happens as quickly as possible.

I am sure I am not the only one in this chamber who has received over 15,000 emails in a concerted campaign that is actually about closing down the live export industry. For those people who have been orchestrating that campaign, it has certainly been one that has clogged up the parliamentary email system beyond belief, but we are very realistic and, in fact, most Australians are very realistic about the importance of our pastoral industry and our live animal exports. Most Australians support the continuation of trade if there are guarantees that cattle will be treated humanely. A recent report substantiates that. An Essential Report that was recently released indicates that 72 per cent of Australians support the long-term continuation of live exports and that 58 per cent of them supported the minister's decision to suspend trade while these issues are being investigated.

We all want this issue resolved. We are in furious agreement about having this resolved, but we also have to work very hard to restore public confidence in the industry before we can renew our live trade export. I have to say that the MLA have responsibility for part of the solution. We just heard about the pastoral industry and the pastoral stations that are significantly impacted by this and the uncertainty about employment, particularly for Indigenous people, is something that I am very concerned about, but of course this goes much further beyond that. It goes right along the supply chain, from the pastoral industry to everyone else involved: exporters, port and stevedoring services, shipping companies, road transporters, veterinarians and everyone in between who is part of a very important industry for the Australian agricultural sector. We do want this resolved, but the Australian people want to have public confidence in our live export industry. Until we can achieve the standards to ensure that there are international welfare guidelines adhered to in this process, we simply cannot just resume a trade that will be to the detriment of the long-term sustainability of this industry. I know that people are stressed and I know that people are worried, but I also know that the minister is working day and night to ensure that the impact on Australian producers is resolved.

Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also rise to take note of answers to questions during question time today and to speak with regard to the questions asked of Senator Ludwig on the live cattle trade. I agree with Senator Stephens that there is broad agreement on both the complexity of the problem and resolving the problem. It is very, very important, in order for the Australian people to understand and to fully support this matter, that the facts are provided. The Senate provides a great opportunity for the minister to provide the facts. Sadly, we ended up with him berating Senator Boswell for his questions, simply answering again and again, 'I've told you what the Australian government is going to do.' Senator Boswell's questions highlighted the fact that, in eight days time, the June quarter licences that are provided not by the Australian government but by the Indonesian government, are due, and what is their view about reissuing those? It is an absolutely fundamental point that I know the industry is dying to hear. But again, I would take the opportunity to commend Senator Ludwig in a very difficult circumstance. I am not sure who persuaded him to move away from his first decision, which everybody agreed was a good one, to a decision to unilaterally suspend the trade. If they were to look back, I am sure that they would have done it somewhat differently.

Australia and New Zealand signed the G20 accord, which has a number of provisions in it. One of the provisions relates to the sanctioning of another nation. Both Indonesia and Australia are signatories to the G20 and there are a series of processes about consultation and negotiation when you sanction another country. In the roar of dust and saddles in all this, we may not have seen it that way, but Indonesia absolutely surely see this as a sanction against their country, and apparently none of the usual protocols were met. There is much speculation in the media that this has now become a very tense diplomatic issue, and I suspect it is because of the way that that decision was made. I think there is somebody who can raise the bar, if you like, in Indonesia about these diplomatic issues. I would encourage Mr Rudd to put down his knife and pick up his passport. I am quite sure that his intervention in these matters would be very helpful.

Everybody acknowledges that we need a full through process that is accredited and trackable today. For some time we have had a process where 10,000 cattle have NLIS tags on them. There is no question about traceability. We have ships that have absolutely no problem. They have been approved to the highest standards of IALA. We then move to the feedlots in Indonesia, which have in fact been passed to an international standard—ISO 2001. It is not some vague international welfare standard; this is a standard that is independently audited and is well known throughout the business world. But that happens today.

We have the minister and others standing up in this place saying, 'All we have to do is get this in place.' That is that point. The industry is saying it is in place. We need to move ahead for those places that can guarantee the Australian people that the animals will get treated according to a standard that is acceptable to a series of OIE standards, and I suspect the standards I am talking about exceed those.

We need to start the trade. We need to recommence the trade, because it is not going to threaten the trade in the long term. It is only starting the trade to those places that guarantee all the things that the Australian people and the Indonesian people have been asking for—that is, a through process guarantee that the welfare standards will be adhered to. That is there and available today. What the members of the coalition and, I suspect, many Australian people want to know is: why don't they simply act? This inaction is gutting Australian families, businesses and communities across the Top End. I get calls every day. Yes, I have this email trail that is exactly the same letter—they could have got two or three different ones. I can tell you that it is a desperate act when a family rings a politician in the middle of the night. I can tell you this is completely a reflection of the absence of the intellect that needs to be provided to this issue by the government.

Question agreed to.