Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A letter has been received from Senator Fifield:

Pursuant to standing order 75, I propose that the following matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion:

The completed dysfunction of the Labor Government.

Is the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Some among us in this chamber will remember the late Rob Chalmers, the longest serving member of the parliamentary press gallery, who began his career when Ben Chifley was the leader of the Australian Labor Party in 1950 and who died last year. When I was a young senator I was befriended by Rob Chalmers and I remember having a conversation with him one day when I was very excited about a particular political event—I cannot remember what the event of the time was. He looked at me in an avuncular and indulgent way, I think, a little amused at my excitability about a transient political happening. He shook his head wisely and said, 'Ah, George, there was nothing as good as the split.'

I think—and if I can conjure the shade of Rob Chalmers in the chamber this afternoon—the extraordinary events that we have seen in the last six days which have riven this Labor government apart will be viewed by historians of the future as events that rival the split. Never before in Australian history, certainly never before in the living memory of any member of this chamber, has a political party been so deeply, so bitterly, so publicly, so poisonously divided as the Australian Labor Party has been in the last several days.

Of course it has only been public in the last several days, but we now know from the mouths of the principal protagonists themselves that this has been going on all along below the surface but not very far below the surface: the government of Australia was a seething well of hatred and poison and personal bitterness and animosity and distrust. I actually feel sorry for the decent people in the Labor Party that they have had to put up with this. We had some disputes on my side of politics in 2009, and I know how trying they can be. I know how corrosive of personal relationships they can be, but, if I may say so, nothing that has happened on the coalition side of politics ever, going back to the days of John Gorton and Billy McMahon and the early 1970s, even approaches this in its bitterness—an observation that comes not just from my side of politics but from Labor Party observers like the former Senator Graham Richardson himself.

The Australian people deserve better than this. It does not matter if they are a coalition supporter, a Labor supporter, a Greens supporter or a genuinely unaligned swinging voter; the Australian people deserve better. They deserve a government that conducts itself with even a minimal level of professional competency and skill. They deserve cabinet ministers for whom the conduct of the nation's business is a higher priority than fighting factional wars for control of the Australian Labor Party. They deserve better than to have the government of the nation consumed by internal power struggles and political games. At a time when the global economy is teetering on the brink of another crisis, they deserve better than to have a Treasurer who devotes his time to blackguarding his historic rival and enemy in Queensland Labor politics, Mr Kevin Rudd.

At a time of acute diplomatic difficulty in various parts of the world, including the possibility of a war in the Middle East, the Australian people deserve better than to have a foreign minister who is being white-anted by his own Prime Minister and her surrogates to the extent that he feels forced to resign as foreign minister. They deserve better than to have a Prime Minister whom her own ministers and her own backbench have felt so strongly to be untrustworthy that they have declared that fact to the Australian people. Mr Kevin Rudd, the senior politician of the Labor Party most favoured by the Australian public, put it very plainly when he said, three days ago:

Julia has lost the trust of the Australian people.

And so she has.

Let it never be forgotten that the only reason Ms Gillard became the Prime Minister of Australia on 24 June 2010 was that she lied to Mr Kevin Rudd when she assured him that, as his deputy, she would support him to the hilt. Mr Rudd learned to his cost how worthless that assurance was. Having secured the leadership of the Labor Party, and the prime ministership, by a political coup executed in the dark of night, Ms Gillard then fell across the line at the 2010 election and was elected as Prime Minister, albeit in a minority government, only because she lied to the Australian people when, on 6 August 2010, a few days before the election was to be held, she looked down the barrel of a television camera and said:

There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.

We know that had she not said that, had she told the truth about her intentions, she would not have been re-elected. She seized the leadership of her party through deception and she was elected as Prime Minister in 2010 through deception.

Then, in the political circumstances of the minority government, she only managed to parlay her position into a commitment from the Independents because she told Mr Andrew Wilkie, the Independent member for Denison, that she would support his measures for poker machine reform. The moment, late last year, that the Labor Party, through whatever devious means—I hate to think of it—convinced Mr Peter Slipper, the member for Fisher, to neutralise his vote by becoming the Speaker, giving them one more vote on the floor of the House of Representatives, she dumped Mr Andrew Wilkie, and Mr Andrew Wilkie now says he was betrayed.

How do you beat that, Mr Deputy President? She became the Prime Minister in the first place because she lied to Kevin Rudd. She fell over the line at the 2010 election because she lied to the Australian people about the carbon tax. She was able to form a government in the hung parliament because she lied to Mr Andrew Wilkie about poker machine reform. Mr Rudd was spot on when, three days ago, he said:

Julia has lost the trust of the Australian people.

There will be an attempt, no doubt, to paper over the cracks and, Humpty Dumpty-like, to pretend that the pieces can be put back together. But I dare say that nobody would be so silly as to believe that the hatreds and the vendettas and the poison that beset this government, which have torn it apart in a public spectacle unprecedented in Australian history, will be easily washed away. We know that they will not be. We have a situation in which Labor elders like Senator John Faulkner, Mr Martin Ferguson and Mr Robert McClelland—three senior Labor politicians, all of whom I know and like and respect—have all, in their different ways, declared or acted on their lack of confidence in the government of Prime Minister Gillard. There are so many scores to settle. There is so much hatred, antagonism and poison bubbling below the surface.

This government is dysfunctional. Its ministers are not on speaking terms. Its ministers publicly denounce one another's lack of integrity. Its ministers are incapable of guiding the affairs of this nation. When there is a political deadlock like this in a democracy there is only one way to resolve it: take it to the people and let the people sort out the mess the Labor Party has created. (Time expired)

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to refute the nonsense of this vague and incomprehensible matter of public importance. The internet is a wonderful invention; you can look up almost anything, and instantly there is a response. I did not have to look very far to find an interesting definition of 'dysfunction' on dictionary.com: 'any malfunctioning part or element: the dysfunctions of the country's economy'. Well, fancy that! There it is, in black and white, for all of us to see. So let us see what really is true. We can see it in this motion from Senator Fifield, the Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate—a member of a coalition government that squandered the opportunities in our nation's budgets between 2004 and 2007. Their only interest was pork-barrelling at election time. What would the coalition have done in the global financial crisis? They would have done absolutely nothing. Those opposite, at that time, said we should sit back and wait. They wanted to put their heads in the sand.

But what did we do? We took the action the Australian people elected us to take. The Gillard government's first priority has been to keep the economy strong by delivering jobs and growth and helping Australian workers. Labor made the right decisions during the global financial crisis to keep people in jobs and deliver economic stimulus to drive growth. We have created over 750,000 new jobs since 2007. We have the right plan now to keep the economy strong and drive future growth to help working people.

Would the coalition have cared if hundreds if not thousands of Australians had lost their jobs during the global financial crisis? Of course not. All they are interested in is big business and their mates—like those in the tobacco industry. Donations are clearly far more important than the Australian community.

Let us have a quick look at what this government has achieved. Those opposite say we should go to an election. The reality is that we have 18 months to the next election, and you have 18 months to come up with some policies to change the Leader of the Opposition's mantra of 'oppose, oppose, oppose'. I might not have time to go through everything, but let us just put things in context. We are about the future, whereas Mr Abbott and the opposition are about taking us back to the 20th century. I said we have created 750,000 jobs since 2007, and we have 140,000 more Australians employed today than we had 12 months ago. The economy is strong. We have bulletproofed the Australian economy and kept it out of recession during the worst economic downturn in three-quarters of a century. Thanks to this, our economy's fundamentals have remained strong, with outstanding employment growth and record investment. We are committed to a return to surplus next financial year.

Mr Deputy President, you would know how favourably the National Broadband Network has been received in Tasmania. It will mean affordable, high-speed broadband for all Australians no matter where they live and for all Australian businesses no matter where they are located. It will mean better education, better health care and better access for Australian businesses to the biggest marketplace in human history.

With our health agreement, we have more doctors, more nurses, more beds, less waiting and less waste, together with better accountability and community control—achieved through a historic health deal with the states at COAG. Our agreement on the carbon price will cut pollution and create clean energy jobs.. It will cut taxes and increase the pension to support the Australian economy. This is Australia taking responsibility among the nations of the world.

Our mining tax will give Australians a fair share of the mining boom—a boost to retirement savings, tax breaks for small business and company tax cuts. These again are things that those opposite oppose.

We have doubled our investment in school education, upgraded facilities at every school and provided more information for parents than ever before.

On skills, we are investing $2.4 billion in the Building Australia's Future Workforce package to create 130,000 new training places—new participation measures that provide opportunities but also demand responsibility.

For seniors, there has been a historic increase in the pension, and now we are looking at improving aged care to give older people more choice and control. Those opposite failed miserably to protect our older Australians over their 11 years in government.

We have made a record investment in our infrastructure of more than $36 billion around the country. We have laid the foundations for a National Disability Insurance Scheme. The 2011-12 budget delivered 95 per cent of our election promises, as well as returning the budget to surplus in 2012-13. Some of the savings measures will not be easy but we will be delivering the biggest fiscal turnaround in 30 years. We have invested $2.2 billion in a mental health package to deliver additional services and a greater focus on prevention and early intervention.

And the big thing we did for Australian workers and families was getting rid of Work Choices—but we know the opposition's plans for future attacks on Australian workers. We have cut taxes in the last three years for working families and low-income earners. Someone earning $50,000 a year now pays $1,750 less in tax than they did in 2007. Interest rates are still lower than they were when the Liberals left office.

We introduced Australia's first ever paid parental leave scheme, giving new parents more time with their children and reducing the financial pressures on families. We have increased the childcare rebate to 50 per cent.

Meanwhile, what have we seen from the coalition? They oppose the mining tax. They oppose more superannuation for workers. They oppose tackling global warming by pricing carbon and Australia playing its role in the world. They oppose investing in the National Broadband Network. They oppose health reform, and they are even backing away from something as important as the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

Instead, the three finance stooges of the coalition already have a $70 billion problem to deal with. Savage cuts will adversely affect everyone. Cuts will be needed to pay for the $11.1 billion in forgone revenue from axing the mining tax. They want to give back the mining tax to some of the world's biggest and most profitable mining companies and, in the process, stop an increase in superannuation savings for Australian workers. And $24 billion will be needed to refund the big polluters for the carbon permits they will have bought for their pollution.

The coalition have already promised cuts to GP superclinics, the GP after-hours hotline, computers in schools, trade training centres and apprenticeship training programs. We know, as the Australian people know, that Tony Abbott has form in health. As health minister he cut a billion dollars out of hospital funding, the equivalent of closing 1,025 hospital beds. The coalition will bring back Work Choices laws to strip away basic workplace protections.

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. What Senator Polley has just said is untrue. It is misleading of the Senate because—

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Fierravanti-Wells, it is not a point of order; it is a debating point. You will have an opportunity during your address.

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Australian people will not forget. They know Tony Abbott's record as Minister for Health and Ageing and they are scared he will take residence in the Lodge. We know that the coalition will bring back Work Choices laws to strip away basic workplace protections. They are a risk to your jobs. The Australian people know that they are a risk to their jobs and they are a risk to job security.

We know, as the Australian people know, that it is the Gillard Labor government that is looking after the economy, looking after working Australians and looking after families. Labor has a plan for the future direction of Australia, positioning Australia to take advantage of Asia's remarkable growth. We on this side know that the Australian community are smart. They are much smarter than the opposition gives them credit for. That is why we are laying down a progressive reform program for taking this country forward. At the same time, we are not leaving behind Australian families; we are not leaving behind Australian workers.

We know that delivering a surplus in the 2012-13 financial year will bring about the sort of security that this economy and the Australian people deserve. We are determined to get the big things done and under Julia Gillard we will get those big things done and we will do what is right. Even when it is difficult we will put the national interest first. We know who is dysfunctional, and it is not this Gillard government. It is Tony Abbott and those opposite. Just as the opposition wants to race back to an election now, the Australian people know that Julia Gillard has Tony Abbott's measure. She can out-negotiate him. She can get the very difficult job done— (Time expired)

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before I call Senator Fierravanti-Wells, I would just remind senators to address members and senators by their correct titles.

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will start by correcting the false, misleading, wrong and totally fatuous comments made by Senator Polley. According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, Australian government expenditure on public hospitals increased every year from approximately $5.2 billion in 1995-96 to over $12 billion in 2007-08. And from 1995 to 1996 annual spending on health and aged care by the Australian government more than doubled from $19.5 billion in 1995-96 to $51.8 billion in 2007-08. Senator Polley, next time you come in and lie to this chamber, get your facts right.

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, on a point of order: it is inappropriate to use that sort of language. I would expect you to ask the good senator to withdraw her comment.

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Fierravanti-Wells, it would be helpful if you withdrew the accusation and directed your comments to the chair.

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw my comments. The point I wanted to make, Senator Polley, is that you know every time you come in here and parrot that absolute codswallop it is wrong, because you cannot even bother reading the data that has been put out by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. If I had to believe anybody I would believe the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare—not you, Senator Polley, or your Labor colleagues who would not even know how to lie straight in bed.

I now come to the point in order, which is the motion before us about the dysfunctional government. I begin my comments by quoting the Canberra Timesfrom 27 February, not that I often quote the Canberra Times:

Contempt. Demeaning. Ludicrous. Psychopath. Chaotic. Paralysis. Dysfunctional. Impossible.

These are the words of venom and vituperation that spewed forth from Labor ranks over the last week, directed at former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and his brand of leadership, spoken by a cabal of his closest cabinet ministers. We saw the charge led by none other than Minister Roxon and I will come to some of her comments in relation to health in a moment. We had Mr Swan unleashing on Mr Rudd minutes—just minutes—after the latter resigned from his portfolio, accusing him of sabotaging the 2010 election. We had the member for Bendigo, Mr Gibbons, referring to the former Prime Minister as a psychopath. And the list goes on. Sources say, in an article by Samantha Maiden:

Kevin Rudd described Julia Gillard as a "childless, atheist, ex-communist" at an Adelaide pub as he plotted a political comeback a year ago.

As everybody was scurrying to deny it, one of the lawyers present at that occasion is prepared to sign a stat dec to that effect. They were all in denial, of course, about this so-called reality of what is now the Labor Party and comments that were made barely a month ago were denied. Now the real gloves are off and we see that a third of Ms Gillard's caucus has now voted against her and a quarter of her cabinet do not have confidence in her.

I come now to health. Through the mouth of former health minister Nicola Roxon, we have had an enormous insight into what has become an example of ramshackle decision making under the Rudd-Gillard Labor government. In Senate estimates I prosecuted this issue in February 2010. I asked questions about whether there actually was a health plan when the Rudd government came to power. There was certainly no plan. There was not even a plan on the back of an envelope. Of course, the officials were quick to deny all of this but the reality is that out of Minister Roxon's mouth we now know just how ramshackle it was. There was not actually a plan. There never was a plan for health reform.

Indeed, in one of many interviews that Minister Roxon gave she talked about the shambolic lack of proper cabinet processes. Processes were not used. She said:

Some very big decisions were being contemplated, in health in particular, that's of course the closest experience that I had, that often there was an inclination to want to go and announce those things without there being proper cabinet discussion or consideration of the downsides rather than just some of the political or potential upsides.

And we have seen the example of Mr Rudd wanting to go to a referendum, knowing that a referendum on the takeover of health would not succeed. He thought it would be a good tool to be able to win the election. The cynicism!

One cannot but be cynical about the way this government operated. On another occasion in an interview, Minister Roxon referred to Mr Rudd's choice to have a referendum about taking over the health system 'knowing full well and agreeing that that referendum would be lost but thought it would be a good tool to be able to win the election'. Mr Rudd was prepared to have such a cynical approach to this.

Again, on Sky News, Minister Roxon was asked by Kieran Gilbert about the rigmarole of a referendum. She agreed absolutely. Minister Roxon said that Mr Rudd had sat there with Karl Bitar and everybody else and said, 'Look, this is a really popular thing to do; we would win the election.' She went on:

I said, ‘Yeah, but we wouldn’t win the referendum. Look at the history of referendums.

This is the sort of cynical stunt that the Rudd-Gillard government were prepared to do in health. And those opposite trumpet the so-called good things that they have done in health! This is what it was all about.

It was all about the photo opportunities. Then Prime Minister Rudd and then health minister Roxon were going out there for the photo opportunities. That was all it was about. If they really cared about the health of this country they would have taken a serious approach in relation to proper health reform. They knew that they would not get the consent of the states to do it but they went along just for the politics of it.

It is very clear from the comments that Minister Roxon has now made that health was only one of the examples. This was what they did in relation to their so-called big health reforms. Ms Roxon went on to say, on Sky News on 24 February:

... he wouldn’t get proper legal advice, he wouldn’t let officials properly prepare the pros and cons and if you don’t do that then you can’t actually assess what risks are involved for Government or the public in going down a course that might be populist and politically successful but ultimately will end in tears.

That is the approach that this government has taken in relation to health, which was supposed to be one of their most important reforms.

I thank Senator Brandis for his note. He has just informed me that Senator Arbib has just announced that he is resigning from the Senate forthwith. Well they are descending; it is much more shambolic. It will be interesting to see. I wonder if Senator Arbib is going to write a book and tell us the truth about some of the shambolic recent history in New South Wales. I wonder if it is going to be as interesting as the book that Morris Iemma and former minister Costa have written: the real truth about New South Wales.

With all of this happening it is little wonder that, irrespective of the result today, there will be no peace and harmony—that they will all be 'happy little vegemites' to quote former Prime Minister Rudd. I do not think that will be the case.

As Martin Ferguson said, he knows that the faceless men will still be in charge. There will be one faceless man fewer now, Senator Mason, because Senator Arbib is going. But those faceless men are at work today, and they will be at work in the future, because they just cannot help themselves. So, I say to this Prime Minister that the issue at hand is about our government and our future. Let's go to an election.

Matt Thistlethwaite (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Last week I had the great pleasure of touring the beautiful electorate of Cowper on the North Coast of New South Wales. I was up there opening some brand new educational facilities at a number of schools.

On Thursday I visited Bellingen High School to open their brand new hospitality trade training centre—a $1.5 million investment by this government in better educational facilities for students in that important rural and regional community in New South Wales. I went through and visited their first-class industrial kitchen. I sat in their cafe. I sampled some of the produce of the students—the wonderful coffees that they were making. I talked to the students about the fact that they now have the ability and the choice to begin their apprenticeship whilst they are still at school, giving them a great advantage for a future in a trade in the local community.

Later in the afternoon I travelled to Maclean High School, where I was fortunate to open their brand new construction trade training centre. That is a $1.3 million investment by the Gillard government in first-class vocational education and training facilities for students in rural and regional New South Wales. I spoke to the local builder, the head contractor, who had been involved in the construction of that first-class facility. He told me about the importance of this program for his local community—about the fact that he as a local builder was able to keep on a large number of his employees because of the government's commitment to jobs in local communities and to better education facilities for students in rural and regional New South Wales.

On Friday I then travelled to Willawarrin Public School just west of Kempsey. It is a small school with only 60 students. I did a tour of the facilities with their wonderful school captain, young Hayden. He showed me their brand new library, a first-class library that has just been constructed, with their wonderful new video conference facilities. He told me that the week before the students in that tiny school had had a video conference with the staff at the Sydney Opera House about their music program. A number of other local schools in that community had plugged into that video conference to tour the facilities of the Sydney Opera House, to learn about its music program, to learn about how productions are put together and how they are rolled out on a particular day—all from the convenience of their school library.

I toured some of the classrooms and the students showed me their brand-new smart boards: how they interact on those smart boards and how they can do programs like mathletics to make mathematics more enjoyable. I spoke to the principal about the benefits of these wonderful new facilities not only for the students but also for the local community—the fact that 80 workers from the local community had secured jobs on this important project and that it ensured during the difficult period of the global financial crisis that many of those local builders, architects and designers were kept in employment. They were also providing an investment in a better education for the kids in their local community. I also toured Kempsey East Public School, which had a $2.125 million investment in a new school hall, and Smithtown Public School with a $925,000 investment in better classroom facilities.

I drove past the work that is going on on the Kempsey-to-Frederickton bypass—a $618 million investment by the Gillard government in a dual carriageway on one of the most treacherous stretches of road on the Pacific Highway. Some 394 pylons are being driven into the ground to provide the largest road bridge in this country—2.3 kilometres of road bridge. Some months ago I was fortunate to drive in the first pylon on that very important piece of infrastructure for rural and regional Australia. Through that investment, 450 jobs were created.

In two days I witnessed $625 million worth of investment by the Gillard government in rural and regional New South Wales. During that time, of all the people I met not one of them mentioned the ALP leadership issue. They were much more interested in the services that their government was delivering for families and communities. The main game in the community is policy development and policy delivery, and it should be the main game in this place as well, particularly when we are talking about matters of public importance. This debate is meant to be about the issues that matter to the people of Australia. When it comes to matters of public importance, Labor has a clear policy plan to meet the challenges of the future, to keep our economy strong, to grow jobs, to ensure that the benefits of the mining boom are shared equally amongst the community, to support small businesses and to support the disabled and their families into the future. Our plan is affordable and it is costed and we are happy to have it independently scrutinised by the Parliamentary Budget Office or any other independent auditor of election costings. That is unlike those opposite who do not have a policy agenda, who cannot explain to the Australian people their policy on workplace relations and who cannot come into this place and clearly enunciate what their education policy will be. I have just mentioned some of the investments this government has made in better education facilities for students in rural and regional New South Wales. Australia-wide, the government has invested $16.2 billion in better education facilities through the Building the Education Revolution.

Those opposite cannot come into this place and enunciate what their policy plan will be on one of the most important areas of public policy in this country. They cannot tell us how they will deal with climate change; they consistently resort to a student-politics mentality of seeking to debate goings on in, and what is being backgrounded to, the media in this place. There is no greater example of that than the incompetence in their approach to fiscal policy. At the last election they refused to submit their election costings for independent scrutiny. When they did, they came up $11 billion short. When they had them independently audited, their accountants also came up short, and later on the accountants were fined for breaches of accounting standards. That pales into insignificance when it comes to what those opposite have planned for Australia. From the very little policy that has been leaked from the shadow cabinet meetings, we do know that they are planning $70 billion worth of cuts in services.

When we talk about matters of public importance there is no greater matter of importance to the public than the cuts those opposite have proposed to service delivery in this country. They should come in here and tell the Australian public what they are planning to do with the childcare rebate, an important support from government that helps families get by—particularly those in the early years of child rearing. They should tell us what it means to pensions when they talk about $70 billion worth of cuts to services. They should tell us what it means when we have a plan to increase superannuation and they are planning to cut $70 billion worth of services. They should tell us what it means when we are planning cuts to the company tax rate and they will not agree to those cuts.

We often get into vigorous debate in this place and we criticise each other about what is happening in our parties, but on the issues that really make a difference to the lives of Australians—the real matters of public importance—it is policy that matters to the Australian people. When it comes to policy and when it comes to comparing the different policy agendas of Labor and the coalition, the contrast is stark. We will always come to the conclusion that Labor is doing a good job when it comes to policy development.

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

(16:23 The matter of public importance today is the complete dysfunction of the Labor government. After the brutal battles within the Labor Party in the last week, there is no question they are dysfunctional. It reminded me of when the former United States Secretary of State Dr Henry Kissinger was asked about the very bitter war then being fought between Iran and Iraq. He said that it was a pity that both sides could not lose. I have no doubt that most Australians today, having seen the result of the battle between the Prime Minister and Mr Rudd, wish both of them could lose—because the public has certainly lost.

I am in a somewhat generous mood today, even if the public might not be. I happen to agree with both Ms Gillard and Mr Rudd, and indeed their supporters. I agree with them all. My good friend Senator Conroy—he is one of my favourites, as you know—said:

Kevin Rudd had contempt for the cabinet, contempt for the cabinet members, contempt for the caucus, contempt for the Parliament.

Senator Conroy was right. What a pity he did not make that public 18 months ago or three years ago or four years ago. That is what a senior member of the Labor leadership group says about the alternative Prime Minister and alternative leader of the Australian Labor Party, Mr Rudd.

My fellow Queenslander, Deputy Prime Minister and Treasurer, Mr Swan, said:

The Party has given Kevin Rudd all the opportunities in the world and he wasted them with his dysfunctional decision making and his deeply demeaning attitude towards other people including our caucus colleagues.

Again, I agree with Mr Swan. I do not have any doubt that that was Mr Rudd's conduct. But this all came out in a leadership contest—the most bitter I have ever seen; I have never seen a contest as bitter as it—a long time after the event. I only wish my Labor colleagues had had the courage to bring this up when it really mattered: three or four years ago, when a dysfunctional person was running the government.

Tony Burke, the Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, said:

… the difference between the Kevin Rudd they saw on their TV screens and how he could actually come to be the micro-manager, the chaotic manager he had become … It became chaotic, the chaos, the undermining, the temperament that started to develop …

That is another senior minister talking about the Labor Party's most popular Prime Minister ever. Only now does the truth seep out from senior members of the Australian Labor Party about the most popular Labor Prime Minister there has ever been.

Ms Gillard the Prime Minister said that Mr Rudd had displayed 'very difficult and very chaotic work patterns as Prime Minister.' She added that he had sabotaged her 2010 election campaign. Yet again, that is correct.

These are the people charged with running our country. They are not talking about the issues that matter. My friend Senator Thistlethwaite spoke about matters that do concern the community; but those things have not been concerning the Labor Party for the last six months. Mr Rudd has been running around, as Ms Gillard says, undermining her and the government. Their focus has been on each other and on their own jobs, not on the concerns of the community.

As you know, I like to be catholic in my approach—somewhat eclectic. So let us look at the other side. One of the senior ministers voting for Mr Rudd today was the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Mr Bowen. He said, 'I do believe Kevin Rudd has a lot to continue to offer.' He might continue to have a lot to offer to the opposition—we do not complain about the political effect of Mr Rudd—but he has a devastating effect on Australia, its government and its people. That is the problem. So I agree with them all; but what a shambles. These are the people who are supposedly administering this nation.

We have one of the largest economies on earth. All of us know that this is a time of increasing pressure on families. The cost of living is going up because of the carbon tax, which is one of the great disasters in Australia's history. It will go down as an absolute and utter debacle. Job security, particularly in manufacturing, is becoming increasingly difficult. The boats keep coming; border security remains a huge issue; that has not changed. The mining tax will be debated, as Senator Evans said today during question time. 'If it moves, tax it,' says the Labor Party. The mining tax will not solve Australia's problems. Taxing does not solve a nation's issues.

So what has changed? Nothing has changed. The problem with the Labor Party ever since Mr Rudd won the election in 2007 is very simple: they cannot implement anything. The implementation of their policies has been a shambles. The pink batts program was perhaps the classic. It cost $1 billion to implement and $1 billion to fix. The NBN has to be a shambles. I will put a bet on the public record that that will be a shambles—and it will not be worth it. In my own area, in the Building the Education Revolution, I heard what Senator Thistlethwaite said. This is the problem: everyone knows that those school halls cost too much. The government's own adviser said that they cost too much. Do you know what is even worse? It was in state schools where the money did not go very far at all. The government secured much better value when it was dealing with Catholic schools and independent schools. Why is it that government schools cost up to 60 per cent more per square metre than Catholic or independent schools? What is even worse is that the Auditor-General's office said that there were not sufficient oversight mechanisms within the Commonwealth department of education to ensure that the Commonwealth got good value for money. That is the greatest indictment of this government in four years: after spending $16 billion, the Auditor-General said there were not sufficient oversight mechanisms to ensure the Commonwealth government secured good value for money in government schools, because the state governments could not administer the money well. That was the problem. But don't believe me; look at what Mr Orgill said. It is all very well to say, 'People thought it was a great idea but we spent all this money.' The trick in government is not to spend money. That is easy. I actually find spending money pretty easy myself. The trick is to spend it well, because for every dollar a government spends, taxpayers deserve a dollar in value at least. And they did not get it out of the BER. That is the problem. It is true.

Senator McLucas interjecting—

Senator McLucas said that some states did better than others. I would accept that. Some states did do better than others. But overall it was a woeful performance.

Senator McLucas interjecting—

Read Brad Orgill's report, Senator McLucas. In Victoria alone, state government schools cost 40 per cent more than Catholic ones. It is absolutely outrageous.

Finally, the cancer within the Labor Party, the cancer within social democracy—right across Western Europe and throughout the world—is one four-letter word: debt The Labor Party, since Federation, has never left government with more money in the bank. They always have more debt upon leaving government. That has happened every single time since 1901. They always leave Australia with more debt. That is the great failing of the Labor Party and social democratic parties in Europe. And aren't we paying for that now?

This morning's contest clearly was between Australia's worst Prime Minister and the second-worst Prime Minister. I am not sure who is who, but we do know this: it was a pretty decisive vote in caucus but history will judge both those people as very poor prime ministers. We should go to an election as soon as possible.

John Faulkner (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let me say that I believe this Labor government is a good government. This is no better demonstrated than by the government's sound management of the Australian economy and by the long list of key policy achievements since its election some four years ago.

It is very easy for an opposition to say that a government is dysfunctional. But just consider how Australia currently compares with other advanced economies in the world. The Labor government has steered Australia through the worst global recession since the Great Depression more than three-quarters of a century ago. Unemployment is low—currently at 5.2 per cent—and employment growth is strong. Unemployment is lower in Australia than in any every major advanced economy of the world, bar one. Some 750,000 jobs have been created since Labor was first elected more than four years ago, including 100,000 in the last year alone, and the government is on track for the creation of another 300,000 new jobs this year.

Growth is steady with a strong investment pipeline. Debt is low. Australia has a budget position that is literally the envy of every other nation in the Western world. Inflation is contained in this country, and interest rates under the Labor government have reached lows never seen by the previous coalition government. Importantly, as I have said before in this chamber, for the first time in our history Australia has received a AAA rating from all three global ratings agencies—something that was never achieved by the previous coalition government.

It would not be surprising to anybody that the opposition has proposed this matter of public importance today. As you would expect, the opposition is trying to exploit the fact that we in the federal parliamentary Labor Party had a leadership ballot today. Well, such events are part and parcel of politics. Since I have been in parliament I voted in six leadership ballots: the two challenges by Paul Keating to Bob Hawke, Kim Beazley's challenge to Simon Cream, the ballot between Kim Beazley and Mark Latham, Kevin Rudd's defeat of Kim Beazley, and, of course, today's leadership ballot. I am a traditionalist, and that is a nice way, I suppose, of acknowledging that I am a relic from the past. And I have always refrained from publicly or privately canvassing the respective merits of those who are contesting leadership ballots. I am afraid I have to disappoint my friends in the gallery; I am not about to start now. I will, however, say that I have the greatest respect for all the Labor prime ministers that I have known and I believe that each and every one of them deserves our gratitude for their efforts on behalf of our party and our nation.

On the other side of the chamber, I have seen Andrew Peacock, John Hewson, Alexander Downer, John Howard, Brendan Nelson and Malcolm Turnbull come and go. I have seen others desperately covet the leadership but not have the guts to contest it—Peter Costello comes to mind there. I have seen Tony Abbott win a leadership vote, the ballot he won in fact by one vote after preferences, against two of his most senior colleagues. So, yes, we have leadership ballots just like the Liberal Party and the Nationals have leadership ballots. And, yes, the Labor Party fights and, yes, the Labor Party fights such ballots hard because the stakes are high. We fight hard because we are passionate in our beliefs. We fight hard because in Labor's broad church so many different views are heard. Like other  political parties, the Australian Labor Party has internal processes to resolve itsdifferences. Those processes have been in operation again today. They have worked again today as they have worked in the past.

So the bad news for the Liberal Party is that, just as has happened in the past after a leadership ballot is done and dusted, differences will be put aside and members of the government will work together in the national interest. This is the way the Labor Party works. We respect the outcome of democratic processes in the party, in the parliament and at the polls. The Liberals have never done that. They will never acknowledge that Prime Minister Gillard has been voted for by the majority of the Australian voters, the majority of members of the House of Representatives and the majority of my caucus colleagues. They can spend as much time as they like denying reality. While they do that, this government will get on with the job of delivering for Australia.

How extraordinary in this matter of public importance debate that the three coalition speakers—Senator Brandis, Senator Fierravanti-Wells and Senator Mason—have themselves been such warriors in internal Liberal Party leadership ballots. Senator Brandis could not stand John Winston Howard. He called him a 'lying rodent'. Senator Mason had similar views. He  probably did not do as much backgrounding as Senator Brandis did  against Mr Howard, but his view was well known. Senator Fierravanti-Wells undermined Mr Turnbull when he was the Leader of the Opposition virtually every minute of every day. Well, I do not think it does any of us any good to have that level of  hypocrisy in the chamber. As I said before, leadership ballots are part and parcel of Australian politics. What I say is that after they are over, a responsible political party  gets on with the job. In the case of a political party that forms government, it gets on with the job of governing. That is what the Gillard government will do: get on with the job of delivering for Australia. (Time expired)