Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Financee (Senator Cormann) to a question without notice asked by Senator Di Natale today.

I use the word 'answer' because that's the proforma of the Senate, but 'response' would probably be a more accurate word, because the minister didn't go within a bull's roar of answering the questions that Senator Di Natale asked him. Senator Di Natale was asking Minister Cormann to shed some light on the deal—or the no deal—between the government and Senator Lambie, which ultimately has resulted in Senator Lambie voting to repeal the medevac law earlier today.

I want to focus to begin with on one particular part of Minister Cormann's answer. He was asked by Senator Di Natale whether there had been an exchange of letters between the government and Senator Lambie in regard to ensuring Senator Lambie's vote to repeal the medevac legislation. Minister Cormann would only say that he had not exchanged letters or that he had not written a letter to Senator Lambie. What about the Prime Minister? Did he write to Senator Lambie or exchange letters with Senator Lambie? What about the Minister for Home Affairs, Mr Dutton? Did he write a letter to Senator Lambie or exchange letters with Senator Lambie? We simply don't know. But what we do know is that someone is lying to the Senate and therefore lying to the Australian people.

The truth will out, as my mother always used to tell me, but I want to make the point that if there is—as Minister Cormann and the Prime Minister, in question time in the other place, said today—no deal with Senator Lambie then what Senator Lambie has done is to give her vote to the government to repeal the medevac legislation for absolutely nothing; she has got nothing out of the government. If that is true, and there is no deal or agreement, she has voted to take away a crucial medical provision that ensures sick people get the health treatment they need.

Let us remind ourselves why medevac was necessary. Hamid Khazaei died of a leg infection because of the inaction of this government. Eleven other people died in this government's care while they were in offshore detention. This government fought tooth and nail to keep suicidal children locked up on Nauru. It was only a massive public campaign that caused these children to be released from that exile last year. A woman who was raped was denied a termination by this government while she was on Nauru. Minister Dutton and Prime Minister Morrison have worn their cruelty as a badge of honour, and I truly hope that they and others are one day held to account in the International Criminal Court for how they have broken people.

I want to end with a message to the propagandists and stenographers at TheCourier Mail and The Australian: I hope you're all happy today; you have played a pivotal role in the misinformation campaign that has marred this entire debate. I'm going to name them up. Those propagandists and stenographers include Simon Benson, Joe Kelly and Renee Viellaris. I do hope you're happy with the propaganda and the stenography that you've engaged in in recent months. I hope you're happy that your cosy relationship with the authoritarians and the fascists in the Liberal-National government can continue unabated; your cosy relationship with the rampant human rights abusers in the LNP can continue unabated; your little secret drops and your sunny little interviews with the merchants of misery can continue. You, Joe Kelly, Simon Benson and Renee Viellaris, are doing the work of ministerial media advisers while you are masquerading as journalists. You've got the gall to call yourselves journalists, but you're not; you're propagandists and stenographers. I hope you're all ashamed of yourselves.

Question agreed to.