Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

It fills me with horror to imagine what this Prime Minister imagines two bad years of an Abbott government looks like!

But the real problem, if we want to talk about jobs, is that the masterminds of this so-called jobs and growth mirage that this government keeps talking about have been in chaos all this week—and it is only Wednesday. Look at the dysfunction of this government. This week the Prime Minister got out his well-dusted riot act and read it again to his colleagues and he worked strenuously, tirelessly, through an empty cabinet agenda—it was not quite empty though, was it? There was an important note for the team at the bottom of the empty box, the folder box—presumably it was from the ministry of truth, or whatever they are calling the Prime Minister's personal office these days—that said, 'If asked about cabinet leaks, respond that the cabinet is functioning exceptionally well'. How do we know it is functioning exceptionally well? Because they leaked it to us! Who needs Sky to find out what is going on when we have the cabinet ministers.

They are a government that are fond of creating division in this country. Everything that goes wrong for this government, everything they mishandle, they blame on a new confected set of enemies. The unhinged attack on the environment over the last two days has been remarkable. The Prime Minister's latest anti-environment rant saw him say of the EPBC: 'We've got to change the law. The law's bad; the law is a terrible law. I, Tony Abbott, will step up with my shining cross and I will change it and save the people and take them to the promised land on the environment.' The problem is that the law he wants to change was introduced in July 2000. 'Uh oh', you think, 'July 2000? Was that when the socialists were running the government or is that when the communists were running it?' It was actually John Howard running it. Since John Howard introduced the very protection for the environment, the good process, that the Prime Minister is so desperately trying to get rid of, there have been 5,500 projects go through that process. Clearly the Prime Minister is justifying not fixing up the mistake in the ranks of his own ministry. You would conclude that to justify this wholesale onslaught on the so-called law-fare crisis in the environment, to justify this great big new crisis, which demands—probably they will be wearing uniforms next to deal with the crisis. What we have seen is 5,500 successful projects—

Mr Christensen interjecting—

Listen: you have been at Reclaim Australia, enough from you.

Mr Christensen interjecting—

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