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

December is the time of year for making lists and checking them twice. That is certainly what the member for Warringah is doing this Christmas. But he is making a list in three columns. He is not doing his Chrissie cards; he is counting the numbers.

At the end of the year, I thought we should put together a list of the government's star performers. It is a Melbourne Cup field of failure, but there are certainly a few stand-outs. There is the Treasurer. He reminds me of Brick from the film Anchorman. Do you remember? He is up there shouting loud noises into the microphone while he waits for someone to tell him what is going on. He was rolled on negative gearing by the minister for immigration and rolled on superannuation by Senator Bernardi, and the first piece of legislation he brought into the 45th Parliament had a $100 million counting error. But, to his credit, he did put forward a very strong anti-unicorn policy this year.

Then, of course, there is the Minister for Foreign Affairs, everybody's loyal deputy. Does anyone in Australian politics put any more time and effort into their one dorothy dixer a week? All those late nights rereading Mark Latham's book; all that preparation for one little segment—she is the Liberal equivalent of Media Watch.

Speaking of women and leadership, let's talk about that great champion of gender equality, the Deputy Prime Minister. Remember what he said when he was asked this year about getting more women into parliament? He said, 'I've got a good track record,' and then he gave us a few examples, and I quote, seriously: 'Scotty Buchholz, although I must admit he's not a woman, Matt Canavan, Danny O'Brien'—that is Danny with a 'y', Mr Speaker—'They're three people who've gone through my office.' That is the modern National Party for you: postmodern, gender-blind, ready for Federation.

Of course, there is the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection. He is the fun one in the group—thin-skinned and easy to roast. You might remember his little outing with the boom mike or, as he calls it, the high-water mark of his comedy career. I would like to say more, but the last time I quoted him in this place he went off on a national sulking tour. Every day, the minister for immigration was out there attacking me for reporting what he said. I finally understood how it feels to work at Fairfax or The Guardian.

A lot of us in this place have children, and we all know they get very excited on Christmas Eve—jumping all over the place, determined to stay up late and wait for Santa. But for the parents of Australia I have got good news; I have found the solution: the Minister for Urban Infrastructure. Three minutes of him at the dispatch box and you and your kids will be out like a light!

There are a lot more who deserve a mention. There is the Minister for the Environment and Energy, the only person who thinks that getting coal for Christmas is a reward; and the Minister for Revenue and Financial Services, who in the morning opposed our reforms to negative gearing because they would push prices up and—wait for it—in the afternoon opposed them because they would push prices down. Then, of course, there is our old friend the Leader of the House, who in just a few sitting weeks has managed to break a 50-year-old record by losing votes on the floor and break a 115-year-old record by having the government vote against itself. To be fair, not only is he dragging down the government in the chamber but the member for Corio tells me he is dragging down the ratings on Pyne & Marles.

But you really cannot go past the filler in every political stocking, the gift that keeps on giving: Senator George Brandis. I tried to make a list of the Attorney-General's top five blunders this year. Suddenly it was a top 10 and that was just for November. I mean, you would need a $15,000 bookcase to document this Attorney-General's failures. What is this government's agile and innovative solution to the worst Attorney-General in the history of the Commonwealth? Make him an ambassador. He is being promoted out. Only in this government the more you fail, the more you get promoted. London is calling and amongst his colleagues I understand it cannot come soon enough. But you have got to give the Prime Minister some credit or at least a sense of humour. For 80 years the British government sent us the prisoners they considered beyond redemption—the sweepings of their society—and, in one fell swoop, Australia will get its revenge!

The reality is that this Prime Minister and his government are finishing the year just the way they started: divided, compromised and sharpening their weapons for civil war. Look at the mess they keep making of this backpacker tax, a debacle from day one. There has been no consultation, no modelling and no idea. It is an ambush of regional Australia, of agriculture and of tourism. The government's economic plans are not worth the paper they are printed upon. They lob things up, they pretend they are set in stone and then they crumble. Now they cannot swallow their pride, admit they got it wrong and help out the regions. Are we really meant to believe this Prime Minister, who has given up on everything he believes in? Remember he was the champion of marriage equality and the champion of climate change? You name it, he was the champion—he was the champion of the ABC. Now he cannot move for two per cent, and no doubt, whatever they work out, this backpacker tax has been a debacle and it shows the government are not capable of governing.

When you look at it, this is a Prime Minister who always caves in to the bullies on the back bench. He is the pawn at the front of the chessboard; the member for Warringah is the king on the back bench now. His colleagues, Liberal and National, have worked him out. They know the Prime Minister is so weak, so focused on his own survival and so desperate to keep his job that they can tweak his tail and get whatever they want. Every time he sells out, he sells Australia short. This Prime Minister, barely a year ago, came to office with the highest approval ratings in a political generation, and after a year plus of coalition failure he had an unprecedented opportunity to set a new direction for this nation. The nation hoped that, when he rolled the member for Warringah, perhaps we would see a different sort of politics and a new economic direction. They hoped that he would take real action on climate change. They hoped that he would put the climate deniers and the flat-earthers back in the box. They hoped he would deliver on marriage equality, to end the injustice in this country that denies one group of citizens a right extended to all the others. They hoped he would undo the damage of the 2014 budget, with the cuts to schools, the cuts to hospitals and the cuts to pensions and families. Instead of fixing these problems, he has made them worse. Instead of a new direction, he has doubled down. It is the same unfairness with the new extravagance—the same cuts to the vulnerable and the same punishment for working and middle-class families. But he can find $50 billion for a tax cut for corporate Australia and he can find money for a tax cut for millionaires. He has a plan that punishes Australians who cannot afford it and rewards those who do not need it. It is the failed, flawed experiment of trickle-down economics—the same old conservative nostrum of survival of the fittest, of dog eat dog. It is an ideology which says that, if you fall behind, you get left behind, the worst possible approach to a changing economy.

The very way he has conducted himself in this backpackers tax debate highlights the true weakness at the core of this government. In his heart of hearts, he knows that Labor's move from 10½ per cent to 13 per cent involves a more modest move from them from 15 to 13, but here is my prediction: this is a government that would rather look at the politics than the policy every time. It is clear that you could simply bridge this difference for a very small amount. My prediction is this: the government would rather go to the fringe dwellers in the Senate than deal with Labor. This is a government that says we should all work together. But every time there is an opportunity to work with Labor it is more committed to its opposition to Labor than it is to the good government of this country. The only thing that unites the government is its furious opposition to Labor and the rights of people to join unions. There is nothing else which unites the government except its dislike of Labor. At the core, this is a government motivated by hate, not hope, and by fear of the future rather than an optimism about what we can accomplish together. This is the government which, at the end of 2016, is marked by its desire to fight Labor than to govern Australia.

In every question time since the government got elected all they have done is attack us. They never talk about their dreams or their hopes or aspirations for Australians. We on the other hand know what is important in this parliament, and it is not the people who sit here; it is the people who elect us. We will make sure in 2017 that we will stand up for working and middle class Australians, and that we will stand up for their jobs, their education and their health care. We will do this and more.

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