Warren Truss (Wide Bay, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is directed to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to his pre-election commitment:

If you are serious about building the 21^st century economy in Australia you have got to build the infrastructure for it.

I also refer him to the October report of the Business Council of Australia which revealed that only 14 per cent of the government’s $96 billion stimulus spend has been set aside for vital economic infrastructure. How does the Prime Minister justify this reckless and wasteful spending and does this low priority that he has given to infrastructure assets not represent just another broken election promise?

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Here we have the National Party campaigning against the rollout of infrastructure across the nation—the rolling out of roads across National Party electorates, the rolling out of rail infrastructure across the nation, the enhancement of ports across the nation, the building of schools in each and every National Party electorate contained within this parliament. I really wonder what planet the National Party sometimes lives on because it is completely detached from what their constituents are saying.

Buried within that question from the Leader of the National Party is the following: that the expenditure currently going to the building of schools in each and every National Party electorate represented in this parliament is not wanted. Is that what the Leader of the National Party is saying? Is that what the member for Wide Bay is saying? He does not want any funding for any school in his electorate? He is hiding in his papers. Is that what he is saying? Is there anyone over there from the National Party interested in funding for their schools? I ask myself why is it that my good friend and colleague here, the Minister for Infrastructure—a term which was missing from the vocabulary of those opposite for their 12 years in office—constantly gets representations from National Party members about more to be done. I am looking at the Minister for Education—truckloads of correspondence; is there any from National Party members?

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There are truckloads. How can you just stand at the despatch box and say ‘It is a terrible waste to invest in this infrastructure’ on the one hand and then on the other write to the ministers responsible and say ‘Give us more.’? I do not understand. How do you get away with this? How do you square up when you try to do this? The member for New England is appropriately gesticulating. There is a certain detachment from reality on the part of the National Party.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Bruce Scott interjecting

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Oh, Bruce. All those members over there: Kay, Bruce, all the others; all of that. You are not saying you do not want that money for your schools in Maranoa? Bruce, do you want money for your schools in Maranoa?

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Are we getting any for Warrego?

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Do you want any money for schools in Maranoa.

Government Member:

He wants more!

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He wants some more. Come on Kay, over there in the Riverina; do you want some money for your schools?

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mrs Hull interjecting

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

So we have got Kay, we have got Bruce—

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On a point of order, Mr Speaker: we have been through this before. Firstly, the Prime Minister is not referring to members by their proper titles and, secondly, it is a particularly cowardly act to ask us to respond to a question when he knows that we cannot answer.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Sturt will resume his seat. The member for Sturt can thank those on my right—he got out of a warning because they carried on. The Prime Minister will refer to members by their names but I suggest to people who feel provoked into making interjections that that provocation does not justify them ignoring standing order 65B. It would assist if they sat there in silence. The Prime Minister has the call.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you Mr Speaker. Let us just leave schools for a moment and go on to roads for a bit, including a road very close to the electorate of the member for Wide Bay—the Cooroy to Kurra road, known very well to me, as I grew up in that part of the world, and to the Treasurer—the road which the Leader of the Nationals himself has described in its current state of repair as ‘something like the worst road in Australia’.

Warren Truss (Wide Bay, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Truss interjecting

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You have not said that? I think he might have said that.

Warren Truss (Wide Bay, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, no—the only approach that the Leader of the Nationals can make is if he is raising a point of order. I do not think that he is really going to do that.

Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Energy and Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Randall interjecting

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I just say to the House what I have said before. The problem here is that we have a tradition that answers are allowed to be debated and these sorts of rhetorical questions are by way of debate. I think that is the problem. I suggest to people that they might just—and this will get me into trouble with those on my right—ignore those type of questions. The Prime Minister has the call.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I hear an interjection from one of our colleagues from Western Australia about infrastructure. Before I go back to the Cooroy to Kurra road, is it the WA Liberal government which is now partnering with us in an infrastructure development at Oakajee? Is it the WA Liberal government which is partnering with us in an expansion of the Ord? Is it the WA government which is partnering with the Australian government in the inner city rail bridge at Northbridge? I think in all three of those cases the answer is yes. And a WA member rises in sensitivity!

Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Energy and Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Again, Mr Speaker, a point of order on relevance of fact. If the Prime Minister is going to question me as a Western Australian, representing—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Canning will resume his seat. The Prime Minister is responding to the question.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question asked by the—

John Forrest (Mallee, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Somebody has got to do something about raising the standards in this place. The Prime Minister is ignoring the injunction you just gave him when you asked that the rhetorical questions not be asked, because he—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Mallee will resume his seat. The point that I was simply making was that, so far, the House has not wanted to address the rules of engagement for question time. I simply put it to you that, if the same rules applied to answers as apply to questions, that would even the playing field. It would mean that some of the allowances that are made for argument in questions would not be allowed as often. That is what I was suggesting.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When it comes to the member for Mallee, should I mention the Horsham Town Hall? That is something which the member for Mallee has been keen to receive investment in, through the agency of the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, in order to assist with that project of, I believe, some millions—a project whose opening, the launch of the project, I believe the honourable member was very happy to attend. The reason I raise this with the member for Mallee, other National Party members, the member for Canning, representing, as he does, the interests of the WA Liberals, and others who are here is to point to one central point on infrastructure investment. It is called hypocrisy. They are in here saying, ‘Isn’t this a terrible thing for the Australian government to be investing in the infrastructure needs of the nation and the regions and localities?’ on the one hand, and in their electorates, in their constituencies, they are doing everything they can to roll it in at the same time.

I conclude with the example which goes most directly to the local interests of the member for Wide Bay, who asked the question: the Cooroy to Curra road, a part of the Bruce Highway which has stood there for decades and decades and decades unattended to and which, according to the local ambulance officers—if I recall from the Treasurer—has been the source of untold tragedy and has therefore been the subject of multiple representations to the government about what we could do. It took this Australian Labor government to invest some $480 million—$630 million in partnership with the Queensland government—to attend to a road need in your area, something which you, when you were the local member and a minister for transport in the federal government, failed to do.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Prime Minister will refer his remarks through the chair.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would simply suggest that the member for Wide Bay, when he next asks a question about infrastructure, reflects on something as basic as this: if you are going to stand at the dispatch box and complain about something, how can you at the same time happily receive that investment back on your home turf? Can I just say it reeks of double standards, and that is what we have seen from the National Party from the beginning to the very end on this entire infrastructure program of the Australian government.