Bob McMullan (Fraser, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is interesting to follow the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for the Environment and Heritage. I thought the first half of his speech was a very interesting definition of the comprehensive nature of the problem. I do not agree with everything he said but it was broadly and in sweeping terms an outline of the fundamental international characteristics of the problem. But what it inevitably meant was that the second half of his speech showed how inadequate the response is to the problem he defined.

I want to spend most of my time dealing with a specific aspect of the way in which the Prime Minister presented the material, which created a misleading impression—and a misleading impression that refers back to some activity of mine some years ago—and I want to deal with that primarily. I welcome in general the opportunity to respond to this statement. The statement is welcome but disappointing. It is one of those Clayton’s statements that you make when you want to be seen to be responding to the petrol price crisis but are not actually doing anything about it.

I was amused to see this morning in the newspaper a critique saying ‘Oil giants will win in fuel package’ and the claim that 87 per cent of the money that the Prime Minister has committed to programs to help motorists will benefit the oil industry.

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