Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

Australia is facing a crisis of confidence. The level of consumer and business confidence in this country has hit record lows, and the lack of confidence is in the ability of the Rudd Labor government to deal with the challenges faced by this nation. Rarely has a government come to office promising so much and delivering so little, and the crisis of confidence that this country is facing stems directly from a lack of leadership on the part of the Prime Minister and his senior ministers. Of course, the Prime Minister is not in the parliament this week—he has left on an overseas trip. Yet the issue is not about how many times the Prime Minister goes overseas or what he does when he is overseas. The fact is that his priorities are such that he would rather be addressing the United Nations than be here in Australia taking charge of the challenges that face this nation.

Australian pensioners could be forgiven for being very disappointed in the Prime Minister for failing to be in parliament this week, when the issue of an increase in the single age pension was debated in the Senate; the Senate expressed its will and supported the opposition’s proposal to increase the single age pension by $30 a week. But the Prime Minister chose to be overseas. And then, when the coalition gave the government the opportunity today to show some leadership on an issue that is causing great distress to pensioners across Australia, the government rejected that opportunity. The government is very good on reviewing and inquiring, and on having a green paper and a white paper and commissions and forums and summits, but inaction is absolutely no substitute for the kind of leadership that this country craves.

People could also be forgiven for assuming that this Prime Minister has a slight touch of the delusions. He actually is rather deluded about his place in the world. His attempts to place himself at the centre of all global issues are as embarrassing as they are pathetic. On the eve of his trips overseas—and this is now the pattern of behaviour we have come to expect from this Prime Minister; he has done this on the eve of each of his 10 trips overseas in the 10 months that he has been Prime Minister—he announces some grandiose scheme, designed to capture the headlines and the early morning news, that places him at the forefront of global initiatives. Forget the G8 or the major countries of the world—the Prime Minister of Australia takes the lead!

But what is he really doing? Just think about the example where he announced, on the eve of one of his overseas trips, that Australia would take the initiative on nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. He announced that former minister Gareth Evans was going to lead the global initiative. Well, that went down like a lead balloon, didn’t it. And have we heard any more of that initiative? Not a word. Then, of course, remember how the Prime Minister was going to take Japan to the International Court of Justice over whaling? He was going to lead the world in the charge against whaling. What happened to that global initiative? What happened to the case against Japan—to be prosecuted no doubt by the minister for the environment? It has just sunk without a trace.

Then, of course, the Prime Minister recently announced the establishment of a $100 million global clean coal initiative, where Australia is again going to lead the world. Well, I suspect that that will share the same fate as all the others. But I think the piece de resistance must be this: on the eve of one of his trips to Japan, he announced—with just a couple of hours notice; he managed to cobble this idea together in a couple of hours—that he would create and establish a European-Union-style Asia-Pacific union. He was going to rearrange the Asia-Pacific architecture. He forgot to consult? No, he did not forget to consult! He is so deluded, and his ego is so out of control, that the Prime Minister thinks it is diplomatic to announce a rearrangement of the Asia-Pacific architecture in advance of a trip to Japan, without having the diplomatic skills to pick up the phone and discuss it with other leaders in the region. Is this the best we can expect from a middle-ranking bureaucrat from the department of foreign affairs who now finds himself in the position of Prime Minister? It is a worry. And the Australian people are greatly concerned about these announcements of grandiose schemes where he is going to lead the world and then we hear nothing more. Would this be because he is just seeking a cheap headline and refuses to deal with the domestic issues that are facing people in their everyday lives back here in Australia?

Why is it that the Prime Minister had no difficulty at all in making announcements about a $35 million injection to the Toyota corporation, while he was in Japan, to build a car in Australia that they were going to build anyway, which took Toyota by surprise—they did not know what they were going to do with the money because they were going to build the car anyway—and yet this Prime Minister cannot make an announcement while he is in New York on a $30-a-week increase for Australia’s pensioners?

I guess we should be grateful for small mercies. I guess we should be grateful that, on the eve of this trip to the United Nations—and this is why the trip was planned: the trip was planned for the Prime Minister to take centrestage at the UN General Assembly so he could make a speech at the millennium development forum, with no lesser world leaders than Scarlett Johansson, Missy Higgins and Colin Firth—he did not announce the Australian Global Initiative to End World Poverty by 2010! He is just going to introduce an emissions trading scheme by 2010, but he is not yet going to end world poverty! I have likened him to Don Quixote. He is delusional in his sense of grandeur and his tilting at windmills. We find that when he gets back to Australia there is no mention of these grandiose plans—they just disappear into thin air.

The coalition have no problem at all with the Prime Minister travelling overseas. We expect our leaders to be in touch with world leaders. We expect them to pick up the phone when they are about to announce the establishment of a European union in Asia. We expect them to have contact with the leaders around the world. We expect them to observe and experience what is happening in the rest of the world. But what benefits have come to Australia from the Prime Minister’s 10 overseas trips in 10 months? Can we name a benefit that this country has received? The pensioners certainly have not received a benefit. The pensioners today have been rebuffed by the government, who have failed to show leadership and refuse to admit that they are wrong on the issue of pensions. That is another failing of the government: they refuse to admit they are wrong, even in the face of the most compelling evidence.

Take Fuelwatch. Remember how the government—

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