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

I am full of a spirit of goodwill towards the member for Bradfield, so I thought to myself, ‘I’m sure he wouldn’t have gone to an opening ceremony for a program he opposed. I’m sure he wouldn’t have stood next to a plaque for a program that he did not vote for, that he did not want one dollar spent on, that he did not want one job created with. Obviously what has happened is that he just happened to be passing by and somehow someone has grabbed him and roped him into the photo.’ I did not think the member for Bradfield would be exhibiting this kind of hypocrisy in his local electorate.

Anyway, I kept looking at the things that I had been sent by Abbotsleigh and they had also sent me the program for the opening ceremony. So I had a good look at that and it was full of all sorts of interesting things. There was a balloon release and a school song, and people got to view the new spaces. I thought that was pretty good. But I was disappointed to see who the opening address of the Evelyn Forster Wing junior school resource centre and early learning centre was being given by—it was the member for Bradfield. What this does not tell me, and unfortunately I have not been sent a full tape recording of the event, is whether or not the member for Bradfield used the opportunity of his opening address to advise the audience of 1,100 people that he voted against every dollar in the program, he voted against every job and if the parliament had followed his lead then this project would never have come to fruition.

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