Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

We have seen these allegations day after day after day, and most of them are incorrect. But I do say to the member that they should refer these matters to the ACCC, because if somebody out there in the supply chain is not doing the right thing then there is a means to deal with that. So they should go straight to the ACCC if the member is actually serious in the question that he has just asked. Has he referred these matters to the ACCC? Has he referred what the suppliers are doing to the ACCC?

We have heard day after day members on the other side come in here and give us some facts about the impact on electricity bills, and generally they have been found to be wrong. The fact is that what we have seen here is a continuation of the scare campaign, which they are pretty embarrassed about now. The opposition leader went to Tasmania three or four weeks ago and admitted that the sky was not going to fall in, that things might not happen quite the way that he said they would—Whyalla would be wiped off the map, Gladstone would be wiped off the map, the whole of the Central Queensland coal industry would be gone. We can see that that has not happened, so they are continuing to try to do this in a different way.

The fact is that this mob opposite have simply run out of steam when it comes to this scare campaign. It is leaving them exposed as not having a policy agenda for the future. All they have got is a $70 billion budget crater. That is what they have got. The shadow Treasurer announced that on breakfast television, sitting there beside the minister for the environment.

Then he goes on TV and says that it never happened. It did not happen! He was not there! The invisible man!

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