Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

We are more than happy, as the Treasurer has abundantly made clear, to take the shackles off Qantas. That is what we want to do. We want to get rid of the carbon tax, which is a $100 million-plus hit on Qantas jobs, and we do want to remove from Qantas the shackles placed upon it by the Qantas Sale Act. Again I say to Leader of the Opposition: if he is fair dinkum about wanting to help the workers at Qantas, if he is fair dinkum about wanting to do the right thing by Qantas—make Qantas more competitive and more efficient in these difficult days—he should work with the government to decouple the bills in the Senate so that this very day we can free all of the airlines of this country from the carbon tax. The only thing stopping that is the Leader of the Opposition.

See this speech in context