Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

Do not forget for one minute—as the member for Bass would love us to—the charade we have seen going through: every time this parliament meets there is a new line-up on their frontbench. Every time they come up, we think there is an eject seat down on the corner there! I want to see the new seating plan, as to who is there, because sitting a few seats behind is the former Prime Minister, who at any point can leak to the media and press the ejector button on whoever is down there in the corner! Those who get put down there today for the first time for question time would want to know that they are in the spots where the clock is always ticking.

The job that is there for the Treasurer of Australia is an important one. He actually took the job on the basis that we were told his predecessor was not providing economic leadership. That is his whole reason for being. The point of the Turnbull government was meant to be to provide economic leadership. And what do we find all this time later? Nearly six months later? It is waffle! It is waffle, and the gap between what this government says and what it ends up doing could not be wider.

The previous Prime Minister had a bad plan, but at least he had a plan. Those opposite now have no idea what they are doing: watch their own members struggling to keep interested in the Treasurer at the National Press Club as he went after platitude after platitude in a speech that would not even stand up at a branch meeting in Cronulla! It would not even stand up before the party faithful as anything of substance, and yet when he gets his platform to speak before the National Press Club waffle is all he has.

I want to see the situation later today, where we give the Treasurer another go at a 46-minute speech. Let's give him a go a bit later and see if over the weekend he has developed a policy. See if over the weekend the Treasurer has decided that he has a single idea for the future of the economy. A single idea! He used to have an idea—the idea that they used to have was called the GST. The argument that they used to want to have: they used to come into this chamber and say, 'Oh, if you oppose the GST it means you're not at the debate! You're not part of the whole debate! You're just not in there—you've just got no courage!'

What happens at the first moment of some murmurings from their own backbench that they are worried about their own jobs and their own seats? The Treasurer backs off. The Treasurer runs a mile from it. Why? Because what is the one thing that will get this mob to change their minds on any policy? Is it whether it has an impact on the jobs of Australians? Is it whether it has an impact on jobs in manufacturing, jobs in Whyalla, defence contracts in South Australia? That is not what will get this mob moving. They are interested in the jobs that are determined by ballot in their own party room or in their own preselections, and that is as far as their policy goes. That is as far as their interest goes.

I feel for the Treasurer. He got up to the National Press Club—

Opposition members interjecting—

No, I do—because they had him speaking on the wrong topic. He turned up to the National Press Club, and they said he was going to talk about the economy. The poor guy—he has never worked on the economy. It's not something that the Treasurer does! If they had done the decent thing and introduced the Treasurer and said he was going to talk about machinations within the Liberal Party, he would have had a speech to give. If they had said to him he was going to talk about reshuffles, he would have had a speech to give. He could have told us what happens in the next fortnight, because, when you lose 12 in six months, it means you are averaging one a fortnight. We get a new minister sworn in. That is where they are at the moment.

Mr Nikolic interjecting—

But this Treasurer has shown the total level of offence after his week from hell—last week—that he had. I would prefer we were suspending standing orders now to allow the Treasurer of Australia to say something about his portfolio. I would prefer we were suspending standing orders now to allow the Treasurer to say something about his job, which is managing the Australian economy. I would like, if he is going to criticise Labor's plans on reforming negative gearing and doing something about housing supply and housing affordability, to hear what his ideas are. I would like him, for a moment, to do his own job. I would like him, for a moment, to do the job that as Treasurer of Australia he is sworn to do.

Mr Nikolic interjecting—

Don't forget: he is not just part of a government that has been fighting with the opposition to get the Treasury benches. He fought with Joe Hockey to get to that job. He fought with the first two years of legacy of this government—the member for Bass is quiet again straightaway. You can turn him on and off like a clock, this guy! And the Treasurer is the symbol of just how bad the internal division is for those opposite. You will not get a bigger symbol of the division from those opposite than the fact that the first action a member of the executive takes when they come back to parliament is to suspend standing orders so they can talk about the voting rules. And the person who comes in to move the change—the person who they say is the most appropriate person to introduce a law about voting rules—is the Treasurer of Australia.

This is a government that has completely lost the way and a Treasurer who does not have a clue. We are happy to support the suspension of standing orders.

Question agreed to.

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