Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

The government had two jobs this year: the vaccine rollout and quarantine. It has botched both. We have a Prime Minister who never accepts responsibility. He's too busy rolling out the red carpet for himself to roll out the vaccination for Australians. This is not just a government of smirk and mirrors; it's a government of shirk and mirrors. It's always someone else's responsibility. We saw it today when we asked questions about the Victorian outbreak and the connection with the hotel quarantine system, which has been established because of the Prime Minister's refusal to establish an appropriate facility. If this Prime Minister has a single Shakespearean quality, it's that he is full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

We saw that again today. He actually had the chutzpah to stand up and say, 'They're attacking the states.' This is the guy who had his Treasurer stand at this dispatch box and attack the Andrews Labor government. He had the health minister attack the Andrews Labor government. This is a Prime Minister who went to Queensland to do two things: to raise funds for the Queensland LNP and to call upon the Palaszczuk government to open the borders. 'Open them up!' That's what he did. And then, in Western Australia, he joined with Clive Palmer to say that Mark McGowan was right. Well, I say this: I'm on Mark McGowan's side; this Prime Minister was on Clive Palmer's side.

We were told that Australia was at the front of the queue, but we know that we're 113th. We were told four million Australians would be vaccinated by March. Well, we're almost in June and we're not at four million yet. When the vaccines arrived, the minister made it sound like the moon landing. Remember that? 'The eagle has landed.' Well, it was a dodo bird, not an eagle, because there we were at the back of the queue. The member for Higgins went further. She said on Raf Epstein's program that the minister opposite deserved a Nobel prize. She did! I'm not kidding. He's more worthy of a booby prize.

Then there are the mixed messages we've had out there. 'We're not in a rush. Nothing to see here. Chill out, peeps. Wait for the next vaccine.' That's the message they've sent out. The PM's messages spin like a weathervane in a tornado. They are different each and every day. No wonder there's so much confusion out there. When we asked about quarantine yesterday, we actually got an answer to the question. For 30 seconds he took responsibility. He stood up and he said, 'Yes, well, the Commonwealth is responsible for quarantine'—hint, hint: it's in the Constitution. He then paused and went, 'But it's the states and territories.' There it was.

We know that the Melbourne outbreak comes because of hotel quarantine in Adelaide. The people involved survived India unaffected, but they didn't survive the Adelaide quarantine without being infected and without spreading it around Victoria. This has real consequences for human health, real consequences for people's everyday lives and real consequences for our economy. That's why this is not an academic exercise. That's why this government shouldn't shirk its responsibility.

They had a report last year from Jane Halton, which recommended that they deal with issues like ventilation in hotels—hotels weren't appropriate—and that they deal with facilities. Exmouth was named. We've had proposals from state governments. The Palaszczuk government—almost a year ago now—in the third quarter of last year were advancing proposals outside of Gladstone and, of course, in Toowoomba. What did we get from the Prime Minister? He described Toowoomba as a place 'in the desert'. Then he said that you've got to have quarantine close to airports. I'll give him the big tick: the proposal is at Wellcamp Airport. It's actually at the airport where his plane landed. Then he said it needed to be near health facilities. The Toowoomba Base Hospital is not a bad place at all.

This is a Prime Minister who got confused between Toowoomba and Betoota. The Betoota Advocate got it absolutely right when they described him as 'Scotty from marketing'. Speaking of marketing, they spent $1 billion on advertising, but they can't get an advertising program for the vaccination rollout right. They spent $3.8 million on a campaign featuring a milkshake video that was so obscene that even The Betoota Advocate couldn't send it up. Then we had government members such as Senator Rennick yesterday saying this about when he would be vaccinated: 'Mate, I'm going to sit back and watch and see how it goes.' That's what government members are saying. Of course, they have no plan for getting the vaccine rollout right. They have no plan for quarantine; that's for the states. And, of course, they have no plan for the economy.

This is a government that's high on visibility but low on delivery. They assume closed borders until after the election. Their budget allows for lower wages, low growth, low productivity and lower workforce participation. What a quadrella! Not only are workers' wages due to go down over the forward estimates; we know their taxes will go up once the election is over and the tax offset is withdrawn. This is all the while racking up $1 trillion of debt while they cut $3.3 billion from infrastructure over the forward estimates.

The Prime Minister recently quoted Talking Heads—someone must have given that to him! What he should have quoted, if he's talking about this government, is 'Road to Nowhere', because that's this government. They don't actually have a plan for Australia's future. Labor does: appropriate quarantine facilities, rollout of the vaccine, manufacturing mRNA vaccines here and a proper advertising campaign. But, post the pandemic, we'll be building back stronger—not just trying to go back to what was there—through our National Reconstruction Fund and through the creation of jobs and skills in Australia. We'll be identifying jobs of the future and training Australians for them, including in the new energy apprenticeships program. There will be universal affordable child care to boost productivity, boost the economy and boost women's workforce participation. Our Housing Australia Future Fund will not just deal with homelessness, deal with people escaping domestic violence and look after our veterans who are sleeping on our streets but also create jobs and build our economy. We will create secure work and deal with casuals, the gig economy, the gender pay gap and 'same job, same pay'. When we asked simple questions about that today—about two people next to each other doing the same job with a $500-a-week pay differential—what did the government have to say about it? Nothing. They've been in government now for three terms. They're shooting for over a decade in office, but they won't take responsibility for anything. On a day like today, the fourth anniversary of the Uluru Statement from the Heart, if you want to lift Australia up, just get it done.

We want an Australia where no-one is left behind and no-one is held back. What we have from this government is not just a government dominated by climate sceptics; we know, as a result of recent decisions, they're market sceptics as well. They're prepared to engage in using taxpayers' money for any purpose whatsoever. What reform will this government leave after three terms? Where's the big vision? Where's the change in the economy, in social policy and in environmental policy? This week we saw that the Prime Minister not only doesn't hold a hose; he couldn't hold a nail! He was there with a hammer, pretending to hammer a nail in. There was no nail there! It says it all about how fake this government is. Australians have been magnificent during this pandemic, and they deserve a government that is better.

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