Aaron Violi (Casey, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I want to commend the member for Riverina for this MPI. It is a very important discussion that we are having and it's one that impacts on my community greatly. We have seen credible reports that this decision has stopped prices decreasing by 40 per cent for international flights. In the Yarra Valley we are lucky. We have a wonderful tourism industry. We have an agriculture industry that is thriving. But those industries also have challenges. The tourism industry is coming off the back of COVID. It's not back to where it was. It is the lifeblood of our industry—having tourists come from many countries around the world. So for that price to not drop by 40 per cent hurts my community greatly. People overseas are making decisions: Do I fly to Australia? Do I fly to the US? Do I go to Europe? Price is one of the key things that they look at. This decision by this government is hurting tourism businesses across the country and particularly in my electorate of Casey.

Trade and exports are another important part of my community. CherryHill is a wonderful business in my electorate, growing cherries. They rely on the tourism industry but also on trade. Being able to fly their cherries overseas is crucial because cherries don't last very long, so they can't afford to put them on ships. Every extra flight brings down that cost of freight. That means they can export more, they can sell more and, guess what, they can employ more Australians. That's why this MPI is so important.

Let's look at the actual MPI: the government's chaotic airport and aviation industry policy. Do we need a better example than the Prime Minister having to come back into this House with his tail between his legs, with the Leader of the House by his side, protecting him, to correct his answer from question time?

This Prime Minister and the transport minister are not talking; months later, they're not on the same page. They weren't talking when this significant decision was being made. Clearly, it's chaos over there. Look at what the Prime Minister said—what he had to do. Look at the minister. She had 10 minutes to outline in detail the reasons why she made this decision—10 minutes to defend her actions. I stayed. I wanted to listen. I was very interested. I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt and hear from her. I kept time. For seven of those 10 minutes, 70 per cent of that time, the minister spoke about the former government. She even went back a decade, to the Prime Minister's work a decade ago. That was 70 per cent of her opportunity to defend her decision, to defend the government's policy, and she didn't do it. She spoke about the opposition and she spoke about the Prime Minister's decisions a decade ago. When she finally got to why she did it—I thought, this will be great; we'll get a bit of detail—it was 'national interest'. That was literally all we got from the minister: national interest—such a broad term it can mean anything.

If you listen to the Assistant Treasurer, we know that national interest is making sure that Qantas is profitable. It delivered a $2.5 billion profit. The member for Canberra did raise some significant concerns about Qantas that need to be addressed, I'll give her credit for that, but maybe she should also talk to the Assistant Treasurer, because it's in the national interest for Qantas to deliver a $2.5 billion profit.

We've seen the members opposite with the opportunity to talk about how this will impact their communities, but they haven't. They've spent the whole time talking about the former government;16 months into government and they're obsessed with the opposition. They're not able to articulate why this decision was made, who made it, when it was made, who was spoken to—the Virgin CEO; the now former Qantas CEO. The Prime Minister has to come and add to his answer, not just duck and weave, because there's no consistency.

It's staggering that the Prime Minister and the minister are not talking. What are they doing? At a time when prices are 50 per cent higher than pre COVID, and supply is down 25 per cent on pre COVID, this government is making decisions to keep prices higher and it doesn't have a plan to bring prices down.

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