Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

We have heard a fair bit of drivel in this discussion of matter of public importance. It's no wonder as we’ve got the member for Leichhardt and the member for Bass. I appreciate that they are new members, but they've got basketball backgrounds. The member for Leichhardt played the game at the highest level in Australia, and the member for Bass was a basketball coach. Well done to them both for that. Sport is healthy, and basketball is a fantastic sport. But when you come into the chamber on an MPI, don't always take the talking points that you're given by the dirt unit of the Labor Party and just spout them in the chamber, because sometimes you might get led astray. Sometimes your pass might be misplaced.

We heard the member for Leichhardt talking about the tidal wave of green energy projects in regional Australia and suggesting that this was a good thing. Let me tell you that, if he visits the Riverina, he will hear completely the opposite, because those green energy projects are going to hurt, and they are already hurting the lives and livelihoods of my constituents. The member for Bass talked about the trillion dollars worth of Liberal Party debt. I might remind the member for Bass that it was the Liberal-National government. We are in a coalition. I appreciate she acknowledges that. When there's talk about the trillion dollars—

Member for Fenner, just be quiet for a moment. You might learn something too. When Labor members talk about the 'trillion dollars of Liberal Party debt', to quote them, I just want to refer them to the RMIT ABC fact check article of Monday 8 May 2023. This is the ABC; this isn't me. This isn't the Liberal or National Party talking points unit. They say this:

During an April 13 interview with Sky News, Treasurer Jim Chalmers—

I'm reading here. I know he's the member for Rankin—

said he was concerned "about the cost of servicing that trillion dollars in Liberal debt that we inherited from out predecessors".

That's what he said, and the RMIT ABC Fact Check investigated it. It said:

Mr Chalmers's claim is spin.

When the Coalition left office in March 2022, Labor was left with $888 billion of gross debt—

I appreciate it's a big number—

or $517 billion of net debt.

Listen to this one. The article goes on:

But while most of that debt was accrued during the Coalition's term, a sizeable chunk was inherited from the previous Labor government.

Labor's share amounted to either 25 per cent of gross debt ($218 billion), or 31 per cent of net debt ($161 billion).

In neither case did this represent a "tiny fraction" of the total.

I appreciate the member for Bass is a new member, but what she should know—and what the member for Fenner would know because he was here at the time—is that there was a global pandemic. We had to address the most challenging of times, and we kept small businesses open.

I sat in silence while you had your contributions. Please give me the respect of doing the same for me.

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