Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. How does the Prime Minister reconcile the climate change minister's statement to parliament yesterday that the closure of the Kurri Kurri smelter is not driven by the carbon tax with his concession on radio this morning that the carbon tax is one of the factors that has affected the plant? How can Australians trust her government on anything when ministers cannot be straight on an issue as important as people's jobs?

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, this is an important issue because it is about the jobs of working people and our government always takes very seriously the jobs of working Australians. We do that despite the continued negativity and day-to-day opposition of the Leader of the Opposition and his team. They did not support jobs during the global financial crisis. They did not support the jobs of steelworkers. They did not support the jobs of automobile workers. The Leader of the Opposition talks a lot about jobs but he has never acted once to support a job in this nation.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister will return to the question.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On the question of the jobs at Kurri Kurri, this is an important issue for those working people. Of course, when any job is lost in this country, our concern goes to the person who has lost their job, and to their family. It is a very difficult time for them. But I would refer the Leader of the Opposition to the statement made by the vice-president of the company operating the smelter on the Channel 9 news last night. He said, 'We've been losing a substantial amount of money for the first four months and we need to stop the losses'—that is, this business has been in a loss-making position. And, as the Leader of the Opposition well knows, carbon pricing does not come into effect until 1 July.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker, I raise a point of order on direct relevance: the climate change minister belatedly admitted the carbon tax had something to do with it. Why won't the Prime Minister? Why won't she come out of denial?

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition will resume his seat. The Leader of the Opposition knows he cannot use points of order for debate. The Prime Minister has the call.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no amount of spin or negativity from the Leader of the Opposition that changes the fact that this business is in a loss-making position before carbon pricing starts on 1 July. Of course, that is because of changing conditions in the aluminium industry. We have got the continuing fallout from the global financial crisis.

Opposition members interjecting—

We know that those opposite, including the shadow Treasurer, who is screaming and shouting, like to pretend the global financial crisis did not happen. Of course, it did happen and we supported jobs and you voted against Australian jobs. There is a fallout from the global financial crisis. There has been a 40 per cent fall in aluminium prices around the globe. That means there are numerous closures of older, less-competitive smelters around the world.

The Leader of the Opposition should not treat working people with contempt by coming into this parliament and trying to pretend that circumstances about their jobs are just more fodder for his fear campaign. On this side of the parliament we respect working people, we support their jobs. The Leader of the Opposition just treats them with contempt day after day—but what else would you expect from a man who advocated Work Choices and believes in it still.