House debates

Thursday, 4 December 2014

  • Abbott Government (1 speech)
    Prime Minister Tony Abbott once told this parliament: The Australian people want a government that is competent and trustworthy. The test of a trustworthy government is: does it keep its...
  • McPherson Electorate: Tugun Lights Up (1 speech)
    I want to take this opportunity to inform the House of the outstanding success of the Tugun Lights Up event on the southern Gold Coast recently. Tugun Lights Up is a community event which...
  • Indi Electorate: Benalla P-12 College, Parliamentary Education Office (1 speech)
    On Wednesday, I had the pleasure to meet with 140 grade 5 and grade 6 students from Benalla P-12 College on the final day of their Canberra camp. I was delighted to talk to them about the...
  • National Broadband Network (1 speech)
    This nation needs fast broadband, and it is extraordinary that the HFC network passing three million households was going to be ignored by the Labor government and that they were simply going to...
  • Environment (1 speech)
    The Prime Minister does not lie; apparently, he just 'misspeaks'. Well, he made a whopper 'misspeaking' when it came to the renewable energy target. Before the election, he told the people of...
  • Western Australia Government: Department of Agriculture and Food (1 speech)
    I wish to speak on behalf of the Hills Orchard Improvement Group, or HOIG, and their current struggles now that the APVMA is phasing out the use of fenthion. Throughout the inquiry on the use of...
  • Budget (4 speeches)
    There is no cheer in the Prime Minister's Christmas cracker for Australians this year: business confidence, down; unemployment, up; youth unemployment at record highs and full-time unemployment...
  • Eureka Stockade (1 speech)
    One hundred and sixty years ago yesterday, the tensions on the goldfields in Ballarat erupted, with miners taking up arms against the colonial authorities in the Eureka rebellion. The rebellion...
  • Budget (1 speech)
    Never in Australia's history has there been a worse government than the Abbott government. It is a government that has lied. It is a government that has broken promise after promise after...
  • White Hill Truck Driver Memorial (1 speech)
    Mr Deputy Speaker, you know, as I do, that truckies carry this nation. Indeed, it was in this context that I was honoured to speak at the White Hill Truck Drivers Memorial last Saturday, in...
  • Abbott Government (1 speech)
    This has been a year of an unprecedented number of broken promises. It has been Tony Abbott's year of lies. Where do we begin? I may need to ask for an extension of time to be able to list the...
  • Deputy Prime Minister (1 speech)
    I rise to place on the Hansardmy thanks to the Deputy Prime Minister, Warren Truss, and his wife, Lyn. They have been incredibly supportive of the new people on the backbench. I would like to...
  • Education Funding (4 speeches)
    As we reflect today on the year of chaos, the year of dysfunction and on the pure number of lies exposed, which have been given by this government, I am led to think that there are few areas that...
  • Landcare: 25th Anniversary (1 speech)
    This year marks the 25th Anniversary of Landcare. In commemoration of this great milestone, Minister Hunt announced a one-off $5 million grant round, some of which I hope will be awarded to...
  • Lyons Electorate: Aged Care (1 speech)
    The ACAR funding recipients for aged-care facilities around Australia were announced today. I want to congratulate a number of facilities in my electorate of Lyons in Tasmania. Corumbene, at New...
  • Education Funding (1 speech)
    It has been a year of lies from the Abbott government—and none more egregious than the promise that there would be no cuts to education. In Queensland, the grade 6s are graduating and they...
  • Infrastructure (1 speech)
    Those opposite have a shameful record on infrastructure, and nowhere is that more obvious than in their appalling failure to support the critical WestConnex project. We will build WestConnex;...
  • Barton, Mr Russell (2 speeches)
    Later this afternoon Russell Barton, the host of question time on the ABC, will sign off for the final time. Through the sixties, seventies and eighties there were few national publications that...