Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I make no apology that I'm probably seen as one of the more prominent ones in favour of abolishing net zero. Yesterday during question time, in fact, the Minister for Climate Change and Energy stated that I don't take the harder debates—that I should take the harder debates and I should have taken on a more ferocious and fulsome and complete engagement with an acerbic interlocutor.

I thought about this for a while when I was on with Patricia Karvelas on the ABC thinking, 'Those pinkos aren't hard enough.' I thought: 'Yes, I need to debate someone. I need someone strong, who probably has a few tickets on themselves and probably has an unfathomable ego, and who'd possibly consider selling their loved ones into slavery to buy a bigger mirror to look at themselves. I thought: 'Where can I find this person? Where can I find this person to debate?' And then it came to me: they'll be scared of the dark, so they can't go on Sky. It'd better be on the ABC or one of the other channels. But this person—where can I find such a person? And then it came to me! They're right in front of me. It's the member for McMahon!

I challenge the member for McMahon to a debate on net zero. If he's so tough—if he can't just be brave in the cave and a bat in the sunlight—if he's so strong and he's so across his facts, then let's have the debate. You and the fourth estate could organise it. It would get the ratings, wouldn't it? I look forward to his reply.