Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Hansard source

It is a bizarre thing when the Australian Labor Party has asked a question—which Senator Evans himself acknowledges is a criticism of the Job Network process—and somehow I as the government minister am not allowed to defend the Job Network process because Senator Evans does not want to hear the statistics about how well the Job Network process has been working. As I have acknowledged, no system invented by humans has ever been perfect. We have never asserted, Mr President, that that which are we are doing is perfect, but I can tell you that it is a damned lot better than that which the Labor Party had in place when we won government in 1996. Last year there were 640,000 Australians who are able to attest to the veracity of that statement that I have just made.