Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I hear Senator Barnett agreeing with that. He would know from his own experiences how difficult it is to get children to accept needing injections for diabetes. Then there was the Sienna program, which was developing innovative tests for the diagnosis of cancer. There was a grant of $120,000 over four years proposed for the Sienna program. Sienna were still negotiating in good faith with the government when this program was cut. They lost their $120,000 and are now going overseas to find other partners to develop their innovative diagnostic test, so we have lost another important medical development because of cutting of this program.

Senator Carr said 75 per cent of the money secretly cut from the Commercial Ready program would go to climate change. I wonder how he then justifies the cutting of funding to the Permadrive program, which was seeking to commercialise a new engine that would reduce fuel consumption by up to 25 per cent. Senator Carr can be assured that the mothers of diabetic children in Australia and the relatives of those with cancer will not thank him for cutting the Commercial Ready program.