Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

That would be a novel idea, wouldn’t it, Senator Abetz? She could kill two birds with one stone, consulting with her own electorate and her portfolio constituency. I would have thought that would be effective use of the minister’s time. But far be it from us to try to give her advice on ending the closed shop of Labor consultation practices.

Mr Rann went up there and he said that the South Australian government had made submissions to the federal government and they were hopeful there would be a positive response. We hope there will be a positive response too, but we hope it will be a more positive response than there was when Anthony Albanese, the then shadow minister, promised that Labor in government would give Nyrstar’s Port Pirie water-recycling program urgent attention. Here we are, more than 12 months later, and there has been none of the urgent attention that was promised more than a year ago by the Labor Party to Nyrstar’s desire to help end lead problems and deliver water recycling in Port Pirie. In more than 12 months, zero urgent attention—so how can we have any faith that this time around the Labor Party will give any sort of attention to the concerns of the people of Port Pirie and Tasmania about their jobs? (Time expired)