Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, following Senator Sterle, I am very pleased that you brought him back into line, because what he was talking about had very little resemblance to the response from the minister, which was about the carbon tax. The closest that Senator Sterle got to talking about the carbon tax and the relevance to the people of Australia was harking back to the last election in 2010, when he was condemning us for being opposed to new taxes. Yet his own Prime Minister, the leader of his government, said, 'There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.' It is known as the monumental lie of modern politics in this country.

It is extraordinary that there are defenders of this deception of the Australian people by this Prime Minister, whose credibility is absolutely at rock bottom. We know that over the course of time the government have tried to mask their deception of the Australian people and the hideous consequences which are impacting every family, such as the rising cost of living and increasing electricity prices. We have pensioners who are no longer turning on their heaters or their air conditioners because they cannot afford it. We have heard these stories, and anyone who goes out and talks to people in the community knows it. If they deliver Meals on Wheels they will see firsthand the impact that this government are having on the cost of living for people. It is a shame and it is an indictment of those on the other side that they are in denial about it. Whilst they do not want to talk about the hardship that Australian families are undergoing, they are coming up with diversion after diversion after diversion. They are trying to talk about Peter Slipper; they stand by Peter Slipper despite his misogynistic comments and his text messages that are absolutely appalling. They reel out the handbag hit squad, as it has been described in the press, to beat up on Mr Abbott—simply to mask the failures of this government. And the failures of this government are extensive.

Senator Sterle, in his contribution, went back to the last election. I think we should start there. We should talk about the people's assembly that was going to reach a consensus on climate change. There is no consensus on climate change, except from this government. And their only consensus is: they will not rein in their spending so they have got to find new taxes with which to burden the Australian people. Mark my words: there are more big taxes on the way. We have had the carbon tax, we have the mining tax, and the super tax is being mooted. The ACTU—the puppet masters of the modern Labor movement—are now saying that we need more super taxes on other profitable industries. Let me tell you, the most profitable industry in this country is being a union boss, because there is no tax payable by the unions. You can get your credit card and swipe it to your heart's content wherever you like. It is an absolute disgrace. The fact is that this government refuses to confront the demons that reside within their own DNA. It is an appalling indictment of their approach to the business of governing this country.

It has been 101 days since the carbon tax was inflicted upon the people of Australia. Right from the word go, we have said that this tax is going to impact our country for the negative. We are seeing it with job losses, we are seeing it with industries closing, we are seeing it with a mooted higher carbon tax price. If you want to identify the hypocrisy and the duplicity of this government, this week they are introducing a bill to link our carbon tax to the European carbon tax scheme. The European carbon tax scheme has not even been finalised and will not be finalised until 2013, and yet we are assured that it is going to result in a lower carbon tax price in this country. If it is going to be lower than what the Treasury has forecast, why is it that the carbon tax is expected to go up and up and up in the forward estimates? Why are the Greens saying it should be $50 by 2016? Why should it be up to $100, $200 or $300 by 2050? The lie is in the detail. The devil is always in the detail, and this is an ad hoc policy. It is a policy that was cobbled together in response to a need for money and some grand diversion. The government have cobbled it together, and they have made eight amendments to it already, which indicates that it simply could not pass muster and that it did not have the appropriate scrutiny that it needed.

The fact that there are defenders on the other side speaks volumes about how purchasable their support is for anything. They will buy and sell anything to the Australian people if they think they can get away with it and if they think it will help them cling to power. The Australian people deserve a better government. They deserve a more responsible government. They deserve a government that will act in their interests and in the national interest.