Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party, Leader of The Nationals in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

We are going to take that as the crucial answer. You have now confirmed that it is going to become a mechanism for infrastructure projects and that is where your buybacks will be. You have ruled out general buybacks. If that is not the case and you have not ruled out general buybacks, you must now clearly state that. I can assure you we will go back to our office and there will be a very irate minister from the state parliament of Victoria on one line, a very irate minister from the New South Wales state parliament on another line and an irate one from Queensland on another line, because the recommendations and the warrants that have been given to these people will be entirely different to what we are actually delivering.

I know it is crucial for you and that the predominant minister is the Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, Tony Burke, but you do have advisers sitting approximately four feet away from you. It is also a recommendation about competency in the delivery of an answer, because this is not fluff. This is absolutely crucial to how people perceive and trust the government. You have been asking for our trust in a bipartisan way. We implicitly are also asking for this recommendation to be explicit and held to account, otherwise we will have to change this in such a way that it will be at some point in time. We have to know.