Senate debates

Wednesday, 15 August 2018

Questions without Notice: Take Note of Answers

Great Barrier Reef Foundation

3:03 pm

Photo of Doug CameronDoug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Human Services) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Education and Training (Senator Birmingham) to questions without notice asked by Senators Keneally and Ketter today relating to a grant to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation.

What a bumbling performance from Senator Birmingham! What a pathetic performance from a cabinet minister, who was unable to deal with any of the questions with any substance during his answers. It's quite clear that this is an absolute rort, handing half a billion dollars over to a small foundation with six employees, when it should have actually been providing more resources to the CSIRO or to the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority. These are the areas that have the scientific knowledge. These are the organisations that know what's happening in the Great Barrier Reef. It's quite clear that Senator Birmingham doesn't have a clue about what's going on.

I'm not surprised Senator Birmingham doesn't have a clue, because the Prime Minister doesn't have a clue either. This is a government in its death throes. This is a rabble of a government, unable to deal with the real issues that affect ordinary Australians. This is a government so consumed by its internal conflict, so consumed by looking after its own jobs, that it doesn't care about the Great Barrier Reef. It doesn't care about ordinary working people in this country. This is a government that is so bad that it can't come up with a reasonable argument—not one decent argument—as to why it would hand half a billion dollars of taxpayers' money to the mates of the Prime Minister and the mates of the Prime Minister's wife. That's what's happened here.

This is about the big end of town looking after the big end of town. So what do they do? They hand them half a billion dollars on the basis that they are supposedly the experts in fundraising in the private sector. Well, maybe the people who are on the board should just put their hands in their own pockets, because these are the people with the $17-million-a-year salaries—the mates of Malcolm and Lucy. These are the mates getting half a billion dollars of public money. It's an absolute outrage. And, if there was one thing that this government could do to actually justify it, we would have heard it by now. Questions have been asked every day this week as to why this government would hand half a billion dollars of taxpayers' money to their mates in the big end of town—to some small organisation, employing six people—when we have the CSIRO and the Great Barrier Reef marine council ready to get the money. They could get the money, they could use the money and they could actually use it well.

The reason they won't give it to the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority is that that authority actually believes in climate change. The authority actually knows that man-made pollution is causing problems. It's causing problems with water quality, problems with the crown-of-thorns starfish and causing calcification. But, because the authority recognise that climate change is a reality and this lot over here want to deny it, they are not going to get a cent. It's the same with the CSIRO. The CSIRO is the pre-eminent research body in this country. They act in the interests of the community. They act in the interests of industry. They are there to make sure we achieve our international and national responsibilities. Yet this mob want to hand half a billion dollars to a small organisation that happened to be mates of the Prime Minister and mates of the Prime Minister's wife.

Senator Birmingham was absolutely pathetic. He can't handle his own portfolio, he can't handle this. This is a government in decline. It's a government that should go. (Time expired)

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