Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thanks, Mr Acting Deputy President Gallacher. For a moment, I thought you were going to call Senator Watt to order for continuing to try to bully me and shout me down when I'm speaking. If I've cast an imputation on Senator Watt, it doesn't seem to have worried him, because he has laughed all the way through it. So I ask him again—through you, of course, Mr Acting Deputy President—whether he was one of those who went around and deliberately told the untruth to the Australian public that Medicare was going to be privatised. I thought that Senator Watt readily admitted that he was, that he went around and told what we all know now to be the ultimate lie—one of the biggest I've seen since I've been in politics. Remember that before the last election there were newspaper ads and how-to-vote cards being handed out—

Opposition senators interjecting—