Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Hume and Senator Seselja might try and do their best to paper over the enormous cracks in the coalition on climate change policy, but these cracks, which have been there all along, have really come to the fore, absolutely decimating any credibility the government has in this space. While Prime Minister Scott Morrison was out and about at the G7 in the UK last week, trying to spruik Australia's climate change credentials, Barnaby Joyce, who doesn't support the very target that the Prime Minister was spruiking, was returned as Australia's Deputy Prime Minister.

Senator Hume was asked about Sussan Ley's interview this morning on RN, in which she refused to guarantee that Mr Morrison's preference—which he had just put forward on the world stage in order to rehabilitate our credibility—would survive Barnaby Joyce's return as Deputy Prime Minister. Sussan Ley simply said, 'We will have discussions with the Nationals.' What does Barnaby say? Barnaby doesn't come out and forthrightly say, 'I don't believe in climate change targets.'