Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) | Hansard source

I have never heard a greater spray or screed of double standards in this place. I was not going to raise the Pakistan issue, but since Senator Faruqi has she might be interested to know—and I don't know if this came up in discussions over there on the subcontinent—that in February, less than six months ago, under a headline from Reuters it was reported that Pakistan plans to quadruple domestic coal-fired power and move away from gas. But she has the temerity to come into this place and blame this country for this climate crisis while failing to mention—and I'm sure she would know—that Pakistan is turning on more coal-fired power stations just as they're going out of fashion. How about we apply an equal standard here? Why are the Greens so quick to damn Australia, our country and our people, but are so quick to let others off the hook, whether it is Pakistan, China, India or Europe—and I'll come to Europe later.

The other broader double standard in this contribution today is that every time it's cold we are told the weather is not climate, and then as soon as it is hot in Rome apparently the weather is climate. What a double standard. Do the Greens remember May? Only a few months ago in May—and I am quoting from a report—more than 100 weather stations across Australia registered their coldest May minimum temperatures on record. I'm not saying that is climate, but you are. You are saying that because it is a bit hot in Europe at the moment it's global boiling, which is apparently the term now. Global warming is no longer useful, so they have come up with a new term to replace the old term to scare us even more. But they are just using weather, using data points, to justify putting a massive new restriction on our own economic restrictions while they are ignoring the data from our own country, which shows we just had one of the coldest Mays on record.

Why do you ignore that? It does not make any sense because what is actually happening around the world, not just in Pakistan—a news flash for the Greens—is the world is increasing its use of coal. But that's not the case in Australia. We are getting blamed. The Greens constantly blame us. They want to blame their own country and their own people, yet they ignore—