Claire Chandler (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I also rise to take note of answers provided by government ministers to coalition questions today. Calling the responses given by ministers 'answers', particularly in relation to questions regarding Qatar Airways is, frankly, a bit of a stretch. This government has been desperately doing all it can to deflect legitimate criticism, reject accountability and obscure the truth about its dealings with Qantas and the former CEO Alan Joyce and the Qatar Airways proposal.

Australians are rightly fed up with Qantas, particularly over the last 18 months. It is a company that was once held in such high regard by the Australian public, but Australians are even more fed up with this government. Over the past week and in the chamber today the arrogance of this government has been on full display for us to see here and for all Australians to see across the country. We can't get straight answers out of them, and the answers they do provide are retracted or are changed a few days later.

Australians watching at home are left to come to no other conclusion than to suspect that this government is running a protection racket, but it is so caught up in its own spin that it can't even remember from day to day whether that protection racket is for the Prime Minister, for the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government or for protecting Qantas's profits. It appears that Labor are making things up as they go along. They have chopped and changed their story on the Qatar Airways proposal to try and wriggle out of a problematic situation and avoid being held accountable.

In an article that I was reading this week, published on the Sydney Morning Herald website, Latika Bourke wrote:

Federal Transport Minister Catherine King says the detention and forced examinations of Australian women at Doha airport during the pandemic was not behind the decision to deny Qatar Airways' request to double its Australian flights.

That was written on 26 July this year. It is the complete opposite of what Minister King said this week, when she claimed that one of the reasons she rejected the proposal from Qatar Airways to increase passenger and freight capacity was because of those searchers. Which one is it? What is the truth? What are the other reasons for rejecting this proposal that the minister alluded to but has refused to elaborate on?

There is no doubt that the forced strip-searches of Australian women were degrading and humiliating and an incredibly inappropriate invasive breach of privacy, and it is absolutely appropriate that the Minister for Foreign Affairs has raised our strong objections with the Qatari government. Why then, is the transport minister implying today that this was part of her reason for knocking back Qatar Airways when she is on the record previously as saying that it wasn't. Just over a week ago, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, when asked at a doorstop interview about the Qatar proposal, said:

Qatar can fly into Adelaide as many planes as they like as big as they like. They can fly in other planes, which are bigger and bring in more people.

Again, if the strip searches of Australian women were at least part of the reason that the minister knocked back the Qatar Airways proposal, why would the Prime Minister last week have been urging Qatar Airways to fly more Australians here into existing ports?

Something, frankly, doesn't stack up, and this government is under pressure because the public can see it and they are rightfully angry. The transport minister, the Prime Minister and this government cannot provide straight answers to very basic questions. Even in this chamber today, with members of the opposition asking questions about this, we are no closer to uncovering the real reason the minister rejected the Qatar Airways proposal. This lack of transparency and accountability is, frankly, becoming a hallmark of this government.

This whole saga has sent Labor ministers scrambling to hastily backtrack on their own previous statements. Just this morning, Assistant Minister Thistlethwaite said that he had been very critical of Qantas when grilled by Sky News' First Edition host, Peter Stefanovic. But Minister Thistlethwaite seemed to have conveniently forgotten posing in a Qantas marketing photo just over three weeks ago, when he stood alongside Alan Joyce, the Prime Minister, Minister Burney and the other 'yes' campaigners. Mr Thistlethwaite was all smiles for that photo opportunity, and so was Mr Joyce, because he'd got what he wanted when the government blocked Qatar Airways flights, and so was the Prime Minister, because he'd got what he wanted: another picture spruiking the Voice.

In the absence of the government doing the right thing, the Senate has agreed to establish an inquiry into this matter. I'm very glad that that has happened, because maybe soon Australians will finally find out what's going on.