Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Foreign Affairs (Senator Wong) to questions without notice asked by Senators Cash, Duniam and Hume today.

We saw from the government another pathetic attempt to try and deflect from the complete mayhem that they have been in over recently weeks with respect to the management of the fuel crisis that we have in this country. Of course, for two weeks they denied there even was a problem. They told us every day here at estimates that there was plenty of fuel in the country, that every ship that was due to arrive had arrived, that every ship that was due to come would come. That's what they told us for two weeks. Then the day after the parliament rose, Minister Bowen went out and held a press conference when there was no opportunity for the parliament to continue to scrutinise what the government was saying, and suddenly there was a crisis.

It took them two weeks to work out what our constituents had been telling us for that whole time—that supply chains were running dry, that fuel stations were running dry, that farmers could not get fuel and that the only diesel the fishing industry had left was what was in their tanks when they got back from sea. They couldn't go back out again because they couldn't get supply.

They still are struggling to understand the supply chains that supply fuel out into the country, because there are over 800 fuel stations in the country today that are out of either diesel or unleaded petrol. They are still struggling to come to terms with that. But what do they do? They do what they always do. They deflect. They try to blame someone else. Today they even handed up a dodgy set of talking points that they'd concocted to try and deflect attention away from themselves.

Then, of course, we heard today that the Prime Minister is going to make a statement to the Australian people tonight at 7 pm. Why doesn't he use the people's house? Why doesn't he walk into the parliament and, on the floor of the people's house, fess up and tell the Australian people what the situation is? The answer is simple: he does not want the scrutiny of the parliament. He would rather wait, just like Minister Bowen did two weeks ago, until the parliament rises, and go out and have a chat to the press and then walk away when it starts to get uncomfortable—all the usual tactics: deflect, blame somebody else; it's somebody else's fault this happened.

This government has been in charge for four years now. At some point they have to take responsibility for the issues in front of them that they have to manage. It is clear that they have no understanding of the supply chains that operate in this country, and they try to blame somebody else for trying to create uncertainty. Well, the Australian people need no help from anyone to be uncertain about what's going on in this country, because the government's doing a bloody good job of it on its own, because it can't keep its story straight. It can't tell the Australian people, truthfully, what's actually going on. And of course the Australian people remember things like $275 as a reduction in their fuel bill that was supposed to be coming. They remember lower housing costs and a better standard of living that were promised by this government. So why should anyone believe them on fuel today? (Time expired)