Page 1485 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 4 May 2016
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broadcast and are available for the public to hear and see exactly how individuals behave in this chamber. It is not often reported on in the mainstream media, but the serial offender in this place in terms of appalling behaviour, the Leader of the Opposition, can now be seen much more publicly. We often have debates in this place, as we do now, with an empty public gallery. But Mr Hanson’s behaviour—
Mr Hanson: Madam Speaker—
MADAM SPEAKER: Have you got a point of order, Mr Hanson?
Mr Hanson: on a point of order as to relevance—
MR BARR: Can you stop the clock please, Madam Speaker?
MADAM SPEAKER: Stop the clock, please.
Mr Hanson: we are debating the budget and the implications of the budget. A verbose critique of other people’s debating styles is hardly relevant to this debate.
MADAM SPEAKER: I do not uphold the point of order. The question is that the amendment be agreed to. Mr Barr.
MR BARR: Thank you, Madam Speaker. As I was saying, there is a great deal more public scrutiny of the nature of people’s contributions in this place, and Mr Hanson would do well to reflect upon that, given the way that he has conducted himself this morning and consistently during his time in this place. But let us not dwell too much on the Leader of the Opposition; let us focus on the issues.
We have heard a lot today about unity tickets, and we heard a lot about unity tickets prior to 2013. So I am pleased that the Leader of the Opposition has used that language because it allows a direct comparison with what the former Prime Minister said prior to the 2013 election. It was all about goodness and light then. We were all on unity tickets about education funding. We were all on unity tickets about health funding. There were to be no cuts to pensions, no cuts to the ABC, no cuts to the SBS and no changes to the GST. It was all laid out very publicly before the 2013 election. We then had the 2014 budget which cut health and education, and made a virtue of it. It was there in the savings table. It was the big way to address what was then allegedly a budget emergency.
Fast-forward a couple of years, substitute the Prime Minister and the Treasurer with the B team, and apparently it is no longer a budget emergency. You have a federal government that is projecting over its forward estimates four consecutive deficits. Apparently, there is no budget emergency. We will certainly compare and contrast the commentary of the Canberra Liberals on the territory budget next month with their apparent preparedness to support continued budget deficits at this time at the federal level, given that their federal colleagues are not projecting a surplus at any point in the forward estimates period of this year’s budget; yet they are still cutting funding to health and education. They have not restored funding to the concessions program that
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