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Wednesday, 12 October 2011
Page: 11605

Mr McCORMACK (Riverina) (13:54): Never before in the history of Australian parliament—not when it was sitting in Melbourne up to 1927, not in the former Parliament House up to 1988 and not in this place—has there been such a drastic change to our taxation system without it first going to the people of Australia. Never before in this parliament, nor in the 42 which preceded it, has there been such a necessity to ask the people what they thought. But this morning, on this ultimate day of betrayal, the misnamed clean energy bills passed, after which we witnessed the unedifying spectacle of rent-a-crowd, no doubt union hacks and Green lobbyists, making a din in the public gallery.

If this minority Labor-Greens-Independent government is so transfixed by a clean energy future, why did it post its What a Carbon Price Means to You in thick plastic? I had a publishing company for eight years before entering parliament and much of our work was putting together material, brochures and mail-outs. Not once did we see the need to issue a publication wrapped in plastic. Putting it in plastic is environmentally unfriendly, expensive and unnecessary.

Upon receiving my copy of Labor's 20-page clean energy future document, I was fascinated to read the disclaimer near the foot of page 4, which read:

The Commonwealth of Australia does not necessarily endorse the content of this publication.

If, as we have been hearing all last night, yesterday and for weeks and months since the Prime Minister went back on her word, it was so urgent to put a price on carbon, why would this publication carry such an odd disclaimer? Maybe it had not been proofread and signed off by the Leader of the Greens, the quasi-Prime Minister, Senator Bob Brown. (Time expired)

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Hon. Peter Slipper ): I will ignore the member's inappropriate use of a prop, but I would not expect that there would be a repetition in the future because I would have to deal with the situation.