Address to the ‘No Carbon Tax’ Rally
Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s Electorate Office
Synnot Street, Werribee
12 March 2011
10:15am
E & OE
MITCH FIFIELD:
We are gathered here today because the Prime Minister lied. She lied to everyone here and she lied to each and every Australian. Julia Gillard formed Government on the back of a lie. We are also here because the Prime Minister failed to do what each of her predecessors have done. She failed to seek a mandate at an election for a dramatic change to the Australian economy.
Julia Gillard needs to answer two basic questions about the carbon tax. How much will it cost? What will it achieve? You may have seen Bill Shorten on the ABC’s Q and A programme attempt to answer these questions. What we witnessed were four and a half minutes of meaningless blather. The reason? The answers to these basic questions are not pretty. A minimum increase in the cost of petrol of 6.5 cents per litre. A minimum increase in household electricity bills of three hundred dollars a year.
The Labor Party used to care about cost of living issues. The Labor Party used to care about the people here in the West of Melbourne. But no more. And as the Shadow Minister for Disabilities I am particularly concerned about the effects on Australians who already do it tough. Take someone with multiple sclerosis for instance. They use air-conditioning a lot to regulate their body temperature. They will pay.
While we have been focussed on this new tax, Julia Gillard has been on her trip to the US. It’s been hailed a stunning success because she managed to hand ball a Sherrin in the Oval Office without skittling Lincoln’s bust. But there’s another hand pass that deserves scrutiny: the passing of economic responsibility to the Greens and co-Prime Minister Bob Brown.
It’s time for the PM to ‘fess up that she lied. It’s time for the PM to abandon this tax. Prime Minister, we have a message for you: Wrong Way, Go Back.
ENDS