Steve Irons (Swan, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I see the member for Melbourne rose. I am sorry to take this opportunity off you to speak, but I just thought that I would like to continue with my comments. One of the things that the member for Makin—and it is good to see him quoting Tory politicians—talked about was changes of promises. If we go back to pre-2010, we can remember the changes of promises that every Australian remembers. The Greens and Labor broke the promise not to introduce a carbon tax. The people in Western Australia will remember that next Saturday when it comes to the election. The Greens-Labor alliance lied to the Australian people about the carbon tax that they said they would never introduce under their government.

Of course, this bill was part of the carbon tax repeal bills. This bill sits within that context. The coalition went to the election with the clearest possible position on the subject of the carbon tax. We announced a policy many months—if not years—out from the election. The policy was communicated in budget reply speeches, in press releases, in debates during the campaign and in the election material of every single Liberal and National candidate across the country. The leader of the coalition at the time, Tony Abbott, was bold enough to declare that the 2013 federal election would be a referendum on the carbon tax. This was an accurate description of what the election turned out to be. But the people on that side of the chamber want to ignore the will of the Australian people.

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