Page 1206 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 4 May 2022
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
I would also like to note that we have valuable skills being shared across many industries in Canberra. On Monday I signed the Soldier On pledge, which values veterans’ skills and experiences in our ACT public service. I would like to note that we would not have been able to get through everything that occurred in the ACT last year during the lockdown without the help of veterans in our food relief program in the ACT, literally putting food on the table for people who would otherwise have had great difficulty doing so.
I am very pleased that we are onboarding more ACT public service executive veterans’ employment champions in more directorates across our ACT public service right now. This will continue the good work that we have been doing in our ACT public service. In 2020 we were awarded the Veterans’ Employer of the Year for public sector organisations in the Prime Minister’s Veterans’ Employment Awards. If there are veterans out there in the community who are thinking about their employment options in the ACT and are thinking about the ACT public service, they can find more information on act.gov.au/veterans.
MR HANSON (Murrumbidgee) (3.53): We will not be supporting the amendment. It is not often that I am lost for words in this place, it is fair to say, but what I heard from Mr Braddock was mad, offensive and incoherent. I am comforted only by the fact that the Labor Party, I presume, will not be supporting him and they will not be supporting it. Outside of the crazy, crazy left of the Greens, I think the only people that would find comfort in what Mr Braddock said are the Russian Embassy and Vladimir Putin. It is extraordinary. What Mr Braddock was saying here was an attack on reason. It was an attack on the whole defence establishment here.
He suggested disarming the Ukrainian people of Western weapons, essentially, by his attack on Western industry, and that the solution is more diplomacy with someone who does not listen to reason. Mr Putin was not listening to diplomacy; it is evident; it is clear. To suggest that that is a rational way forward, I think, exposes the flaw in the whole Greens logic here. If this speech from Mr Braddock serves any purpose, I hope it is that it exposes to his Greens coalition partners, the Labor Party members, who these people actually are—who your Greens colleagues actually are—how extreme they are, and how distant they are from mainstream Australian values. I am disturbed at how they have doubled down on this, how dangerous they are and how extreme they are.
Let me say that I am encouraged that the Labor Party is not supporting this. We have our differences between the Liberal Party and the Labor Party, but I acknowledge today that you have drawn a line in the sand and you are not going down this path of madness. I am glad to see Ms Cheyne shaking her head there and agreeing with me. It is encouraging to me that the Labor Party is holding the line here, and I thank you for that. I genuinely thank you for that because the sorts of policies, proposals and plans being put forward by the Greens, by Mr Braddock today, are dangerous, are extreme and give me real cause for concern. We obviously will not be supporting this amendment, and I am hopeful that the Labor Party will not either.
MR BARR (Kurrajong—Chief Minister, Treasurer, Minister for Climate Action, Minister for Economic Development and Minister for Tourism) (3.57): No, Labor will
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video