Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler—Leader of the Opposition) (15:44): Indeed this is a government that never does its job, because it's too driven by disunity, dysfunction and dishonesty, and that's rendering it incapable of moving the country forward. The central characteristics that define this government mean that it's just not competent.

I've been Leader of the Opposition for three summers now. In the first summer, of course, we had the bushfire crisis, characterised by a Prime Minister who said, whilst in an interview in Hawaii, 'I don't hold a hose, mate.' The guy who doesn't hold a hose but wants your kid to drive a forklift—that's this Prime Minister. Of course, during that period he did come back, and he went through a period where he forced people who had been impacted by those bushfires to shake his hand.

The period was full of announcements. Something that's also characterised this government is announcement and then, 'Job done,' with no delivery. He announced $4 billion in the Emergency Response Fund. Of that, we know now that not one cent has been spent on recovery—not one cent. During that period, $836 million in interest payments has been added to the fund. This isn't a disaster recovery fund; this is more like a term deposit for the government, at a time when people in those communities are still living in caravans.

Of course, we know as well that, during that period, the Premier of New South Wales had this to say: that it was always about the politics. Gladys Berejiklian said, 'Lives are at stake today and he is just obsessed with petty political pointscoring.' We saw that again today. We had serious questions from the member from Eden-Monaro and the member for Gilmore, and how were they responded to by this government? Without any shame at all, this Prime Minister went out and spruiked the former member for Bega—not the current member for Bega, because that's a member of the Labor Party, Dr Holland, but the former member. The backlash against the Liberal Party is there for all to see, because Bega is a seat that's been there since the 19th century, and Labor has never held that seat, but we do today.

The second summer was, of course, the summer of vaccinations, when countries around the world were racing to get vaccinations to protect their populations. But for this Prime Minister it wasn't a race, so we ran right at the bottom of the queue. For a long time, we were barely in the top 100 countries, and as a result, of course, the booster rollout is later than in other parts of the world.

The third summer was, of course, the summer of rapid antigen tests, the crisis in aged care and the crisis for people with disabilities—the crisis for really vulnerable people in our community. There his response was: 'It's not my job; it's someone else's job. It's always for the states to respond.' We've seen over 700 people lose their lives in aged care. We see older Australians who've helped to build this country unable to get access to adequate food and water and unable to be showered. People are dying on their own, separated from their loved ones, because of this government's failure.

But, of course, we know that this is a Prime Minister who always chooses the political road and never looks at what the right thing is for the country. As the former Premier said, it's always about politics, not people, with this Prime Minister. That's reflected in all the characteristics of the government if you go through. We have a treasurer who's described by the Australian Financial Review as 'lighter than helium', and we see that every day at the dispatch box, with this absurd research being done, combing through the websites, combing through what people said at school and going through people's garbage looking for notes. It's just pathetic. He is the Treasurer who has presided over $1 trillion of debt, who has committed $60 billion errors in his adding up and who has not put in place appropriate protections for taxpayers' interests when it comes to the JobKeeper program, resulting in over $20 billion going to companies that were increasing their profits. He's a Treasurer without an economic reform agenda going forward.

Of course, we have a defence minister who thinks that national security is a political football, a defence minister who wants to speak about security but can't speak for one minute out of every three about those issues. We have a health minister who could have taken his moment to shine but has been reduced to a minor character in a Shakespearean tragedy. That's what this health minister has done. And we have a Deputy Prime Minister who perhaps its best to just say is an embarrassment, a national embarrassment to the country, and one who we hope campaigns throughout the country in both cities and regions. I say to the Deputy Prime Minister: you are welcome anywhere at all!

But this government is always about the politics, which is why it commits so many errors and why it doesn't deserve a second decade in office. We saw that last week with the chaos around the Religious Discrimination Bill. Here it is: a concept, an idea, that's supported by just about everyone in this parliament, I would hope. The idea that you shouldn't be discriminated against because of your faith is certainly something that Labor supports. But the government couldn't even get it right because they were too busy trying to play wedge politics and be clever. They wedged themselves and fell apart on the floor of this parliament and ended up voting against their own legislation. Then, when the amendment was carried consistent with what the Prime Minister had put to me in writing on 1 December and what he had told and leaked publicly to the media last December, he walked away from the legislation, but not before trying to do a deal in the cabinet about a national integrity commission, saying he would be prepared to bring it forward. He would not actually pass it. He was just doing a little trick to try to get the crossbenchers and some of his own party back on side. But he got rolled in his own cabinet room.

How do we know that? It's because this is a cabinet that leaks so hard it feels more like a dam bursting. These leaks are flooding out from the cabinet, from those opposite. Day after day, we have to put up with the leadership struggle in full view, a Prime Minister sitting there while Bill and Ben over there compete with each other on how they're going. Today we saw that even the Safer Communities Fund has been rorted by this government. It's a government that's good at rorts but not very good at RATs for people.

We on this side will continue to hold the government to account, but we will also be campaigning on a positive future, a better future for Australia, one where there's secure work, one where there are higher living standards, with wages being lifted while we make childcare more affordable, where we have Medicare at the centre of the health system and where we have a future made in Australia. Have you noticed in two weeks there's been not a single question about our climate and energy policy released more than two months ago? It's a policy that will create 604,000 new jobs, will reduce power prices by $275, includes $52 billion of private sector investment, will reduce emissions by 43 per cent by 2030 and is supported by the Business Council of Australia, the National Farmers Federation, the ACTU, ACCI and the Australian Industry Group. That is what real policy does to take a country forward. That's along with our national reconstruction fund and our 'buy Australia' plan, which will support Australian industry, Australian jobs and Australian economic growth.

But instead we have a great pretender, someone who pretends he's a hair shampooer, pretends he's a fighter pilot, pretends he's a race car driver and pretends he's a ukulele player. He's someone who acts as the Prime Minister. He should just do his job. I have been acting Prime Minister before, in 2013. This guy has been acting Prime Minister since 2018, because he hasn't done his job. (Time expired)