QUEENSLAND Nationals Senator Barnaby Joyce said today is a clear indication of the reality of the duplicity of Labor Party policy.
"How long did we have to go in to the Senate chamber day after day to hear Labor, generally via Senator Conroy, berate us over the privatisation of Telstra?
"They taunted us to block the sale because it would have been safe in government hands.
"Right from the word go the Nationals stated that we severely doubted the integrity of the Labor Party's claim that they had no intention of privatising Telstra.
"It had been stated by Kim Beasley when he was Finance Minister that he supported the privatisation of Telstra. In October 2005 Senator Conroy himself said it did not matter who owned Telstra.
"Thank God the National Party got the deal we did because under the Labor Party we would have got nothing.
"They promise today that they will deliver $4 billion. They also promised that they were not going to sell Telstra.
"They have more episodes than Blue Hills when it comes to key policy.
"They are a complete moving feast, totally unreliable in anything they say.
"They should go back to the Hansard and listen to the tirades that they delivered with all the feigned disgust and theatrical posturing when I believe they knew at the time it was all a complete and utter misrepresentation of their real agenda.
"That is the key issue here. You cannot trust their real agenda because they are not fair dinkum and probably have no clue what it is themselves.
"This is another chapter of the Labor 'I am terribly worried about the transport workers but I support the sale of Qantas', story.
"Labor says 'It is outrageous that you privatise Telstra, but we are going to do it anyway'.
'We believe in the responsible management of our major export coal, but we are going to give Peter Garrett the veto over stopping it.
'We are a fresh new start but we are the same garden from which grew Milton Orkopolus, Gordon Nuttall, Steven Chaytor and Brian Burke.
'We are great economic managers and the jewell in our crown is NSW which is about to go in to recession.'
"What a great entrée in to where we should be dealing with Labor in a very crucial part of how a country runs – policy."