💧DUKE Clyde (HANSARD)CFW9 (Biden-Harris ELECT)💧 · @nobby15
10th Apr 2017 from TwitLonger
RACHEL BAXENDALE - Tony Abbott responds to swing against NSW Libs
Tony Abbott has responded to huge swings against the Liberal Party in the weekend’s NSW by-elections by reiterating his call to defund renewable energy and reform the federal Senate.
The Berejiklian government recorded a swing against it of 24 per cent in the Sydney seat of Manly which has been vacated by former premier Mike Baird and forms part of Mr Abbott’s federal seat of Warringah.
In the nearby seat of North Shore and the Central Coast seat of Gosford, there were swings to Labor of 15.5 per cent and 12.2 per cent respectively.
The former PM said the Liberal Party had to give the public something to hope for and give people in the Liberal heartland “something to fight for”.
He said the federal government should prioritise affordable power prices.
“The best thing we can do there is stop subsidising these windmills because they’re making power less reliable and less affordable,” Mr Abbott told 2GB’s Alan Jones.
“The other thing we can do is fight for senate reform because good government is becoming almost impossible in this country, Alan.
“You can never get a populist crossbench to vote for less spending, less regulation and less tax on the most productive people in our society.”
Mr Abbott reiterated his support for a proposal first put forward by John Howard in 2003, which would amend Section 57 of the Constitution so that if the Senate rejected legislation twice three months apart, a joint sitting of both houses could be held without need for a double dissolution election.
“Now this would turn the Senate from a house of rejection into a genuine house of review,” Mr Abbot said.
“If you went to the next election saying to the people there’s going to be a referendum as part of this election, and Australian people, what do you want — Do you want government, or do you want gridlock? -- That would be a very clear choice and it would give the people of Australia a chance to grasp a better future and this is what we want.”
“I think we feel at the moment that as a nation we’re letting ourselves down. We’re not being as good as we can be. Our problems are on top of us rather than us getting on top of our problems, and this is a chance to get on top of the problems by giving good government a chance to get on with the job.”