Senator STERLE (Western Australia) (15:03): I move: That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by Opposition senators today. That the Senate take note of the answers given by ministers to questions without notice asked by opposition senators today. Before I start, I want to touch on one part of today's question time, when Minister Scullion was asked questions by Senator Canavan about the beef industry. I think it should be noted that, I think, about $100 million or $120 million is going into beef roads for upgrades. That is very, very important—I admit that—but I find it the height of hypocrisy for it to be coming from the government, because not long ago the hardworking Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport References Committee ably supported me as the chair and my good mate Senator Bullock as an ongoing— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Sterle, the motion before— Senator STERLE: I am going to get there, Mr Deputy President, but I have to clarify some misleading from the government. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: That is not actually the question before the chair, so, as cooperative as I am, please come back to the question before us. Senator STERLE: Okay, let's talk about some of the measures in the budget—and I did refer to $100 million in the budget to beef roads. If you listened to that mob over there, you would think that they gave a damn about the beef industry. With the greatest of respect, the red meat industry would love to have some answers from the minister. Minister Joyce has gone missing in action, through you, Mr Deputy President. If he did give a fat rat's backside about the industry, he would at least have the decency to come back and address their concerns. They have asked for a lousy $4 million of assistance to keep this great industry afloat and they want to talk about best returns to the farm gate. Senator Canavan knows where I am coming from. Senator Canavan has absolutely no doubt where I am coming from. If they did care about the beef industry, which is worth $8.6 billion, they would talk about the real issues of how the industry have put forward a proposal to save themselves, with not a mention of it in the budget. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Sterle, I do need to bring you back to the motion before the chair. Senator STERLE: There is not a mention in the budget about that. Mr Deputy President, regarding the budget, what a calamitous issue we have here. It was only 18 months ago when we had Mr Abbott and Mr Hockey, ably backed up by all the now government senators and members, telling us about some fiscal crisis we had and how they were the only ones who could fix it. They said they would fix this budget emergency not only by toughening up on, in their terms, too much spending or wastage but by making absolutely no cuts anywhere. We even had Minister Cormann, when asked a question by Senator Wong today about how many new taxes there would be, blatantly sit there and say, 'Absolutely none.' I cannot believe that the Australian people think that that mob over there can be believed. How do they think that they can fool the Australian public for another year? With their big, tough talk and all the action and what they were going to do, we do not have a fiscal crisis; we have a spending crisis. We have a crisis from that mob over there, who have absolutely no idea. They went to the election and the now Prime Minister, Mr Abbott, clearly stated there would be no cuts to certain areas. He clearly stated on more than one occasion—through every media outlet he could get his face on—that there would be no cuts to spending, no cuts to education, no cuts to the ABC and no cuts to pensions. What a disaster. We are at budget No. 2 for Mr Hockey. The commentators are clearly saying this is not a budget about what is in the best interests of the nation, this is not a budget about what is in the best interests of the Australian people or the future for Australia's kids, this is about two people. I will quote from some media sources who I would not call raving-mad lefties. One is none other than Mr van Onselen. I do respect and enjoy listening to Mr van Onselen, but he is not one of my mob. He is not a leftie, I can tell you. When I say 'leftie' I mean left of centre. In today's The Australian, on page 13—and this is friendly fire—he said: 'Hockey is delusional that reform is underway; however, I saw him utter the following words last night ….' He quotes Mr Hockey: … the economic plan laid down by this government more than a year ago, is in place and it is helping us to deal with these challenges. Mr Van Onselen goes on to say: 'How? By osmosis? That plan included the shelved Medicare co-payment, dumped changes to pension indexation, a higher-education package twice blocked by the Senate and family tax benefit cutbacks yet to be passed.' He went on to say: 'An economic plan already in place? He must be joking.' This is not Labor people saying this, these are right-wing media people. He goes on to say—and I agree with every single word—'No wonder Costello thinks they have become a morbid joke.' He is talking about the opposition. The sad part is that there are two jobs on the line: Mr Abbott's, the Prime Minister, and Mr Hockey's, the Treasurer. How long will they last? God help us, but hopefully we will find out sooner rather than later.