Mr SHORTEN (Maribyrnong—Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services and Superannuation) (14:22): I thank the member for Hindmarsh for asking a question that is of interest to literally over 100,000 Australians and people from other countries who are travelling on Qantas, both in Australia and overseas, and who were caught up in this issue. It is an issue that affected employees—they have been trapped in hotels overseas and cannot get back to their families because of this action. It is an issue that is important to the insurance industry, which I will return to in more detail in a moment. What rights travellers have in this—an issue conspicuously absent from the coalition's questions; it took a government member to ask this question—are influenced heavily by the turn of events from Saturday afternoon. The rights of travellers are influenced heavily by the disproportionate and precipitant action of Qantas. They are the people who grounded the planes and now make it a live issue about the insurance rights of people. Why is it we never hear the opposition criticise Qantas? Why is it that they only ever criticise one side of the debate? They have been deafeningly silent on what they think about Qantas. Opposition members interjecting— Mr SHORTEN: As much as they may shout my answer down, we know that their industrial relations policy is dial a friend: ring Qantas and find out what to do. Of course the reason why travellers in this country need information about their insurance is that Qantas could not manage their employee relations and so in turn chose to damage the economy. An otherwise smart company full of professionals could not do the day job which they are paid to do, which is to encourage their employees on a process of change. Because Qantas could not do their day job properly, travellers now need to find out what their rights are. I have spoken with the Insurance Council of Australia. Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER: It is very tempting but it would be time consuming. I warned the member for Higgins. She will leave the chamber for one hour under standing order 94(a), only because I just cannot wait around for a division. When I warn people I expect there to be a reaction. The member for Higgins then left the chamber. Mr SHORTEN: I have spoken with the Insurance Council of Australia. First of all, they say that travellers inconvenienced should check with Qantas first to see what Qantas will say to them. They tell me that industrial action is normally a predictable event, so sometimes insurance companies will not pay the cost of a lost ticket. The emphasis there is on 'normally a predictable event'. The insurance industry has said that this shutdown was unpredictable. Because of that, insurers, I have been told, not universally— Opposition members interjecting— Mr SHORTEN: If the opposition don't think it was unpredictable, they need to explain their actions. The SPEAKER: Order! The minister will ignore the interjections and the interjectors will cease interjecting. Mr SHORTEN: The insurers have said that, whilst there cannot be a blanket commitment, they will look sympathetically to claims. They do say they will assess whether or not passengers were able to mitigate their loss and if they were able to get a flight quickly what losses they incurred. Because this is an unpredictable element they are going to be more sympathetic to claims than has traditionally perhaps been the case on other occasions. Of course, this comes down to the question of unpredictability. This event was certainly unpredictable to the flying public. It was certainly unpredictable to the tourism industry. It was certainly unpredictable to the mining industry. It was certainly not notified to the government until Saturday afternoon. But of course that does beg the question: who did know? I sat through the 12 hours of hearings in the commission last Sunday and Monday morning. I did not run into any Liberals in the lift queue trying to sort the matter out. I do know that Qantas said that easily from 20 October this was on the cards. Of course, there is one other set of actors who can explain whether it was unpredictable. We all know where I am going here, don't we? What did the opposition know? Did you know? Were you informed at any stage? Did some of your former staff members tell you what was going on? Shame! (Time expired) Opposition members interjecting— The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Wright has been well behaved since coming closer to the chair, but the fact that he is now out of his new chair makes his behaviour grossly disorderly. He should behave much better.