Barnaby Joyce has slammed Tanya Plibersek for constantly smiling throughout a heated breakfast television debate about Australia’s cost-of-living crisis.
The former Nationals leader was trying to explain how a Coalition government would stabilise the economy when the Labor frontbencher butted in and accused him of not actually having a plan to combat the crisis during an appearance together on Sunrise.
An exasperated Mr Joyce tried to make his point despite repeated interruptions by the smiling Ms Plibersek.
‘[Labor] is just pouring [immigrants] into Australia, this is how they think they’re going to solve the problem, just pouring people in,’ Mr Joyce claimed.
‘He’s got no plan,’ Ms Plibersek said in response.
‘I’m giving you an answer… Do you think you’ve done a good job just pouring people in so [others] can’t get a house,’ Mr Joyce replied.
‘Why are you smiling? It’s not funny at all,’ he said when he noticed the environment minister grinning. She kept smiling.
Ms Plibersek said the government is ‘laser-focused’ on bringing living costs down after a recent Resolve Political Monitor poll showed that 51 per cent of the voters think that it’s the federal government’s job to do so.
Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce slammed government frontbencher Tanya Plibersek for smiling throughout their discussion about the cost-of-living crisis during their appearance on Sunrise
Host Natalie Barr repeatedly tried to get the conversation back on topic as the two political guests continually talked over each other
Host Natalie Barr repeatedly tried to get the conversation back on topic as the two political guests continually talked over each other.
Ms Plibersek argued that Labor already bought inflation down from six per cent to three per cent.
She accused the previous coalition government of causing the crisis and insisted that Mr Albanese’s government had ‘inherited inflation’.
Ms Plibersek said the government works ‘every day to make sure people understand that we’re about helping with the cost of living’.
She said the opposition did not have a plan just months out from the next federal election.
Mr Joyce rejected Ms Plibersek’s claims and accused the government of only caring about ‘issues such as what goes into the census’.
He said the opposition’s plan was to ‘keep our baseload power going’.
‘One of the fundamental feedstocks that keeps inflation down is having affordable energy. Affordable power. It goes into … everything else you do,’ he said.
‘Why are you smiling? It’s not funny at all,’ Mr Joyce asked Ms Plibersek when he noticed the environment minister grinning during his remarks
Mr Joyce also said the Coalition would focus on infrastructure, targeting regional roads and dams as two areas he claimed the government had overlooked.
Ms Plibersek said the opposition did nothing to stop 24 coal-fired power stations from closing but Mr Joyce fired back that the plants ‘closed under you, Tanya’.
The discussion turned to immigration when he accused the government a mass importation of migrants which had led to a rental crisis.
The race to hold government at the next election has been tightening up in recent months with Mr Albanese barely edging out Opposition Leader Peter Dutton as preferred prime minister 35-34 in the latest Resolve poll.
Mr Albanese’s government maintained its lead against the Coalition 51-49 in two-party preferred terms among 1,614 voters surveyed.
On economic management, however, Mr Dutton is leading by a sizeable margin with 37 per cent of Australians thinking he could do a better job than Mr Albanese on 26 per cent support.