“Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce’s claims on radio this morning regarding the Secretary of the ACTU Sally McManus are a fabrication.
The attack reveals a desperate man, in a chaotic government, forced to make things up and blame other people for his own failure to address the challenges facing regional Australia.
The number one issue in regional Australia is jobs.
The National Party have sat on its hands while entry level jobs for young people have been taken by temporary visa holders, issued by their government.
Deputy Prime Minister Joyce has championed the live beef export industry, which has cost Australian workers jobs processing meat.
The Government has replaced real jobs with $4 per hour wages, cut penalty rates, forced people into compulsory work for the dole programs, and cut taxes for big business. These policies take money out of regional communities and put it in the pockets of big businesses, headquartered in Melbourne and Sydney, and their offshore shareholders.
Mr Joyce has supported privatisation and stood for the interests of big power companies who are making eye-watering profits off the back of regional Australians who are paying inflated power bills.
At the last election, Mr Joyce proudly turned the sod and heralded the benefits of a new wind farm in his electorate, which created local jobs. This morning, he was denying other communities the opportunity, backing comments that attack renewable energy.
It is desperate stuff from a man desperate to distract from his own failures.
It’s no wonder that wages are at record low, big business’ profits are booming, and regional communities are finding it hard to get a secure job or a pay rise, when people like Mr Joyce continue to advocate the interests of big power companies and multinational business at the expense of his constituents.
Unions are fighting for jobs and jobs security for Australian workers every day, too bad Barnaby Joyce doesn’t do the same.”
ENDS