Moncrieff Media

Peter Garrett fiddles while homes burn

26 February 2010

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has once again defended and commended his bumbling lieutenant Peter Garrett while Gold Coast insulation businesses continue to go to the wall as a result of Rudd Government ineptitude, says local MP Steven Ciobo.

Mr Ciobo asked Mr Rudd in Parliament today about the plight of the workers and owners of Allpro Insulation of Molendinar, and why they should lose their jobs while the calamitous Minister Garrett gets to keep his.

“Minister Garrett presides over what can only be described as a debacle, spins and weasels his way out of the mess and keeps his job, while the workers he claims to be supporting are let go,” Mr Ciobo said.

“Allpro is just one of the many good Gold Coast companies with a fine reputation paying the price for Minister Garrett’s hurried and ham-fisted scheme which has done untold damage to the industry as a whole.”

“The Rudd Government took a good industry and put a celebrity in to run a $2.5 billion program which quickly became a licence to print money for shonks and fly-by-nighters who have now ruined it for the good guys.

“On top of that we’ve now got up to 240,000 dodgy installations, we’ve had 93 house fires, up to 1000 potentially deadly roofs and tragically young workers have died in connection with this program.

“If the Rudd Government had taken a breath and instituted this scheme properly with proper quality and safety guidelines, none of this may have happened.

“And yet unbelievably the Minister in charge still has a job.”