Today’s pre-parliament stadium stunt from the coalition of the unwilling smacks of hypocrisy and desperation.

Three of the members have confidence and supply agreements with the Government. Ringleader Kristie Johnston famously traded off her support of the Liberals for a carpark.

The best way they could make a stand against Jeremy Rockliff’s stadium would be to stop propping up his government, but instead they have chosen to throw stones via the media.

Labor has been clear. We support Tasmania’s AFL teams. We support a stadium. We want to see it built and for that to happen it needs to pass through parliament.

Since the election, Tasmanian Labor uncovered the biggest infrastructure stuff up in Tasmanian history, the ferries fiasco.  An extraordinary debacle which will cost Tasmanian taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.  It resulted in the forced resignation in the Deputy Premier of Tasmania.  The Independents refused to even support an inquiry into it.

We have relentlessly pursued the budget crisis and only yesterday, successfully destroyed the Premier’s privatisation plan, with a successful motion through the House.

We will continue to hold the Government to account for its delivery of the Premier’s stadium, because we want it done properly, not stopped.

And no amount of hypocritical posturing from the coalition of the unwilling will change that.

Anita Dow MP
Deputy Labor Leader