FED: Aust needs Labor to deal with future challenges =4

AAP General News (Australia)
04-27-2007
FED: Aust needs Labor to deal with future challenges =4

Mr Rudd raised a laugh among delegates when he accused Mr Howard of being much more
than just a climate change sceptic.

"Mr Howard is a climate change denier," he said.

"This is the modern equivalent of arguing that the earth is flat and that NASA faked
the moon landing and that Elvis is out there somewhere still flipping burgers in Florida.

"That's how in touch with reality Mr Howard is on this one."

Mr Rudd was unapologetic about Labor's plan to scrap the government's industrial relations laws.

"I will not be party to a government which proclaims to be the party of family values
when it has enacted a piece of legislation which is the most hostile to working families
of any piece of legislation enacted by any parliament in the commonwealth in its history,"

he said.

"That is why my commitment to this conference and this country is clear-cut. If we
are elected to form the next government of Australia we will remove, get rid of, Mr Howard's
unfair industrial relations laws once and for all," he promised, to a burst of applause.

"And we will do so without apology because working families across the length and breadth
of our country Australia are depending upon us to do it."

The Labor leader told the conference he was confident Australians were a sensible people.

"They don't expect us to produce miracles," he said.

"They have a keen sense of the possible.

"When Mr Howard says you have to choose between the economy and the environment, guess
what, the Australian people don't believe him."

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KEYWORD: LABOR RUDD 4 SYDNEY

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