Senator Eric Abetz

Labor today acknowledged that a Department with no experience in program design or program delivery or program risk management has been put in charge of the Pink Batt debacle.

Labor’s Senator Wong refused to deny the truth of comments made by Martin Parkinson the head of the new Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency.

Senator Wong was unable to give any reason why the new Department was better suited to handle the Pink Batt debacle. It was reminiscent of shuffling the chairs on the Titanic.

It seems the idea was to look as though action was being taken but the debacle has been moved to a Department even less qualified, hard as it is to believe.

Senator Wong has said the new Department will “build on the existing capability” which the Department admits is non-existent.

Martin Parkinson told a staff meeting last Friday “It’s not like DCC has any expertise in this area. DCC is not a program manager…one of the ironies is that DCC is even more of a policy department…I know that there is a natural degree of trepidation. I won’t hide from the fact that when I found out what was going on it was like, oh my God…I know nothing about program design, about program delivery, about program risk management.”

It is clear the Government has no idea what its doing other than to window dress – another example of all talk and spin and no actual remedial action.