It is time to talk about bringing Qantas International into public ownership as part of any further assistance package, Leader of the Australian Greens Adam Bandt MP said today, urging the government to step in. Mr Bandt said the Greens supported calls for the extension of JobKeeper, but that government needed to do more.

"With one in five workers now gone at Qantas, tens of thousands of workers are now at risk of unemployment unless the government steps in to help," Leader of the Australian Greens Adam Bandt MP said today.

The Greens are calling on the Government to make sure that the security of the workforce of the major airlines is prioritised in the bailout, and to give taxpayers an equity stake in the airlines.

Quotes attributable to Greens transport spokesperson Senator Janet Rice:

“These two major airlines have spent a fortune on share buy-backs to prop up shareholder value. They have paid out exorbitant CEO salaries and both companies have successfully minimised their tax over many years.”

I rise to speak to the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2019. The bill amends the Customs Act 1901 to expressly ban the importation of polyethylene aluminium composite panels, which are a type of flammable cladding. I support the comments by Senator Patrick and Senator Pratt with regards to banning this type of cladding.

Today's weak economic figures reveal an economy that is spluttering and directionless under a Coalition Government whose plans are nothing more than the same old discredited trickle-down nonsense. That's why the Greens are calling today for the Government to adopt a Green Stimulus package, said Leader of the Australian Greens Dr Richard Di Natale.

"The growth figures released today prove what has been clear to so many of us for so long: this Government's lame old trickle-down approach to the economy is a flop and they have no plan to fix it," Di Natale said.

The Australian Greens have pledged $1 billion in funding to ensure that bike riders have the freedom to ride safely for every journey. The Greens package would create a comprehensive network of bicycle routes across our cities and regional areas.

“Every bike rider death on Australian roads is a preventable tragedy and almost all are a failure of our infrastructure” said Senator Janet Rice, Australian Greens transport spokesperson.

Bill Shorten has today confirmed that Labor’s 50% by 2030 electric vehicle target isn’t an election promise, and that it “doesn’t mean that [it] will happen.”

“The Greens are extremely disappointed that Bill Shorten and Labor have caved in to the scare campaign from the climate deniers on the hard right on their electric vehicle policy,” said Senator Janet Rice, Australian Greens transport spokesperson.

More than 24,000 full-time jobs a year would be created in Western Australia under the Greens plan to rapidly transform Australia’s energy system to renewables by 2030.

Greens Leader, Senator Richard Di Natale said:

"Coal is the world’s biggest cause of climate change and Australia is the world’s biggest exporter of coal with 80 per cent of what we dig up being sent overseas to be burned. Unless we phase out coal, we can’t deal with climate change.