What do a triple chocolate cheesecake, a skim chai latte, a (humble) pie and the steel industry have in common?
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Nothing. Unless you’re two Illawarra politicians involved in a verbal food fight over Labor’s steel pledge.
Shellharbour Labor MP Anna Watson took aim first, saying the region’s parliamentary secretary, Liberal MP Gareth Ward, should eat “humble pie” after last year criticising her for going “out on her own” to push for a 90 per cent steel-use mandate.
Ms Watson wasn’t at Monday’s announcement due to a medical appointment but said she was “delighted my calls … [are] now the centrepiece of NSW Labor policy”.
Mr Ward hit back, saying not everything required by government was produced in Australia, meaning the 90 per cent target was “actually a fallacy”.
“It’s like having a triple-choc cheesecake and thinking you can dissolve it all by washing it down with a skim chai latte – it just doesn’t work,” he said.
“They can talk about 90 per cent in government infrastructure projects but 90 per cent of nothing is nothing.”
Mr Ward reiterated the Gerringong Princes Highway upgrade and the Berry bypass both used “a majority of Australian steel” and the NSW government was the largest purchaser of Australian steel in the country.
“The last project Labor did before it left office was the western grandstand [at WIN Stadium], which was chock-a-block full of overseas steel,” he said.
“This is just [Labor Illawarra spokesman’s] Ryan Park’s way of cosying up to the union movement … this is not about the future of steel manufacturing.
“What we’re doing is working with the Australian Steel Institute to develop standards so that we actually have a focus on quality as well as price and we use quality Australian products in infrastructure.”
Mr Park dismissed the suggestion he was snuggling up with the unions.
“Gareth Ward is ashamed that he has again failed the Illawarra region he is meant to be representing,” he said.
“Instead of squealing about our positive plan perhaps he should try and get his mate Mike [Premier Mike Baird] to deliver something with a bit of substance.
“He needs to come back from Parliament this week with some kind of action”.