Ms TRISH DOYLE (Blue Mountains) (17:14): What an absolutely pathetic, sorry and miserable excuse for a transport Minister we now have in New South Wales. Members will recall that I have been on a public transport crusade for the seven years I have been in this Parliament, and for most of that time the target of my anger was Andrew Constance. I have described former Minister Constance as incompetent and hopeless many times, but his record of failure and mismanagement pales in comparison to the blundering oaf from Baulkham Hills who now occupies the role. This is a government that bought trains that did not fit the tracks in the Blue Mountains. Those trains are now three years overdue because the tracks, tunnels, platforms and signalling equipment are still being rectified to make those fat trains fit. I gave Andrew Constance a hard time. But, truthfully, many of the mistakes were actually owned by Gladys Berejiklian, so I take this opportunity to correct the public record.

In the way of these things, the history books will say that she was a hardworking, competent administrator who was let down by an error of judgment in her personal life. The truth is she was actually incompetent as well. She was the transport Minister who originally signed off on the intercity trains order for an off‑the‑shelf design from overseas that doomed the intercity fleet to failure. She was the Treasurer who led a cost‑cutting agenda that prioritised cheapness over quality. That is why our ferries are junk and our trams are falling apart. That is why our trains do not fit the tracks. So Andrew and Gladys laid the groundwork with many, many years of incompetence, mismanagement and ideological stupidity that put us in a terrible position to start with. That is why I would have thought our new Premier would take the opportunity for a fresh start and put someone good in there to quietly clean up their mess. Instead, he gave a massive, vitally important portfolio to a man who has an even poorer track record than his two predecessors.

As Minister for Emergency Services, he deserted our firefighters amidst the Black Summer bushfires and went on holidays—just like the Prime Minister did. He was the Minister for Corrections who illegally fired a prohibited weapon. He was the police Minister who impersonated a cop and abused a child. As the member for Baulkham Hills, he has boasted about driving around his electorate at night bullying local kids in the park. Time and time again this boofhead has been found guilty of misbehaviour and incompetence. It is staggering how often he is forgiven in the Liberal party room by the cowards sitting opposite. Now he has used the city's mass transit system and the livelihoods of millions of Sydneysiders and beyond as a battering ram in a low‑level industrial dispute with some of New South Wales' most hardworking and devoted public servants—our transport workers.

Those people have turned up and done the work of keeping Sydney moving during COVID. They deserve a pay rise. They deserve job security. They deserve to be safe at work. They deserve to be treated with dignity and respect by their employer. I stand with the Rail, Tram and Bus Union [RTBU] and all railway and transport workers, including those represented by other unions such as the mighty Australian Services Union and the Electrical Trades Union. I stand with RTBU NSW Secretary Alex Claassens and I respect his expertise. Clearly, Alex Claassens is the only person at the negotiating table with any concept of how to run an efficient, safe and reliable public railway.

The Minister, on the other hand, is an inept, hopeless and reckless buffoon. He is a liability, not just to this Government but to the people of New South Wales. He probably should not be in this Parliament, but at the very least he has no business in the Premier's Cabinet. It is not just that he does not deserve to be paid the salary of that office, it is that every day he remains in the position he puts the reliability and safety of our public transport system at risk. Gladys Berejiklian did not have the guts to sack this imbecile when she had the chance, but now Dominic Perrottet must.