Jimmy Barnes’ brilliant take down on Q&A
Appearing on Monday night’s Q&A, Jimmy Barnes has held politicians accountable for their questionable claims, all while entertaining audience members.
Barnes was sat next to Nicolle Flint, the member for Boothby with the pair both battling it out in front of the remaining panel members.
The conversation first started when the South Australian MP and Adelaide-local Barnes discussed renewable energy.
South Australia is considered to be a world leader in Australian integration of renewables.
Flint also touched on the Paris Agreement which looks at lowering carbon emissions and discussed how the government is taking part in the program.
“As the prime minister and the (Energy and Emissions Reduction Minister Angus Taylor) often say as well, we’re technology agnostic,” she said.
“When people come to us with proposals, we’re going to have a look at them. The critical thing is that we have reliability and affordability. So, reliability in the system, so we do not ever have the situation that we had in South Australia.”
Flint was referring to the 2016 blackout when almost all of South Australia had lost its electricity supply.
“(It was) one of the scariest experiences of my life, getting home and making sure my staff got home and family got home safely that day … it was a miracle nobody was killed … this is the impact of losing the reliability of your power supply. There are real human risks and human costs,” she said.
But that’s when Barnes interjected, telling the MP that climate change was responsible for those incidents, leaving the Member for Boothby looking defeated.
“Wasn’t there also, like, the fact that this was caused by extreme weather?”
“Exactly,” said Labor MP Joel Fitzgibbon as he laughed in amusement.
It didn’t take long for the entire audience to cheer in agreement as Barnes continued his argument.
“Has that come into consideration here? What are you talking about? I don’t understand this argument at all,” he said.
“Jimmy to be fair, we have extreme weather around Australia. We have cyclones, all sorts of …” Flint retaliated back.
“Yeah and it’s getting worse,” said Barnes.
“You’ve gotta work it out mate, when it isn’t the weather’s fault, it’s the Labor Party’s fault – always,” Fitzgibbon said to Barnes.
The audience erupted into applause, with Q&A host Tony Jones having to interrupt to help pull the reigns on the show.
“Jimmy, you’re turning this into like a great sort of dinner party,” said Jones.
“It’s like me saying, ‘I am just going to make one or two singles because I will do what I have to do to meet my requirements’. You do the best job you can. That’s what you’ve gotta do,” responded Barnes.
“Alright I have to impose a certain amount of order because we’ve gotta hear some more questions,” said Jones before moving on with the show.