{"id":571292,"date":"2026-03-29T03:49:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T03:49:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/571292\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T03:49:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T03:49:16","slug":"murray-watt-and-the-labor-governments-long-weekend-fuel-advice-unveiled-as-michaelia-cash-claims-labor-living-in-fantasy-land","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/571292\/","title":{"rendered":"Murray Watt and the Labor government’s long weekend fuel advice unveiled, as Michaelia Cash claims Labor living in ‘fantasy land’"},"content":{"rendered":"

The government has been accused of \u201cliving in fantasy land\u201d for telling Australians to “continue” with any long weekend travel plans amidst the ongoing fuel crisis.<\/p>\n

Australian petrol prices remain stubbornly high \u2013 more than 250c per litre in capital cities \u2013 as the tourism industry is down on bookings and expecting Covid-era returns over the Easter weekend.<\/p>\n

Environment and Water Minister Murray Watt told Sky News\u2019 Sunday Agenda the government wanted to see families \u201ccontinue with their holiday plans\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone\u2019s going to be in a different situation there,” he said.<\/p>\n

“But as a blanket rule, we don\u2019t want to see people deciding to cancel their holidays because of concerns that they may not be able to get fuel.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe tourism industry in Australia relies on the Easter period as one of its peak periods and if people have already got plans then\u00a0we\u2019d\u00a0encourage them to continue with that to the extent that their household budget allows them to do so.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Liberal Senator Michaelia Cash told Sky News Australia the answer had \u201creally surprised\u201d her.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201c(Mr) Watt was living in fantasy land by saying to Australians: ‘the government says take a holiday’,\u201d she said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u00a0can\u2019t\u00a0afford to, and even if they\u00a0could, they\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0know if the fuel is going to be there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

She said families had been broken down by persistent financial pressures even before the US-Israel, Iran war broke out at the end of February.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMum and dad Australians … for four years have been smashed by a cost-of-living crisis, (have) recently had an interest rate rise, (their) energy bills are out of control, (and) are now literally paying in excess of $3 a litre at the bowser and don\u2019t know if their servo is going to be open.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYou tell me, how do they\u00a0travel at\u00a0Easter?\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms Cash said in her own state of Western Australia, that a classic Easter weekend getaway was unlikely for many.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do Western Australians do at Easter? They take their kids off and down south to Bunbury, to Busselton, to Esperance, down\u00a0to Albany,\u201d she said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re\u00a0gone;\u00a0caravan parks will tell you that people have been phoning them now to cancel their holidays.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople are worried about the price … but more than that, they are now worried that they\u2019ll get halfway to their destination, they\u2019ll need to top up and despite the government saying supply is not an issue, they\u2019ll rock into a servo that says we\u2019re closed for business, as we are now seeing around Australia.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Data from the NSW\u00a0Tourism Association\u00a0suggested\u00a0about 92 per cent of regional tourism operators were experiencing a slump in bookings ahead of the period \u2013\u00a0Friday, April 3 to Monday, April 6.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Members of the organisation\u00a0largely blamed\u00a0the\u00a0declined\u00a0numbers\u00a0on fuel and travel costs, cost of\u00a0living,\u00a0and broader economic uncertainty.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Other small businesses told\u00a0The Australian<\/a>\u00a0the fuel crisis was like a \u201cCovid flashback\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"Albanese<\/p>\n

The Coalition has offered to work with the government to cut the fuel excise which\u00a0comprises\u00a052.6c per litre of fuel costs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The government will assess its options at a National Cabinet meeting with state and territory leaders on Monday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

PM Anthony Albanese also announced his government\u2019s intention to underwrite and deliver \u201cshiploads\u201d of fuel to Australia.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Amendments to the Export Finance and Insurance\u00a0Corporation\u00a0Act will\u00a0formalise\u00a0the Commonwealth\u2019s powers to underwrite\u00a0additional\u00a0cargoes.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe deal making expertise of Export Finance Australia will allow them to enter contracts of insurance or indemnity, give guarantees, make loans, or enter arrangements needed to help secure fuel supply from international markets,\u201d information from the Prime Minister\u2019s office read.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Fuel Security powers help to address (price rises and shortages) by giving suppliers confidence to secure additional and discretionary cargoes \u2013 which will be used to service uncontracted demand, including regional and independent fuel suppliers.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The government and state leaders will meet at a National Cabinet on Monday to discuss a coordinated response to the ongoing price rises.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The government has been accused of \u201cliving in fantasy land\u201d for telling Australians to “continue” with any long…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":571293,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,27305,5517,35431,3786,1788,4273,647,51904,13404,44,46,5520,12638,670,25962],"class_list":["post-571292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-coalition","tag-diesel","tag-fuel","tag-government","tag-labor","tag-liberal","tag-melbourne","tag-michaelia-cash","tag-murray-watt","tag-news","tag-perth","tag-petrol","tag-price","tag-sydney","tag-wa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571292\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/571293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}