Fed: Rudd 'deeply sorry' for home insulation deaths

AAP General News (Australia)
04-27-2010
Fed: Rudd 'deeply sorry' for home insulation deaths

SYDNEY, April 27 AAP - Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says he is deeply sorry about the
deaths of installers working on the federal government's home insulation program.

"Any family who has lost a member of its family through accidents of this nature, any
human being must feel regret and sorrow for what's occurred," he said.

Mr Rudd's comments come after he was accused on Tuesday of being a "creep" for not
apologising to the parents of a man who died.

The prime minister earlier met with Brisbane couple Kevin and Christine Fuller, whose
26-year-old son Matthew was the first installer to die while working on a job performed
under the scheme.

The Fullers told Monday's ABC Four Corners program that Mr Rudd had not offered them
any sympathy for their loss.

Speaking in Sydney on Tuesday, Mr Rudd apologised on behalf of the government.

"Certainly, when it comes to the Fuller family, I am deeply sorry for what has occurred,"

he told reporters.

"The government and ministers and myself are deeply sorry for the loss of life that
has occurred, and that goes to the loss in the Fuller family and the other families as
well.

"Nothing, no action actually brings those loved ones back."

Opposition environment spokesman Greg Hunt on Tuesday said it was disgraceful, weak
and hollow that Mr Rudd did not express sorrow to the Fullers.

"I have said the prime minister of Australia is a creep ... because he was with people
who had suffered a tragedy. That tragedy was intimately associated with a program which
was designed and botched by the government and the prime minister, and he couldn't look
them in the eyes," he told ABC television.

AAP bzs/klm/jl

KEYWORD: INSULATION RUDD

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