Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Hansard source

If the member for Dunkley has a comment, he could seek the call. Perhaps he does not have a comment, so he will sit there quietly. Successive Speakers have been in great difficulty over these matters for time immemorial. The point is that one would hope that there could be an understanding from both sides of the chamber of the need to have a question time that is more of what the people observing the proceedings of the House think is relevant.

Whilst I have not used this ruling before in this parliament, it has been understood that both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition have been given longer lengths of rope than other members of the House. So this particular occasion probably was not the greatest example to bring into this debate about points of order. In that context and given that this is the question time after a budget, when people are perhaps a little testy, that is where we are really at.

With regard to other matters, it would be helpful if answers were shorter. It would be helpful if they were not interrupted as much with points of order that are fairly obvious but are not points of order that I can agree with and rule on. In relation to the way in which relevance has been conducted in this parliament for quite some time and answers, since the election, which I think have been consistent with previous rulings, there has been a slight improvement in the way in which questions have been couched, to make sure that they do not give us an opportunity to have debates when we should not be having debates during question time.

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