Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Hansard source

Maybe, Mr Speaker, you should comprehend that the nature of a dissent motion is that, if it is carried, you lose your job. This goes to the heart of whether this parliament has confidence in you. But what we have seen over the last couple of days is an orchestrated attempt by a government that is out of touch and out of time and does not want to debate the issues so engages in disruptive behaviour. We saw it in response to the Leader of the Opposition’s first question yesterday, where we had an orchestrated attack from those opposite. We had the Prime Minister and the pretender without courage—Chicken Man—yesterday and the day before giving the finger to the Leader of the Opposition and to those opposite as if that were acceptable. That is the sort of behaviour that we have to put up with time after time.

When we raise points of order, what we get is reminiscent of The Castle—Denis Denuto being asked, ‘Why are rulings being made in the High Court?’ You sit there and you say, ‘It’s the vibe.’ We never get to an actual point of order or to any substance. What we simply get is: ‘That’s the majority, and it’s right. This is the minority and you’re wrong.’ It simply is not good enough. We know that it is sporting finals time, and everyone who follows sport knows that the home team usually gets a bit of an advantage from the umpire, but the figures this year show that 52 Labor members have been ejected and only two—one of which was yesterday—from the coalition. That is a penalty count of 52 to two. But, to be fair, that is consistent because you have excluded more members of parliament than any Speaker before you since Federation. You have excluded 175 Labor members from the House and only five members from the coalition. That shows, Mr Speaker, just how unreasonable the rulings have been.

You ruled question No. 1 today out of order, that the Special Minister of State did not have to answer it, even though standing order 98(c)(ii) makes it very clear that a minister is responsible for answering questions about administration. He is the Special Minister of State. He employs not just all his staff but every staff member in the parliament. He is responsible for it. But you, when there is a difficult question, say that it is optional whether ministers answer them.

Let me tell you that Mr Phelps has put out a press release and in it says, ‘Dr Phelps is the chief of staff to the Special Minister of State but was attending the meeting in a private capacity.’ The only problem is that the media contact, Dr Peter Phelps, uses 0419261416, the phone number paid for by the taxpayer. He is sitting in the office there. He did radio interviews this morning but you ruled that it was somehow optional whether he be accountable to this parliament or not. It is simply the case that those of us on this side of the House do not expect to get an advantage. But we do expect, when there is a clear parallel less than 24 hours apart—such as the Prime Minister’s statement and the statements from the member for Melbourne and the member for Gorton—that you will make a consistent ruling and treat people the same.

We are all accountable to our electorates, and you are accountable to this parliament. Whenever we raise difficult questions to you, you never refer to standing orders; it is just, ‘No, no, the government’s right.’ I have to say that you have a hard job, because the Leader of the House is probably the worst offender in the parliament when it comes to breaching standing orders. Not once has he ever got to that microphone at the dispatch box and referred to standing orders or House of Representatives Practice. That is because the members of the government do not care. Their arrogance is out of control. It is arrogance because they got a Newspoll result that was the same as the Newspoll two polls ago. How arrogant are they going to be if they are re-elected at the election later this year?

That is what we are seeing from this government. It is an arrogant government, out of touch, out of control and out of time. But they do not want to call an election because when you call an election you cannot abuse standing orders in this House, you cannot abuse the advertising budget and get the taxpayers to pay for all your party political advertising. This is a government out of control, and you have a responsibility, Mr Speaker, to be fair dinkum and make consistent rulings so that they are brought back into line. You have failed to do that, Mr Speaker. That is why we are dissenting from your ruling and that is why this dissent motion should be carried, and everyone in parliament knows it should be carried. (Time expired)

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