Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Hansard source

How ironic it is that the Labor Party now have not yet realised that they are in government. They are moving motions in this chamber to suspend standing orders. I have no recollection in 11 years of the Howard government that the government ever lost control of the chamber in the way that the Labor government have lost control of the chamber today, let alone their having moved a motion like that one—there is no precedent for it. We are going back into the Hawke years as we stand, trying to find a precedent. This just illustrates that these people are more interested in stunts, more interested in the charade of government, than in making hard decisions. How ironic it is that they had to move 34 amendments to their own Work Choices bill. I bet the old Greg Combet would be turning in his old union grave if he knew they would have to—

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