Tony Smith (Casey, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

The honourable member opposite has motivated me to explain the history to him in great detail. It is fine for the government to seek to ignore the opposition members on that committee, but what is really revealing is they are ignoring their own members of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters and bringing in this legislation without allowing them to have a say on it. Why would they do that? They are fearful that the members on the committee might do what they did back in 1996—they might do the right thing.

We opposed this bill in a different form back in February. We are going to oppose it again. The history of this episode highlights utterly the hypocrisy of those opposite. This bill should not be before this House. We will oppose it. The measures in it should be considered as part of a wider review.

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