Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

I second the motion, Mr Speaker. I stand here with the coalition to defend the principles of parliamentary democracy. I stand here with the coalition to defend the sovereignty of this parliament. This parliament is a more powerful institution than this arrogant Prime Minister and this parliament will not be ignored by this arrogant Prime Minister. This parliament is an institution that is fundamental to our stability. It is fundamental to our prosperity. It cannot be ignored even by this arrogant Prime Minister.

I had thought I had seen it all from this government. I thought I had seen the depths which it was prepared to plumb. Yet it has proven me wrong: it can go lower. Not only does it trash its election promises, not only is it prepared to walk away from every philosophical base it has ever aspired to and not only is it prepared to abandon its convictions and abandon the people that voted for it; it is prepared to defy the will of this parliament as expressed by both houses of this parliament today. This is the height of arrogance and the height of disrespect to the Australian people. The Australian people elected 150 members to this House and they elected 76 senators to the other place, and a majority of those members and a majority of those senators decided today that this government's so-called Malaysian solution should be condemned, that this government should listen to the representatives elected by the Australian people and withdraw its inhumane, ill-conceived, illogical and fundamentally flawed Malaysian solution and find a better way. Yet this government has ignored it. This is the type of behaviour we see in Third World dictatorships. This is the kind of behaviour, overriding the majority of both houses of parliament, overriding the will of the parliament, overriding the views of the majority of the elected members to this place.

The character of the Prime Minister is now on full display to the Australian people. It is not an edifying sight. The arrogance and contempt for the democratic process of this nation are now on full display. Australia deserves better. Australia deserves much better than this Prime Minister, who must be censured for defying the will of the Australian people through this parliament. The nation deserves better than an arrogant Prime Minister who is willing to defy the will of the parliament in the same way that she defies the will of the Australian people. Let me take the House back to early 2010 when this Prime Minister told the Australian public that she would not challenge her leader for the leadership. She promised to be a loyal deputy, but did the member for Griffith find out she could not be trusted! She betrayed the member for Griffith, she betrayed her leader. And now she has betrayed the Australian people by her broken promise over the carbon tax. The Australian people remember how this arrogant Prime Minister looked down the barrel of a camera and said, 'There will be no carbon tax under a government I lead.' Yet she broke that promise and has now sought to introduce a carbon tax having promised not to.

There is nothing this Prime Minister can say that the Australian people can trust anymore. How can the Australian people trust the Prime Minister to operate this country in a democratic way, to put in place the state of the nation along democratic lines, when she is prepared to arrogantly toss aside a motion that has been passed by both houses of this parliament? How can the Australian people trust anything she says anymore? She has shown such arrogance for other nations in our region, the way she treated East Timor over the East Timor processing centre, the way she has treated Malaysia over this Malaysia solution, the way she has treated Papua New Guinea, ignoring the sovereign status of those countries. Now she is doing it to our own nation. This Prime Minister, the leader of this country, is now defying the sovereignty of this parliament and she must be censured for it. What is even more extraordinary is that this Prime Minister is not even in this chamber to answer this call. She is not even here to answer this motion. What arrogance, what contempt! This Prime Minister must be censured and she must be brought back to the House to answer to this House.

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