Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

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I seek leave to move:

That the House has no confidence in the Special Minister of State and Minister for Defence Materiel and Science.

Leave not granted.

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the member for Maribyrnong from moving the following motion forthwith:

That the House has no confidence in the Special Minister of State and Minister for Defence Material and Science.

If the Prime Minister will not act, the parliament must. We heard an answer from the Prime Minister, who loftily dismissed these issues and said that nothing has changed in the last two years or since this issue was first raised. Oh, yes it has, Prime Minister. In the last two weeks, we have seen the Special Minister of State mislead the parliament. We did not ask the Special Minister of State to go on 60 Minutes and make the statements that he did to Liz Hayes, the journalist, on 60 Minutes. We did not ask that. That was entirely a conscious decision by the Special Minister of State. We did not ask this current Special Minister of State to come into this House and to propose—

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